Robert V. Reid
Born in the Caribbean nation of Trinidad and Tobago and raised in its rich cultural milieu, light, color, and movement are deeply embedded in Robert V. Reid’s collective unconscious. With graphite, charcoals, watercolor and oils, Reid uses these elements to create emotive rendering of the human form.
Reid’s creative journey began in Trinidad where he was introduced to a number of significant Caribbean artists who mentored him and nurtured his natural, untrained talent. Over a 16 year career, Reid’s work has changed to mirror his journey from the Caribbean to New York City. He arrived in New York, as a trained architectural draftsman, with a passion for painting and an urge to record, invent and manipulate the human image using raw talent. His immersion into the New York art scene led him to study at the School of Visual Arts and the Arts Students League, where he developed new techniques and sharpened his technical skills.
Reid has since created a body of work that reveals and an impressive range of skills- works ranging from detailed- styled figurative realism rendered in oils, to stunning watercolors that blur the line between figurative and abstract paintings, to drawings in charcoal and pencil that demonstrate sound draftsmanship.
Reid’s figure paintings are characterized by the absence of a background, his focus is not on the space that the figures inhabit, but on the figures themselves; thereby empowering the viewer to imagine a space of their choice and to create their own answers as to why the figures are there.
The female figure has been one of the important subjects of painting, and has been reinterpreted by painters in various styles throughout history; Reid joins this legion of painters with his favorite subject being the female form, painted from live models.
Some of the Instructors I have studied with at The League : { Mary Beth McKenzie , Dan Gheno , Peter Cox and Janet A. Cook }
EDUCATION
2015 - 2020 Art Student League, New York , NY
2008 - 2011 Art Students League, New York, NY
1990 – 1994 Art Students League, New York, NY
1989 - 1990 School of Visual Arts
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2018 & 2019 Harlem Fine Arts Show, Riverside Church, New York
2015 Red, Clover's Fine Art Gallery Brooklyn, NY.
2011 Harlem Fine Arts Show, Riverside Church, New York
2005 & 2008 Art Off The Main, Contemporary African, Caribbean and Latin American Art,
1997 Life Dance , New Century Artist Gallery, New York
SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2017 & 2018 Iggy pop " Life Class Exhibition " Royal Academy of Arts London
2016 Iggy Pop " Life Class Exhibition Brooklyn Museum New York
2015 To Be Real, Dorsey Art Gallery, Brooklyn NY
2013 Contemporary Art Fair, Jacob Javits Convention Center New York
2011 Transplanted, Clover's Fine Art Gallery, Brooklyn New York
2009 Dance on Canvas, Manhattan Borough President's Office, NY
2007 Caribbean American Heritage Exhibition Kings County Hospital Center D
2002 Black Romantic, The Studio Museum Harlem, New York
AWARDS AND ACCOMPLISHMENTS
2008-2009 Financial Scholarship Awards – Art Students League of New York
2008 Jean Gates Award
2004 Valentine NY , 1st Annual Fine Art Awards – Winner in Watercolors & Drawings
2003 Art Review – New York Daily News
