Friday, January 28, 2011

Seascape - Dick Roberts

A gorgeous sea-rock-scape from 1979. Richer and more blue than his 60's work.

Few details listed on the photo by Dick. It says, "Oil 1979" and "Frank & Laurie Bellocchio".
It's laying on an unfolded newspaper - I'm sure it's the Stamford Advocate - so it's approx. 30" x 30". Looks like canvas, but it may be board.

Seduction - Dick Roberts




Illustration by Dick for Jeff's 2009 book "Chatter in the Canopy" - Booksurge, Charleston, SC. ISBN 13: 978-1439214817


Seduction

It's the sand in your voice that lures me.
That and the moonlight buttering your long ribs.

You can shout into the wind through cupped hands.
I can smell the salt and wet canvas.

What if I surrender to your rolling, black valleys
To the tops of mountains, kissed away?

When we collapse flat-faced and ordinary
On tar-colored foam and a dead skate - what then?



-Jeff Roberts 2009

Chatter in the Canopy at Etsy.com




Seascape - Dick Roberts

Seascape
1962
24" x 30"
Oil with pallete knife on canvas

Some of Dick's seascapes had titles. Most did not. This one, from 1962, was just called Seascape.

Dick painted a lot of seascapes. And good ones, too. Almost everyone in the extended Roberts-Pinkney family has at least one in some prime spot in our homes.

The family vacationed on Cape Cod every year in the '50s and '60s. Dick did his "plein air" thing in Brewster and Eastham and environs.

In those days we were allowed to play on the dunes. Dick would roll down the dunes with us kids as if he were one of us. We'd walk along the water line in the morning and "comb". It was a treat to come across a dead skate washed up. After some prodding to make sure it was dead, one of us would use its tail as a handle and fling it back into the waves - to washup again for the next comber.

See skate post here.
http://rjroberts.blogspot.com/2011/01/seduction-dick-roberts.html

The Digger - Dick Roberts


The Digger


A family favorite. This was hung at the foot of the stairs, off the living room, in Dick's house in Stamford. The Digger greeted everyone who needed to use the bathroom upstairs. Some visitors chose to wait.


Oil on board - 1960. Nearly life-size, approx. 30" x 48"


Current owner: Alison Andrade (Roberts) daughter. Washington, Maine.