ROD PENNER
17 October - 23 November 2013
Selected Works
Press Release
I’m interested in the look of things and the quality of being there, a moment that is completely frozen with all the variety of textures; rust on poles, crumbling asphalt, light hitting the grass. The finished paintings should evoke contrasting responses of melancholy and warmth, desolation and serenity…”
Rod Penner
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – AMERINGER | McENERY | YOHE is pleased to announce an exhibition of recent paintings by Rod Penner. The exhibition will open 17 October and will remain on view through 23 November 2013. A public reception for the artist will be held on 17 October from 6:00 to 8:00 PM.
Rod Penner exquisitely renders the Texas Hill Country and surrounding Southwest in painstaking detail. Meticulously painting one small section at a time, he slowly develops each blade of grass and layer of bark.
Landscapes may be sparse, with a discarded soda can on the ground or paint chipping off the side of a building, but Penner paints objectively, portraying each locale as he finds it while managing to convey the sense of somber isolation and despondent fatigue that quietly resonate through the works.
The paintings are based in on-site observation, photographs, and digital video stills, with each painting’s title denoting the subject matter or scene location. The heritage of classic Americana, its haunting and overlapping experiences of isolation, melancholy, consumerism, determinism and hopeful dream come together in Penner’s dynamic compositions.
Scenes that exhibit contrasting elements particularly captivate the artist. On his trips to locate material in and around his hometown of Marble Falls, Penner is drawn to the variety of textures and elements found in deserted gas stations and empty parking lots as well as the unique particulars of weather and geography. His ability to capture everything from the warmth of a shining spotlight to the abandonment and impermanence reflected by a puddle on the ground makes these works stand apart. Reveling in the details, these ordinary settings become moments exalted.
Rod Penner was born in 1965 in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, and currently lives and works in Marble Falls, Texas. He attended Kwantlen Polytechnic University in Canada before receiving a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1986 from ORU in Tulsa, Oklahoma.