Robin Wessman Sold at Auction Prices

Robin Wessman is a realist painter from Boston, Massachusetts who has lived most of his life in New England. He is known as a still life and landscape painter who prefers working primarily in oils. Trained formally as a painter, he earned a Master in Fine Arts from Ohio University and a Bachelor in Fine Arts & Education from the University of Massachusetts, North Dartmouth. He continued to build on this foundation by attending workshops to help expand his understanding of painting in oils and provide a wide variety of techniques to better express his ideas visually. His oil paintings have a classic representational approach, yet they are less about the accurate depiction of a particular subject than they are about capturing the vision that initially inspired him to paint.

For his landscapes, he is drawn to scenes along the New England coast where he spent much of his youth and developed a strong affection for the beauty and diversity of life along the ocean’s edge. He is particularly interested in painting what it feels like to be in the landscapes surrounded by water, sand and trees as the sunlight hits them and creates an atmosphere with emotion. He strives to accomplish this by focusing on composition, color and light to create the illusion of space that draws the viewer in and around the painting. Direct observation of nature through plein air studies is essential to his understanding of how light affects color, texture, and form. His landscapes originate outdoors where he can work quickly to capture the spirit of the landscape as it inspired him and record as much as possible of the experience on canvas. He often works on several paintings at a time using layers of paint to create certain effects. Robin continues to work on his paintings in the studio where he combines observation, experience and his own internal vision to finish each piece.

Robin's approach to still lifes is a bit unusual as he looks for objects not ordinarily found in paintings, such as, old tools or rocks that he combines with other more familiar objects which when placed together create interesting compositions that require further inspection and contemplation by the viewer. One of the most important steps in the painting is setting up the still life and adjusting the light source. Painting in oils on linen, canvas and panels Robin has developed a method of painting that begins with sketches and studies, followed by a combination of direct paint application and layers of glazes worked in between to achieve the desired effect. The results are paintings with a unique perspective that have a quality and individuality all their own.