Steven Erickson
Erickson received his MFA in painting from the University of Iowa in 1993. He is an exhibition designer at the University of Iowa Museum of Art and lives in Iowa City with his wife and child. He has exhibited at Forum Gallery, Minneapolis; CSPS, Cedar Rapids, Iowa; Carolyn Ruff Gallery, Minneapolis; Hudson River Gallery, Iowa City, Iowa; and Icon Gallery, Fairfield, Iowa. Erickson's work is included in the public collections of Mercy Hospital, Iowa City; University of Iowa Hospitals & Clinics, 1st Bank, Minneapolis, the University of Iowa School of Law, and the University of Iowa Museum of Art.
Erickson works with a plethora of styles, techniques, sizes and points of view. Ranging from the photo-realistic to the utterly non-objective, and many points between, the work is a celebration of possibilities within the media of oil paint.
These paintings of Iowa landmark Old Capitol and the Pentacrest area show Erickson's rendering these familiar scenes in the soft light of early morning. His approach combines a careful realistic attention to detail with a formal, simple and balanced arrangement of shapes and colors. The effect is to make the scenes seem both contemporary and timeless and classical at the same time.