Robert Cottingham

Jonathan Novak Gallery, Los Angles
Forum Gallery, New York
Acquired by the present owner from the above

Springfield, Springfield Art Museum; Chattanooga, Hunter Museum of Art; Kansas City, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art; Joplin, Spiva Art Center; Norman, University of Oklahoma Museum of Art; Cedar Rapids, Cedar Rapids Museum of Art; Lewisburg, Bucknell University Center Gallery; Middletown, Davidson Art Center, Wesleyan University; Williamsburg, Muscarelle Museum of Art; Ithaca, Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, Cornell University; Oshkosh, Paine Art Center and Arboretum; Manitowoc, Rahr-West Art Museum; New London, Lyman Allyn Art Museum, Robert Cottingham: A Print Retrospective 1972-1986, January 1986 - September 1991
New York, Whitney Museum of American Art, Six Takes on Photo-Realism, November 1991 - January 1992

Louis Meisel, Photorealism, New York, 1989, p. 142, no. 394, illustrated
William C. Landwehr,  Robert Cottingham: A Print Retrospective 1972 – 1986, Springfield, 1986, p. 53, illustrated in color

This work is in very good condition overall. The canvas is not lined. There is some hairline cracking at the turning edges and pale surface soiling throughout. Framed.
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The Robert Cottingham painting Ral’s from 1983 is a celebration of America and the evolution of the commercial landscape. The artist precisely rendered bold, capital letters against an audacious red awning as an homage to the local businesses that have kept our nation strong and helped define its character. The signage promotes an independent business that like many others, has its existence threatened by today’s global marketplace where chain-stores homogenize the main streets of America. The business advertised on top of the smooth, flat textureless storefront is unpretentious; it invites the customer to leave the street and partake in a meal, to engage in conversation, as well as to enter into a meeting for all members of the community.  

Above the signage is beautiful wrought iron work that was likely forged by hand in a factory and installed to adorn the outside window panes from the building directly above the storefront. Adjacent to Ral’s is a green and blue marquee. While the full name of the businesses on the polychrome canopies is obscured, this parade of color on awnings would be visible while strolling the downtown areas in small towns across America.

At the time when Ral’s was painted, the local independent business was much more common than today, but was already under siege from large regional and national purveyors. The contrasting graphics of serf and san serf fonts decorating storefronts and promoting commerce spoke of the hope of every man to provide a service accessible to the population that inhabited cities and towns across the nation. It is likely at the time that Cottingham conceived of this body of work, the artist could already foresee how our nation would evolve over the past 30 years.