Bob Brock

Artist's Statement

            I believe in a reality that is greater than a person's concept of it. However one chooses to represent nature, nature will still exist independently of one's expectations. It is this independent "other" which I pursue. My whole objective approach to art is based on the premise that the truth lies in nature.

            My work is figurative only because it is toward nature that I have chosen to be objective. I set up still-lifes not for the objects, but for the objects' form and color. I attempt to be truthful to my experiences of nature, while at the same time I try to construct paintings through juxtaposed relationships.

            My process is of expansion and re-expansion from a central area; a continual working and reworking from the center out, in relation to what is observed. A centering is involved. A continual returning to center is involved. A continual relating back to a central subject is involved. And over and over again the questions arise, "where is the center?" and "what is the subject?" And the subject may be something as simple as an arabesque curve.

            As I push the discovered subject farther away from the discovered center, I find my painting becoming more about design and more about myself. And as I pull the discovered subject back toward the discovered center, I find the painting becoming more about an objective experience of the subject.

            My selectivites within what I see are determined by the insuperable segmented views of nature, which are always fragments of the greater balanced whole. But even though I am subjectively selective, I attempt to be selective in ways that do not distort the drawing or color relationships. I refer to my selective process as a "placement and emphasis" of events.

            It can be said that I approach my figurative work in a scientific spirit. I acknowledge that my visual statements may be altered under continued examination or that they may fail to sustain themselves critically in an enlarged experience. I find as I sharpen my vision, I sharpen my construction as corrections are continually made. Through my re-evaluative approach my experience of nature becomes enlarged as my corrections take me a step closer to that which I see as true.