Rick Mullin “Cranberry Bog in the Pine Barrens,” 2025

Rick Mullin’s The Landscape exhibition features 14 works created with thick oil and acrylic paint on canvas and panel, with an emphasis on the landscape. Many of the works were painted directly on site, or from studies and drawings made from observation. The settings for the paintings are specific locations that Mullin returns to again and again, and with which he feels a visceral connection.

Though representational to each location, the paintings veer toward the abstract and romantic, luxuriating in bold mark-making and rich color. Impasto surfaces draw us in to the earthly qualities that have been witnessed in these places, while transporting us to higher, emotional states. The paintings suggest a process that is responsive and intuitive. Mullin states, “My approach is difficult to describe, but I find that George Inness’s observation that knowledge must bow to spirit is essential to landscape painting. It has become something of a mantra to me as I work.”

The Landscape, organized by Jason Karolak, associate teaching professor or art, is on view through March 6, 2026 in Mead Hall, open Monday through Friday from 9 a.m.-5 p.m. An artist talk and reception will take place February 9 from 4-6 p.m. in Mead Hall.

——-

Visit Drew University gallery at 36 Madison Ave., Madison, New Jersey 07940