An Artist Paints the Carolinas

Danny Robinette paints wonderfully bright flowers, houses, landscapes and snowscapes inspired by rural North Carolina - 21 of which are on display in the Upper Foyer Gallery of the Duke Art Museum. It's rare for an artist to exhibit more than 20 of their works at one time. It is even more meaningful for Robinette, who has only one lung and is seriously ill. He attended the opening last week with a respirator and sat in a wheelchair to conserve his strength.

"I've never seen so many of my paintings in one place before," said Robinette in a faint but steady voice. "I probably never will again."

The emotion of the evening was heightened by the fact that Robinette's works are being featured due to a loyal fan at Duke - award-winning writer and James B. Duke Professor of English Reynolds Price. Price, who owns four of Robinette's paintings, curated the exhibit as the first in a new museum series called "Academic Eye."

Price told the audience of about 50 people - including several Triangle residents who own Robinette paintings - how he had responded uncharacteristically swiftly to a call for professor-curators from museum director Michael Mezzatesta. Prior to the exhibit, Price had written a moving essay about how he had wanted to be able to paint since he was a little boy and how Robinette has succeeded where he had "tumbled."

"He has made a whole world from the sights of his life; and most human beings alive on the Earth here at the start of the 21st century could confirm at least that the world he sees - and so calmly translates onto two-dimensional surfaces - is both recognizable, nobly hospitable, instructive, disturbing, and finally consoling," Price wrote.

After the talk, Duke Librarian David Ferreiro said he understood why the urbane writer viewed the rural North Carolinian painter as a kindred spirit.

"I think that both Reynolds' and Danny's work convinces through the senses," Ferriero said. "Like Reynolds, Danny notices things in the landscape of North Carolina that others of us ignore. Both cause us to focus our attention on what is in front of us and cause us to feel differently as a result of the experience."

The mood was intimate, with people grouped around the two star speakers seated next to each other in wheelchairs.

Joe Rowan, former president of the board of the museum and owner of Somerhill Gallery in Chapel Hill, which carries Robinette's art, said he found the evening revealing.

"It's easy for Reynolds to be magnificent - he has 'the voice' as we tease him," Rowan said. "He is a captivating speaker. But I've always seen Danny as this kind of shy, retiring country boy. I was slap-jawed in wonder to hear this reservoir of articulation come forth with his words of appreciation and gratitude.

"Danny was not being dramatic or asking for sympathy when he said he'd probably never see so many of his works together again," Rowan said. "I think he got energy from the people there. It was a magical evening."

The exhibit will run through in the Duke Art Museum through May 27.