- Biografie
Peter Rohs
Birth of passion
Peter was born in Kerkrade in 1956 to a family of miners and moved to Nijmegen in 1971, where he started studying (TeHaTex from '75). At the Arnhem Art Academy, Peter took the teacher training course from '81-'83, after which he started as a professional artist. After a short adventure on La Palma, Canary Islands, Peter began his career as an artist in the Netherlands in 1989.
Soutine's influence
After initially experimenting a lot of abstract, peter delved into figurative painting after 2 years. During this period, Peter found inspiration from works of Soutine as a real teacher to overcome the fear of painting: "any progress involves taking a barrier". After Soutine's influence, Peter has explored his own way journey in creating the art which makes a difference for all. Many changes subsequently followed, with the plain and surprising nature gaining more influence as a source of inspiration.
Compelling technique
His painting technique developed to the level of the great masters, in fact, he was increasingly able to use and refine different ways of painting with oil on canvas and other materials, even glass. His unique working method made it possible to magnify and enhance the beauty and characteristic elements of the nature around us in a special way by including light, shadow, the wind and unique depths.
Compare it to a dedicated musician; it is not so much what he plays that is important, but how he plays it (begeisterung / "sturmisch bewegt"). The way he brings music to life, therein also lies the core of his art, not in the content or theme but precisely through his technique it strikes the right chord, and brings the viewer into wonder and surprise or even rapture.
As Picasso said, "Some make the sun a stain and others make the stain a sun." At its core, of course, the sun is nothing new.
Nature with all its diversity offered Peter the opportunity to refine his techniques to depict simple scenes in a special way and unique style. For more than 20 years, Peter has focused on the varied nature and landscape, especially the uncultivated, which you mostly have to look for elsewhere in Europe.
"To improve is to change, so to be perfect is to change often."
Peter's "Why"
It is difficult to explain why Peter paints the way he does and why he chooses a particular subject. The -especially untouched- nature and cultivated landscapes with special perspective, offered him space and insight to apply all the painting techniques he had mastered, in one painting, in one motif. The special landscape turned out to offer new challenges each time that Peter could interpret, as he saw it through. Peter felt that the landscapes and
nature wanted to tell him something; look for the possibilities in the story and bring it together. Peter is precisely not a biologist, naturalist or admirer of fantastic vistas or mountains to paint. Nor does he have religious motives, in the sense that man would be subject to nature, to God or other gods, or to suffer the grandeur of nature, and certainly not in a nationalistic, historical, or romantic sense. He only marvels each time at the surprises nature has in store for us. Landscape, nature, flower, fruit and animal are one: they are all related. Man seems to be from a different reality. Nature is so diverse, no one could have imagined it this way; that is why it deserves such respect today.
By immortalizing recognizable scenes/motifs in such a way in a painting, Peter is able to let the enthusiast enjoy every day.
His technique is really an essential part of painting, just as with good musicians: without technique no music. Peter has become a master of the most difficult form of painting with oil on canvas: “alla prima.” He paints everything in one go, i.e. without underpainting, layering or precise preliminary drawing. Thus, no mistakes can be made: everything must be right on the canvas at once. This also means that Peter must have total control over the subject matter and the motif.
Nature is something Peter takes seriously and considers as a fact: reality. There is no metaphysics involved (F. Pessoa). This has the consequence that he takes nature as it appears, and does not change it in the painting. By framing correctly, he lifts his motif out of context and gives it -within art- its own right to exist, forever.
Peter Rohs, now at 67, still aims to work about 50h a week and devotes a lot of time and attention to each work. His paintings can be found here in our collection, and you can come and view -by appointment-, possibly in combination with a visit to nature or stay in the Bed & Breakfast facility.
We feel honored to offer his unique collection in our Artz of Nature Atelier in Emmen.
