Robert Herrmann (1922 - 1996)

13. Pleasant Ridge, 1966-7, oil on board, signed, dated and titled verso, 16 x 24 inches, exhibited: Robert Herrmann, Cincinnati Art Galleries, Cincinnati, OH, March 4 to 28, 2000, no. 13 (illustrated in catalog)

$6,500

Born in 1922, Robert Herrmann was an art historian who painted in secret-- concealing his vast body of Neo Immaculate work for over forty years. Much of Herrmann’s artistic life is unknown; however, his oeuvre demonstrates a deep understanding of American modernism, particularly Precisionism. 

As an undergraduate, Herrmann studied art, art history, and architecture at the University of Cincinnati and the University of Wisconsin and earned a master’s degree from The Ohio State University in 1949. Herrmann wrote his master’s thesis on Charles Demuth, The Stylistic Development of Charles Demuth’s Art. Furthering his education, Herrmann studied at the University of Iowa and earned his PhD in Art History and Fine Arts from Columbia University in 1954. 

At some point in the 1950s, Herrmann began to pursue art seriously. His Neo Immaculate paintings were often composed of bright colors to create architectural landscapes completely devoid of the human form. Herrmann spent his life alone and never married or had children, yet his uninhabited images reflect the beauty he found in the mundane and his love of life. Herrmann’s use of color and form contrast with the solitary nature of his compositions and offer a lively vision of the interplay of light and shadow on the built environment.

It wasn’t until Hermann’s death in 1996 that his sister discovered hundreds of paintings. Cincinnati Art Galleries held three solo shows from 2000 through 2004 bringing to light Herrmann’s previously private and unseen paintings.