Essay in "Field Language," published by Palmer Museum of Art at Penn State University

Field Language—The Painting and Poetry of Warren and Jane Rohrer

It was an extraordinary honor to be invited to contribute an essay to this publication, which has just been released from The Palmer Museum of Art. The artist Warren Rohrer (1927-1995) was the single biggest influence on me as an artist. In addition to my essay, one of my works is reproduced in the catalogue as well as one of my photographs of a rural location that served as a place of inspiration for Warren Rohrer. I continue to relate personally with Jane Rohrer and the rest of the family.

Field Language presents the work of an extraordinary couple who together left the rural lifeways of their Mennonite upbringing to go “into the world” to create forms of modern art that reflected on the places and culture they came from. Published on the occasion of a retrospective exhibition devoted to the working relationship between abstract painter Warren Rohrer and his wife, poet Jane Turner Rohrer, this sumptuously illustrated book explores the Rohrers’ painting and poetry in relation to their biographies and to the nature of modernism and modernity.

The artists, poets, and historians contributing to this volume present a variety of perspectives on the Rohrers, situating their work within the context of modernism, the changing agricultural landscapes of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, and the aestheticization of local craft practices. Through the work of these two highly original and creative artists, Field Language invites readers to consider relationships between global art movements and local visual cultures, issues of land use, the sustainability of rural communities and cultures, and our own relationships with agricultural landscapes, seasonal change, labor, and human need and desire.

In addition to the editors, the contributors include Christopher Campbell, Steven Z. Levine, Nancy Locke, Sally McMurry, Janneken Smucker, William R. Valerio, Jonathan Frederick Walz, and Douglas Witmer.

Story Time -- about the work of Jesse Hickman

Jesse Hickman, Defiance 2 (for Douglas), 2016. House paint on wood, 6.5 x 11 x 1 inches.

I’ve been photographing and cataloging my art collection. I find myself wanting to make an occasional series of posts about the artworks I live with and about my cherished friendships with artists around the world.

I’ll start with this piece by Jesse Hickman. He made it in 2016, but the story of it really begins 30 years ago.

The piece is called “Defiance 2 (for Douglas),” house paint on wood, 6.5 x 11 x 1 inches.

I went to a small college in northern Indiana. The closest city, Chicago, was several hours away. The art department made field trips there once or twice a year. On one such trip in the spring of 1990, I saw Jesse Hickman’s exhibition “The County Series” at Klein Art Works, a group of strong, shaped, rectilinear compositions. The dark bands were burned into the surface. On first take, they were black and white...but really they were various organically produced shades blackish-brown, yellowish-white, etc. The titles were names of midwestern US counties.

The card for Jesse’s show went directly on the wall of my room for the next several years. I loved the image on it, a work titled “Defiance.” (Pics 2,3) That show influenced an entire body of my drawings over that time. And it was a strong push for me in the direction of geometric abstraction generally.

I never heard of him again, but I never forgot his name. However in 2014, I noticed his name on an announcement for a small gallery in northern Michigan where I vacation each summer. I inquired a little bit. Sure enough, it was the same Jesse Hickman, now living in northern Michigan. We corresponded for the first time and I told him the story of seeing his show. We arranged to meet that summer when I came to Michigan and our friendship began.

Later, I found a drawing from the summer of 1991 (4). It shows the influence his work had on mine. It’s an abstract interpretation of the view out the window of my bedroom...his exhibition card hung on the wall above my bed that entire summer. I decided to send him the drawing. In return, Jesse made me a miniature “Defiance.”

Story Time -- The Klösterkirche Thalbürgel

Recently I was able to revisit a very important place in my life as an artist. The Klösterkirche Thalbürgel was built in the Romanesque style beginning in 1133 as the cloister for a Benedictine monastery, and a community of monks lived and worshipped there until the reformation. Today the church serves as a place of worship for both the Protestant and Catholic diocese, as well as hosting concerts and exhibitions.

I think of May 1993 as when I “really” became an artist. I finished undergrad with a 3-month study abroad term and lived with a family in the eastern German city of Jena. Up to that point in my life, when I referred to myself as an artist, I was accustomed to people (Americans) asking “but what do you do?” The “but” at the beginning of the phrase made it clear the question was not about what I did as an artist. In Germany I got the same question, however with no qualifying “but...” They wanted to know about my art. There was often a follow-up question. This kind of instant acknowledgement and engagement gave me so much confidence. I was able to shed somewhat my own internalized devaluation of what would be my life’s work, instilled in me from the culture of my upbringing.

During those months I interned with a ceramist in the nearby town of Bürgel, a center of a particular regional style of polka-dot decorated pottery called “Blauweiss.” Down a hill on the outskirts of the town was a smaller village with the medieval cloisters. The Klosterkirche was still mainly intact and in use but the rest of the site was a preserved ruin. Several days a week after work I’d walk to the cloisters for a few minutes before catching the bus back to Jena. The late spring and summer were warm but there was coolness, mystery, gravitas and solitude in the shadows there. I made so many drawings that summer based on the sloppy grid of the old stones, which set the stage for a group of paintings I exhibited in Lancaster, Pennsylvania in 1994...my first show as a “real” painter.

View fullsize

View fullsize

View fullsize

View fullsize

View fullsize

View fullsize

View fullsize

View fullsize