Rob Rowland GRA
Rob prefers not to analyse where his inspiration comes from but simply to accept that he has a need to express the feelings which accompany it; and the era of the Industrial Revolution despite all of its moral and economic ambiguities, man working more closely with the earthly elements, and the interweaving of nature and industry provide him with all the ingredients he needs. As Constable once remarked, 'painting is but another word for feeling'.
All that he ever wanted to do was to be an artist and he considered working in special effects, cinema poster art, and commercial art but chose to take up the opportunity to work in a picture restoration studio where the smell of oils, spirits, resins, juicy pigments and the presence of Victorian easels and paintings enriched his already fertile passion for art.
He went on to graduate from Gloucestershire College of Arts and Technology and a period as a freelance graphic designer followed before being employed in the art and design department of a National Brewery. It was there, while working on a number of themes to coincide with the GWR 150th anniversary, that he became besotted with representing railways in art. He became a member of the Guild in 1987 and has been painting professionally since 1990.
