LOCALadk Magazine

Fall 2014 23 LOCALadk Bob is a Syracuse University graduate whose interest in painting dates back to grade school, but he put painting on hold through a three-decade career as an ad agency art director. His retirement from agency work in 2010 gave him the time to pursue his art, and the Adirondacks helped bring his passion for watercolors rushing back. When Bob sees something that inspires him during his many Adirondack outings, he captures those moments on his camera for use as possible subject matter for his future paintings. Oftentimes, some of those photos may languish in anonymity for months, even years, as bits of data in his iMac. Then, inspiration strikes and thoughts of a painting begin to formulate somewhere in Bob's subconscious. He often doesn't anticipate the final painting. This was the case when he asked retired DEC officer Gary Lee to guide him and his wife, Cheryl, on a birding trek to Moose River Plains near Inlet, N.Y. "Along the way," Bob recalls, "I snapped a photo of Gary, just as a memento." Gary was looking out over the pond, binoculars in hand, a camouflage cap shading his eyes. That moment became the painting he calls No- See-Ums. It's a painting that resonates with Gary's wife, Karen, because it, "so captured my husband," and their mutual love of the Adirondacks. This was Bob's first portrait. But as with all of his paintings, there's more to it than first meets the eye, and each small detail helps the viewer experience that time and place. No-See-Ums transports us to a tranquil Adirondack pond with the ever- present leatherleaf rimming its shoreline, white pines reach skyward, and morning fog drifting into the background. Gary's camouflage hat captures the flavor of the experience since Bob uses the hat to incorporate a moose, bear cub, brook trout (of course), loon, woodpecker, and chickadee into its camouflage design. Adirondack paintings often conjure the romanticized grand landscapes that draw thousands to the sights, sounds, and smells of these mountains. Bob's painting take on a different view, focusing on the small details that make up the landscape instead. "There's beauty to be found in the small things, if one looks closely," Bob says. Bob Ripley's paintings also tell a story . The Rust bucket, which was honored with the People's Choice Award at the Adirondacks National Exhibition of American Watercolors in 2014, is an example of this. The scene depicts a bucket leaning against a barn. The bucket has clearly been there a long time - it has become part of nature. On its rim is perched a very present and in-the-moment chickadee. There is also the nostalgic comfort of the scene inside an old garage, decorated with old license plates, its dark interior cluttered with odds and ends that have no where else to reside. We don't have to see clearly to know what we'd find in there. In United Plates Bob added the '32 Ford to complete the picture's story. Bob has two photos that have been on his mind more and more lately. The first, loons on Seventh Lake, and the second, the night sky on Cranberry Lake. Every Adirondacker has enjoyed the night-time call of a loon drifting over a peaceful lake. It makes you wonder when the photos of these experiences will inspire Bob to take paint to paper and transform them into his vision of Adirondack moments captured in watercolor. To see more of Bob's painting, go to www.bobripley.com.

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