Selected Collections from the Rosenborg Estate 1940-1990
Mark Woolley Gallery, 224-5475
April 3-28

Ralph Rosenborg: Though the name isn't familiar, it belongs to an artist that maintained a painting career which ran parallel to that of noted art icons like Pollock, Rothko, and Barnett Newman. Rosenborg began his long career in New York in the 1930s, working in circles such as the group of painters known as "The Ten," who organized DYI exhibits in rebellion against the established structure of museums and galleries.

Rosenborg painted a wealth of canvases, largely depicting what he called, "a highly personal and creative effort to interpret nature and the American landscape and its people." Aside from the beauty and depth of his work, the remarkable aspect of Rosenborg is the way in which he remained true to himself through all the tumult of the art world surrounding him.

His widow Margaret Rosenborg (who now resides in Portland) described a day in the early 50s when: "Jackson [Pollock] broke one of Ralph's canvases over a chair, saying, "Don't you know that you are supposed to paint large paintings?" Another time, when sitting with Pollock, de Kooning, and [Franz] Kline, they said to Ralph, "You deserted us." To which Ralph replied, "No, you deserted me." Also on view at Mark Woolley is a selection of monotypes and black and white photographs by Rhoda Peacher.