Robin Colerin Artist Reception

An artist’s reception will be held after services on Sunday, April 10 (10:15 a.m. – 1:15 p.m.) for Robin Colerin, whose work is on view in the Social Hall gallery space April 3 through May 22, 2016. The exhibit can be viewed on Sundays between 9 a.m. and 1 p.m.

About the Artist: Robin Colerin has been creating art since she could hold a pencil and “make stuff” with her artist-mother. Growing up in Minnesota provided many opportunities to enjoy the outdoors and appreciate the natural world. Her current work has kept her close to home, focusing on the flora and fauna of her local environment, particularly the creatures that organic home gardening invites. This ever-changing environment brings a constant flux of new material from which to draw – especially chickens.

Robin’s artistic inspiration has also been shaped by travel. From the continental United States to Canada, and tropical locales in the Caribbean, Robin has collected rich and varied perspectives on nature and the environment. A period living in Vancouver, with its endless ocean, famed old-growth trees, and granite mountains, introduced a vastly different experience from life in the upper Midwest. While in British Columbia, Robin studied woodcarving, and later continued developing her skills in Minneapolis. Her artwork has been shown in Canada and Minnesota.

An interesting counterpoint to her abstracted ecological work, Robin’s interest in historical Britain is reflected in a body of contemporary Celtic style prints. It is in printmaking that Robin finds her primary calling – a discipline that requires a way of thinking much different from that of drawing and painting. It is a very technical, layered approach to creating a piece of art, each stage thought out ahead of time. In turn, printmaking is an inherently compelling process: as the work progresses, a kind of metamorphosis unfolds, a layer at a time, until the final image is revealed. Robin carries a screen printer’s signature into her paintings, with flattened space and blocks of color.

Alongside her art career, Robin spent seventeen years in the graphics industry, eleven as the owner of a screen-printing company where she designed a successful line of printed garments and won awards for her designs. Robin earned a B.A. in Studio Arts, with an emphasis in printmaking and drawing, from the University of Minnesota, following study in geology at Iowa State University. Robin is knowledgeable in Pacific Northwest Native Art and in Pre-Christian to Classical Celtic art.