Robert Thur

I paint for myself. That said, what is worth painting? In images, what will be of use that hasn’t been painted before? Sometimes my experiences well up in visual language. Sometimes I have to express what I see in the world, or hear from my patients. My painting techniques have to be so expressive that the painting touches the inner life of the spectator. The titles present in words another angle on the difficulties faced in the struggle to be human: “Longing for Home,” “I have Nothing to Remember,”  “I Never Had a Friend” “Adam and Eve, together taking their freedom in,” “Against Nonsense,” “Was I A Friend to Myself?” “Towards A Positive Solution.”

As a psychotherapist I’ve listened for forty years to the shared joys, griefs, creativity, confusions, the absurdity, all the while studying faces, eyes, gestures, the voice, as a way to be with the person, and objective enough to be of use. I think art says what is. That fact presents alternative ways to interpret what we want from our lives.

I am grateful to my teacher of the last six years, Brian Keubler, for his ability to understand the aims of each piece and to help to achieve them in the many-layered techniques of the Renaissance.