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June Issue 2005
Upstairs Gallery in Blowing Rock, NC, Features Works by Bob Rankin
The Upstairs Gallery in Blowing Rock, NC, will present the exhibit, Mountain Abstractions, featuring new works by Bob Rankin, from June 10 - 25, 2005.
When you meet the Rankin, you have no clue he is an acclaimed artist with multiple prestigious awards and famous collectors across the globe. Even well into a conversation, Rankin wouldn't think to crow about his artistic accomplishments. One gets the sense that he just doesn't realize how important his contributions to the art world have been. In person, he's just a regular guy.
And yet, Rankin has been voted Spectator Magazine's Best Artist in the Raleigh, Durham Chapel Hill Triangle area five times; received Best in Show awards at the NC State Fair, five times; and won the Raleigh Medal of Arts Award in 1993. He's studied art in Paris, London, Amsterdam, Rome, Florence, Venice and Athens. Rankin's paintings hang in permanent collections in the palace of the King of Morocco, the John Denver Windstar Foundation, SAS Institute, Omni International and IBM, to mention a few. This accomplished artist's proudest accomplishment, however, is being voted North Carolina Secondary Art Educator of the Year. He's a regular guy with a huge heart.
So what makes Rankin so popular? One simply
has to see his work. If you can't resist color, you can't resist
his bold and unapologetic brush strokes. Hugely inspired by his
regular adventure travels, Rankin returns home each fall with
emboldened palette and motifs. When friends and collectors, Judi
and Kevin Beck (of Capehart Beck, the Upstairs Gallery) first
met him in 1985, Rankin had just returned from an Indonesian trek
in which he and a buddy traveled to the island of Sulawesi to
witness the most elaborate funeral pyre imaginable. In this case,
it meant 30 years of constructing a bamboo burial village, 10,000
mourners, live animal sacrifice, wooden effigies and frenetic
native dance while the deceased of thirty years was
torched with the entire newly completed village!
Another year Rankin's "Fiji Fish Series" was inspired
by scuba diving in Fiji. In 2004, he fueled his artistic fire
for two months in the Italian countryside and coastline.
Much less alien but just as stimulating, Rankin's upcoming show is largely inspired by his desire to abstract representational elements found in the mountains. Lovers of color, abstraction, bold strokes and joie de vivre will want to attend this attractively priced show.
For more info check our NC Commercial Gallery
listings or call 828/295-6367.
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