Rochelle Rottenberg

After retiring from my full-time faculty position at the School of Social Work, University of St. Catherine and St. Thomas University, in 2007 I finally had the opportunity to pursue my interest in art. I became an “Art Adventure Guide” at the Minneapolis Museum of Art (MIA) and enrolled in a watercolor class with Marian Alstad, a long-time painter and teacher at the Edina Art Center.

I have always liked to sketch and when my children were younger would take a class or two in drawing or painting but never seemed to find the time to pursue it on a regular basis. At this point in my life, I can devote more time to learning good techniques and to practice what I am learning. I have tried oil painting as well as acrylics but somehow watercolors seemed to be the “poetry” of painting. You can say a great deal with only a few suggestions as well as have lucky accidents. Being a “Pisces”, a water sign, may also be contributing factor if you believe in astrological interpretations.

In doing water colors one strives for balance, harmony and beautiful forms in space, but the results are hard to achieve, so that one keeps trying even though the ideal is never attained, just sought after. Watercolor painting has a language of its own that one must learn and an approach which you start to use in the larger world. In watercolors one must establish values, beginning with lighter tones and ending with darker, more saturated colors. These contrasts help to create the forms and shapes that make the image emerge. Afterwards, when you look at the physical world, you see these gradations of colors and the way that light affects objects, and you begin to see things more clearly, noticing details that you had not appreciated before. It is the kind of activity that allows for a kind of transcendence when you are “at one with the endeavor”, and when that happens there is contentment and even joy. I hope that when you view my paintings you, too, feel some of the pleasure of the paint on the paper and the enjoyment of seeing ordinary objects transformed by light and color.