Tracing Robert Bechtle's career from his earliest paintings of the 1960s to the present day, this is the definitive book on one of the founders and foremost practitioners of American
Photorealism. Created in close collaboration with the artist, Robert Bechtle will accompany the distinguished painter's first retrospective exhibition. Lavish plates feature
reproductions of approximately ninety of Bechtle's most significant artworks, from large-scale oil paintings to intimate watercolors and drawings. These magnificent illustrations portray the
range of the San Francisco-based painter's iconic imagery of California--the rows of palm trees, stucco houses, and the ubiquitous automobiles that spurred suburban expansion--as well as his
lesser-known but equally compelling family scenes and stark interiors. Bechtle's preference for wide, empty spaces; his flat, sun-bleached palette; and his detached mode of recording random
details impart a singular sense of alienation to his subjects. His deadpan paintings capture the essence of the postwar American experience, in which California often serves as the testing
ground for the realization of national dreams. Tracing Robert Bechtle's career from his earliest paintings of the 1960s to the present day, this is the definitive book on one of the founders
and foremost practitioners of American Photorealism. Created in close collaboration with the artist, Robert Bechtle will accompany the distinguished painter's first retrospective
exhibition. Lavish plates feature reproductions of approximately ninety of Bechtle's most significant artworks, from large-scale oil paintings to intimate watercolors and drawings. These
magnificent illustrations portray the range of the San Francisco-based painter's iconic imagery of California--the rows of palm trees, stucco houses, and the ubiquitous automobiles that spurred
suburban expansion--as well as his lesser-known but equally compelling family scenes and stark interiors. Bechtle's preference for wide, empty spaces; his flat, sun-bleached palette; and his
detached mode of recording random details impart a singular sense of alienation to his subjects. His deadpan paintings capture the essence of the postwar American experience, in which
California often serves as the testing ground for the realization of national dreams.
