Robert Bauer (born 1942) is an American painter who creates pictures of people, landscapes, backyards, and gardens. Bauer's paintings of backyards and gardens gained him much recognition and his art has been shown in multiple exhibitions.

Personal life

Bauer was born in Iowa in 1942 and spent his childhood on a farm near

Williamsburg Williamsburg may refer to: Places *Colonial Williamsburg, a living-history museum and private foundation in Virginia *Williamsburg, Brooklyn, neighborhood in New York City *Williamsburg, former name of Kernville (former town), California *Williams ...

, Iowa, United States. Despite enjoying drawing as a child and attending art classes in high school, Bauer was not aware until years later that he could make a living from painting. He became a

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after graduating from high school and drew pictures when he was not on duty. Bauer visited art museums and read about the history of art in his spare time. In 1965, Bauer enrolled at the

Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (PAFA) is a museum and private art school in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Founded in 1805, it is the longest continuously operating art museum and art school in the United States. The academy's museum ...

to work on art that involved casts and live studio models. Bauer and his wife Barbara have two children.

Career

Shortly after Bauer finished his art training in 1967, Kenmore Galleries in

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placed his art in a show titled Four Young Realists. He moved to Iowa in the same year to paint, with most of his art throughout the late 1960s and the early 1970s being paintings of figures that were a mixture of twentieth-century avant-garde

funk Funk is a music genre that originated in African-American communities in the mid-1960s when musicians created a rhythmic, danceable new form of music through a mixture of various music genres that were popular among African-Americans in the ...

and seventeenth-century Dutch

realism Realism, Realistic, or Realists may refer to: In the arts *Realism (arts), the general attempt to depict subjects truthfully in different forms of the arts Arts movements related to realism include: *American Realism *Classical Realism *Liter ...

. In 1972, Bauer completed four paintings with three of them being sold to the Davenport Municipal Art Gallery, a bank, and a

Maryland Maryland ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It borders the states of Virginia to its south, West Virginia to its west, Pennsylvania to its north, and Delaware to its east ...

museum. He completed 35 to 40 paintings in 1973. Bauer went to schools to show his painting process and answer questions in the 1970s. After that period, Bauer's paintings depicted people as models in natural settings and landscapes. He began to paint backyards and gardens in 1980 and those paintings have given Bauer much of his recognition. He works with

acrylic paint Acrylic paint is a fast-drying paint made of pigment suspended in acrylic polymer emulsion and plasticizers, silicone oils, defoamers, stabilizers, or metal soaps. Most acrylic paints are water-based, but become water-resistant when dry. Dep ...

and

watercolor painting Watercolor (American English) or watercolour (Commonwealth English; see spelling differences), also ''aquarelle'' (; from Italian diminutive of Latin 'water'), is a painting method"Watercolor may be as old as art itself, going back to the S ...

Exhibitions

In 1974, his painting "Iowa County" won a show prize at the Davenport Municipal Art Gallery in

Davenport, Iowa Davenport ( ) is a city in Scott County, Iowa, United States, and its county seat. It is situated along the Mississippi River on the eastern border of the state. Davenport had a population of 101,724 as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 cen ...

. His work has been shown in more than 50 exhibits including Allan Stone Gallery in

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, the Thomas Segal Gallery in

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, the Olson-Larsen Galleries in

Des Moines, Iowa Des Moines is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of cities in Iowa, most populous city in the U.S. state of Iowa. It is the county seat of Polk County, Iowa, Polk County with parts extending into Warren County, Iowa, Wa ...

, the

Cedar Rapids Museum of Art The Cedar Rapids Museum of Art is a museum in downtown Cedar Rapids, Iowa, United States. The museum is privately owned and was established in 1905. The museum acquired the old Cedar Rapids Public Library building after the library moved into a ne ...

Cedar Rapids, Iowa Cedar Rapids is a city in Linn County, Iowa, United States, and its county seat. The population was 137,710 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, making it the List of cities in Iowa, second-most populous city in Iowa. The city lies o ...

, the

San Francisco Museum of Modern Art The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) is a modern art, modern and contemporary art museum and nonprofit organization located in San Francisco, California. SFMOMA was the first museum on the West Coast devoted solely to 20th-century art ...

, Forum Gallery in New York City, among others. Bauer received two grants from the Massachusetts Cultural Council and two grants from the

Pollock-Krasner Foundation The Pollock-Krasner Foundation was established in 1985 for the purpose of providing funding to visual artists internationally to further their artistic practices. It was established at the bequest of Lee Krasner, who was an American abstract expr ...

. He was a Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery’s Outwin Boochever Portrait Competition finalist in 2006.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bauer, Robert 1942 births Living people 20th-century American painters Painters from Iowa Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts alumni People from Williamsburg, Iowa