Our January Artist of the Month is local artist Rinse de Koning. Rinse’s work can be seen on the Art Wall next to the New Books shelves.
About the artist:
Rinse Jan de Koning was born in The Hague, The Netherlands (also known as Holland) in 1941. He was educated through the Montessori system and then attended the College of Hotel-Restaurant Management there. He emigrated to the United States in 1965 and first made his home in San Diego, California.
After spending his working years as an Executive Chef and Restaurant Owner in San Diego and in Colorado, he retired to Oregon to be closer to family.
When an opportunity arose to move back to Holland for a couple of years and study visual arts, he took it. He had painted off and on through the years and was always attracted to the arts. After staying there for seven years, he returned to Oregon where he paints and builds on his every-growing collection.
His images focus on the colors, the shapes and the emotions — they are not abstract, but a combination of “natural” and “impression.” A painting is a world of color and peace with a composition that is uncomplicated but forceful through his choice of color, where it enters a hypnotic paradise — a story of its own.
