portraits
click on each image for size and pricing details
Original Oil painted from life
By Sir Roland Richardson
Size: 32.5” x 22” canvas
Dated March 2019
$2,500
Limited Edition Giclee on Canvas Commission Order is Welcome
Original “Plein Air” Oil painted from life
By Sir Roland Richardson
Marigot, French St. Martin
Size: 40” x 25” canvas
Dated October 2019
$5,500
Commissioned Portraits Welcomed!
Original Oil painted from life
by Sir Roland Richardson
Size: 50” x 28” canvas
Dated February 2017
Marigot, French St. Martin
$5,500
Limited Edition Giclee on Canvas Commission Order is Welcome
Original Oil painted from life
by Sir Roland Richardson
Size: 41” x 24” canvas
Dated May 2019
Marigot, French St. Martin
$5,000
Limited Edition Giclee on Canvas Commission Order is Welcome
Original Oil painted from life
by Sir Roland Richardson
Size: 43” x 25” canvas
Dated June 2016
Marigot, French St. Martin
$5,500
Limited Edition Giclee on Canvas Commission Order is Welcome
Painted from life by Sir Roland Richardson
Marigot, French St. Martin
Original Oil on Canvas
72” x 30.75”
July 2012
$10,000
“In the small village of Grand Case where I grew up, you knew everyone. Certain qualities stand out as if symbolically more so than your actual knowledge or experience of them. Mr. Gilbert Denis was one of these personalities. You knew him by the ramrod uprightness in the way he walked, aloof and quiet and mysterious. I always naturally had a deep sense of respect for him, saw him as elegant and handsome and always well-groomed. I left the island for many years and when I returned, much had changed but some things not. The houses seemed smaller, my schoolmates like myself had changed and grown up, but Creole Rock was there as it had always been and Gilbert, older, was exactly as I had always remembered him - stately, elegant, quiet.
Many years again went by as I worked hard to have the courage to become the artist of my place and time. Eventually the time came when I understood that I had painted the rocks, the land, and the sea, the flowers and the trees, but now I should address the most challenging subject, my fellow men and women.
The tree does not care how you paint it, nor does the rock, or the cloud, but a person does. People are the only subject that has an opinion to express and therein is the difficulty of portraiture. That opinion is not limited to the subject only but implicates all of mankind so it took a while before I approached Gilbert.
“Mr. Dennis, I would appreciate it if you would agree if you would let me paint a picture of you with your suit on.”
“Well, that would have to be on a Sunday after mass. I only wear my suit on Sunday.”
That short exchange was like a huge accomplishment for me. I had approached this mysterious person from my childhood memory. Now I was faced with actually doing it - transmitting it onto canvas. I planned to work in the rectory behind the church, but the light was not good and there were too many people. This was a private and privileged exchange so we went to my studio gallery in Marigot. We worked on the porch, him standing with his cane and sunglasses, never saying a word until he was tired and wanted to go home. I thanked him and he looked at the painting for the first time and pointed to the gray line in his otherwise dark hair and said,
“Next time, you have to paint that white out.””
Painted from life by Sir Roland Richardson
Marigot, French St. Martin
Original Oil on Canvas
36.5” x 27.5”
March 2009
$7,500
Limited Edition Giclee on Canvas Commission Order is Welcome
“That capacity to respond is the subject that I think portraiture is principally about, and the response is not limited to the subject only but involves other humans and over centuries. However, portraiture is not only about a psychological revelation of the personality. It is and should be about the discovery they show and share about themselves, not what I wished to show about them. Most important to me is its timelessness and its eternal message.”
Painted from life by Sir Roland Richardson
Marigot, French St. Martin
Original Oil on Canvas
72” x 26”
May 2015
$8,500
Inquire
There is no way that we can at a glance imagine the richness and complexity of the person we see on the street yet in fact that they attract your attention maybe heralds hidden treasures. This was certainly the case with Roseann Romnit.
It was carnival time, a time when I also got into a frenzy of painting the crowds, the multicolor, gyrating troops, the music making my chest and clothes and canvas throb with the blasting roadside march in the hot afternoon sun. When I met Roseann though it was a quiet afternoon. She stood on the roadside in a large broad hat, a fiery red blouse and a down-to-the-ground white embroidered skirt down to her ankles, her umbrella and the stance that made her appear to be the center of everything.
I immediately pulled my car over and called out,
“I would love to paint your portrait!”
She said, “When?”
“Thursday?”
She answers again, “What time and where?”
And so began an adventure that resulted in several charcoal portraits and a large six-foot oil painting dressed as I first saw her on the roadside.
This lady, dress to the T was headed to Town ready for rain or shine, for Jump-Up and parade, noise, smoke, food and drink, turned out as I got to know her, had returned from Holland to her native St. Martin, having been declared unable to be helped with terminal cancer. Yet here she was, several years later, cancer-free, never having been operated on or through the use of medication, only herbs and cleansing and fasting.