Robert Dewitt Adams
Robert Dewitt Adams is originally from the Washington, D.C. area, also having lived in the Pacific Northwest and Minnesota. Currently in Jacksonville, after earning his MFA from the University of Oregon he has taught at Lane Community College and University of North Florida. His work has been included in exhibitions around the U.S including shows at the Seattle Art Museum Rental/Sales Gallery, the Viridian Artists Gallery in Manhattan, the Smithsonian-affiliate Annmarie Sculpture Garden and Arts Center, and the upcoming MOCA Jacksonville Triennial. Media featuring Adams' work have included the Eugene Weekly, Seattle Weekly, Art Access, and Artweek magazine.
Adams’ creations take inspiration from outsider art, neo-Dada, propaganda design, and D.C.'s DIY alternative culture. He says, "Art provided an alternate perspective on growing up in a military and government family. I admired folk artists' ability to make beautiful creations out of the overlooked and everyday. I began using pop imagery after a conservation corps job fishing colorful trash from streams. I distill my images into simpler fields of color, reflecting the way art, through graphic design, has helped reduce the world into marketable products and symbols."
Humor and an appreciation of the absurd are vital to Adams. He combines disparate images, objects, and concepts as a form of brainstorming, a metaphor for the layering of the self. His works frequently relate to environmental and historical issues, including his works addressing plastics pollution, and his Carpet Bag series addressing the Lost Cause mythology still potent in the South and beyond. He invites the viewer to join in thinking in new ways, to add their own interpretations to the connections that he makes. See more on IG at RobertAtomsArt