Ronnie Queenan can be contacted by email: or by phone: (713) 664-0369.

BEING FLAWED, BEING TRANSPARENT, CREATING ART

At about 15, I was drawn to Abstract Art, to the freedom and calmness within it. It touched me. It rang a bell with me. I began experimenting with color field work, primarily influenced and inspired by artists Mark Rothko and Hans Hofmann, but also branching out into abstract expressionism. I am a self-taught painter. My first art class was in 1998, after a career as an accountant. Rules and techniques followed without question can stifle creative expression. I have to work as directed from within, by what inspires.

The landscape around Lubbock, Texas, where I grew up, probably did play a part in my passion for the abstract, the openness and flatness there, at least when driving in the surrounding counties. It looks like a lot of nothing, desolate, monochromatic, but when you stop and begin to take in details, you see depth, subtle variations in color. What appears simple on the surface, is really complex. I find the geometry of the imperfect square or rectangle to be a primary consideration in my work, perhaps because it reminds me of west Texas flatness and the self-containment of life there.

I begin a piece by gessoing and using modeling paste and other materials to create a textural base. Without this, I feel naked, just me and my rawness. Art-less. I feel the need to get dressed. That is creating art for me, mixing and building up layers of color, playing texture against plainness or rawness. This is healing, and it opens me up. I sense hope. Hope comes from having a purpose. Instinct tells me when the painting is done.

I usually work on two or three paintings at one time. A work may take days -- or months -- to complete. I paint over and over the same piece, experimenting. I go deep inside, into memory, learning more about myself. I see more and more. When you pull over on a Texas highway, as I did recently on a trip to Huntsville, when you stop to look at a dead tree that has been there for such a long time, to study shape, color, detail, the beauty of the bark, you are drawn in deeper and deeper. Nature, especially the desolation of west Texas, and intriguing architecture, stimulates my work. As I paint, I recall places in my past, though my work is nonrepresentational. The challenge is to enjoy the journey, the fun of it, not be hounded by the end result, to just let go and let it be, to learn, evolve.

I paint solitude, but not loneliness -- what is discovered in solitude. My colors are the colors of the natural world, which can be kind of sedated, the gray trunk of a tree next to green leaves, for instance. My rectangles have rough edges like the imperfections of life. They are flawed. It takes maturity to accept our flaws. Nothing is really smooth. Nobody is perfect.

And we all wear masks, like my self-portraits. This series recreates life's stages, pains, and victories. These are probably my most transparent pieces.

--Ronnie Queenan

Education:

Texas Southern University Houston, Texas
Glassell School of Art Houston, Texas
Art League Houston Houston, Texas