Last year I helped my friend Rob with the artist’s statement to cover his then-latest gallery show, called “Pronk,” an old Dutch word used to describe, among other things, a certain sort of exuberant, luxuruious still-life painting popular in the 17th century Netherlands (pronken being a verb that means “to strut”; ontbitje, “little breakfast,” is generally food-related still life subcategory). It’s been a great joy to have a personal front-row seat to Rob’s continual vibrant exploration of the surprising intersection between old Dutch masters and contemporary pop and visual culture. Back in the day, Andy and I used one of Rob’s early paintings for the very popular cover of re:generation quarterly‘s “Evangelism” issue, linked here via the portfolio of our then-art directors (and designers of this very website), Yee Design.
