Robert Qualters 1934 Born

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Robert Qualters 1934
Born: 13 March 1934; McKeesport, Pennsylvania, United
States
Field: painting, fresco, printmaking, drawing
Nationality: American
School or Group: Bay Area Figurative School
Genre: genre painting, cityscape
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Early life
Qualters was born in McKeesport, Pennsylvania and grew up in
Clairton, Pennsylvania.[2] His mother was a schoolteacher[1] and
his father a county assessor. He has two sisters, Priscilla and
Margaret.
Education, military, and teaching
Qualters graduated from Clairton High School in 1951 and
enrolled in Carnegie Institute of Technology (now Carnegie
Mellon University) as an art major.[3][4] At Carnegie Tech, he
studied with Robert Lepper who once taught fellow
Pittsburghers Philip Pearlstein and Andy Warhol. In 1953,
Qualters joined the army, serving the following two years as an
artilleryman in England.[1] He returned to Pittsburgh in 1955 and
spent one more year at Carnegie Tech.
Qualters moved to California in 1956 on the G.I. Bill and
enrolled in the California College of Arts and Crafts in
Oakland.[1] He earned a B.F.A. there, while becoming immersed
in the fledgling Bay Area Figurative Movement of
Representational Painting.[1][4] At California College, his
mentors included the painters Nathan Oliveira and Richard
Diebenkorn[2][4]—founding members of the Bay Area Figurative
Movement—and the calligrapher Sabro Hasegawa. It was
Diebenkorn who, in 1957, invited Qualters to be in the first Bay
Area Figurative show.
Qualters returned to Pittsburgh in 1959.[1][4] From 1962–1968,
he taught at the State University of New York at Oswego,[1]
while completing an M.F.A. at Syracuse University in 1965. He
settled in Pittsburgh permanently in 1968.[1][4] Since then, he has
taught at the University of Pittsburgh, Carlow College, Slippery
Rock State University, Indiana University of Pennsylvania,
West Virginia University, and Carnegie Mellon University.[2] He
has also been an Artist-in-Residence at the Pittsburgh High
School for the Creative and Performing Arts.
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Edward Hopper Was Driving from Lessons of the Masters, 1997
Work
―A quintessential Pittsburgh artist,‖[2] Qualters is known for his
vivid, color-saturated depictions of Pittsburgh's neighborhoods,
bridges, and steel mills as well as self-portraits. A ―master of the
collaborative process,‖[5] Qualters has also created original
works with poets Jan McReery and Gail Ghai; mixed media and
tattoo artist Nick Bubash; photographers Charlee Brodksy and
Mark Perrott, and other Pittsburgh-based artists. With scenic
designer Tony Ferrieri, Qualters designed and painted the set for
the City Theatre of Pittsburgh's 1996–97 production of ―Below
the Belt.‖
Qualters has exhibited in Pennsylvania, as well as in New York,
California, Maine, and West Virginia. In Pittsburgh, he has had
solo-artist shows at Borelli Edwards, Concept Art Gallery,
Carson Street Gallery, the Carnegie Museum of Art, the
Pittsburgh Center for the Arts, and many other galleries and
museums.[3] A 2008 retrospective at the Rivers of Steel National
Heritage Area in Homestead featured works from a 20-year
span, 1980–2000, highlighting the end of the industrial age in
the Monongahela Valley through firsthand observation and
through what Rivers of Steel Director Ronald Baraff calls ―the
lens of the people.‖[6] His work is represented in the permanent
collections of the Carnegie Museum of Art; the Oakland
Museum of California; and the Westmoreland County Museum
of American Art in Greensburg, Pennsylvania; as well as in the
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main offices of PPG Industries, Alcoa, Hillman Company, The
Pittsburgh Foundation, The Heinz Endowments, and many other
corporations, schools, and government agencies, and private
collections throughout Southwestern Pennsylvania.
Qualters' work has also been seen in more than two-dozen
public murals and site-specific installations around the city.
Besides commissions from The Mercy Hospital of Pittsburgh,
The Western Pennsylvania School for Blind Children,
Pittsburgh's Three Rivers Arts Festival, Oxford Development
Company and others, he has created more than a dozen murals
with high school students between 1986 and 1988 and as
recently as 2005. His work with these students, like his
numerous collaborations with prominent Pittsburgh artists,
reflects a passion to create, as well as to teach, learn, and
discover.
Besides Diebenkorn and other Bay Area colorists, his influences
include Brueghel, Rembrandt, Matisse, and fellow Pittsburgh
artist John Kane. Many of his works include references or
homages to these artists.[4]
Mural at Grant Street and Boulevard of the Allies, 1986
Awards and recognition
A past president of both the Associated Artists of Pittsburgh and
Artists Equity of Pittsburgh, Qualters is the Pittsburgh Center
for the Arts' 1985 Artist of the Year, one of many honors
bestowed on him over six decades of work.[2] In addition to local
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grants and commissions, he has received funding to work in
France and was a visiting artist at the American Academy in
Rome. Along with countless reviews and feature stories in local
press, his work has been published in American Artist, The
Pittsburgh That Starts Within You, Carnegie Magazine,
Pittsburgh Quarterly, and the Pratt Institute's Artists Proof.
Penn Station Rotunda, 2006
Personal life
Qualters lives in the Squirrel Hill neighborhood of Pittsburgh
and works in Homestead.[2][3][4] His wife of 46 years, the former
Joanne Ricchi of Oswego, New York, died in 2010. [7] The
Qualters have two sons: Robert Qualters III of Florida and Brett
Qualters of Montana.[7]
Other
In 2014, three concurrent projects will celebrate Qualters' life
and work: a biography by author, historian, and curator Vicky
A. Clark, PhD of Clarion University that will be published by
The University of Pittsburgh Press; a documentary film directed
by Joe and Elizabeth Seamans and produced by Pittsburgh
Filmmakers; and Qualters' largest retrospective to date at the
Pittsburgh Center for the Arts in Shadyside.
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