One common thread that runs through all of Robinson’s work is a complex psychology-a tension and depth of feeling that results from intense and perceptive observation. In his paintings feelings become graspable. Robinson’s subjects are evocative and dream like, but they also exist right in front of you.

 – Artist Brett Baker

realism has a way of intensifying the seemingly casual visual perception so that its deeper necessity stands revealed.

-Bill Berkson, Artforum

Statement

My paintings require me to occupy space in a way that most people will be unaccustomed to. As a teenager I worked as a janitor to help pay my way through private high school.  A janitor understands a room in a different way than the guests at a party. Perhaps the janitor inhabits the space when others have left, maybe even at night. A janitor is invisible. But in another way the janitor is a privileged visitor, hearing seeing and thinking with curiosity. If there are secrets in the carpet, walls, and dustbins, the janitor might find them. The secrets may be his own, as they come to light in the empty room. I am a privileged visitor to the spaces I choose to paint. I only choose spaces that lead me away from the inconsiderate path of efficiency and thoughtless function. I am inefficient and considerate.

What happens to an empty room when you spend time looking at it carefully in solitude? Does the room change? My paintings are reflective of these changes. They are personal, intimate- often I spend months or years within these rooms making my paintings. I try to arrive at the qualities of things instead of their literal likeness, to see past appearances and make room for metaphor and association.

I choose spaces which reflect divergent stories. Dropped ceiling tiles in a gothic-inspired church hallway, or an abandoned kitchen, which is part of my current studio and serves as a sculpture for holding morning light. Although I don’t always identify with the idea of “liminal space,” being in-between is an important part of my life, as these spaces are suspended in a question of meaning.

For me light is alive and has personality.  It physically alters everything it encounters.  When I look at a white wall, I try to grasp its dual nature; how it’s a combination of a tangible object but also something immaterial and atmospheric.  I see the warm penumbra on the edge of a shadow, and then it goes violet and then turns little green.  These rich differences help create my sense of self; they reflect the nuance of my inner voice.

I have encounters with people I would normally not meet- and in doing so I often find that the space I am in has its own social fabric and societies. For example, while painting at the foot of the stairs in the back hall behind a coffee shop, I encountered a group of adult intellectually disabled janitors who arrived every Wednesday morning with their supervisor. Currently at the YMCA, I have come to know a mysterious man in bedroom slippers who spends long hours in the chapel and meeting rooms a few feet away from my painting spot. He talks to me about my painting and how he is taking classes on selling goods over the internet. At least he claims that is what he is doing in the chapel- but I’ve heard much more animated conversations- so I’m not sure.