Herb Roe (born 1974) is a painter of large-scale outdoor murals and classical realist oil paintings. After attending the

Columbus College of Art and Design Columbus College of Art & Design (CCAD) is a private art school in Columbus, Ohio. It was founded in 1879 as the Columbus Art School and is one of the oldest private art and design colleges in the United States. Located in downtown Columbus, CCA ...

Columbus, Ohio Columbus () is the state capital and the most populous city in the U.S. state of Ohio. With a 2020 census population of 905,748, it is the 14th-most populous city in the U.S., the second-most populous city in the Midwest, after Chicago, and t ...

for a short time, he apprenticed to mural artist

Robert Dafford Robert Dafford (born May 14, 1951) is an American muralist. Life and work Robert Dafford is a current resident of Lafayette, Louisiana. He has painted over 400 works of public art across the United States, Canada, France, Belgium, and England. ...

. After 15 years with Dafford Murals, Roe left to pursue his own art career. He currently resides in

Lafayette, Louisiana Lafayette (, ) is a city in the U.S. state of Louisiana, and the most populous city and parish seat of Lafayette Parish, located along the Vermilion River. It is Louisiana's fourth largest incorporated municipality by population and the 234th- ...

Biography

Roe was in born 1974 in

Portsmouth Portsmouth ( ) is a port and city in the ceremonial county of Hampshire in southern England. The city of Portsmouth has been a unitary authority since 1 April 1997 and is administered by Portsmouth City Council. Portsmouth is the most dens ...

Ohio Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...

. He spent his childhood across the

Ohio River The Ohio River is a long river in the United States. It is located at the boundary of the Midwestern and Southern United States, flowing southwesterly from western Pennsylvania to its mouth on the Mississippi River at the southern tip of Illino ...

Greenup County, Kentucky Greenup County is a county located along the Ohio River in the northeastern part of the U.S. state of Kentucky. As of the 2020 census, the population was 35,962. The county was founded in 1803 and named in honor of Christopher Greenup. Its cou ...

, but moved to Portsmouth while in his teens. In 1992 he received a scholarship to the

and attended his freshman year there in 1992 to 1993. In the summer of 1993 he met the

Louisiana Louisiana , group=pronunciation (French: ''La Louisiane'') is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It is the 20th-smallest by area and the 25th most populous of the 50 U.S. states. Louisiana is borde ...

mural artist

when he started a mural project in Portsmouth. Roe subsequently apprenticed to and worked for Dafford for 15 years. During that time Roe worked on Dafford mural projects in

, Ohio;

Paducah Paducah ( ) is a home rule-class city in and the county seat of McCracken County, Kentucky. The largest city in the Jackson Purchase region, it is located at the confluence of the Tennessee and the Ohio rivers, halfway between St. Louis, Missour ...

, Maysville, and

Covington, Kentucky Covington is a list of cities in Kentucky, home rule-class city in Kenton County, Kentucky, Kenton County, Kentucky, United States, located at the confluence of the Ohio River, Ohio and Licking River (Kentucky), Licking Rivers. Cincinnati, Ohio, ...

New Orleans, Louisiana New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans
Merriam-Webster. ; french: La Nouvelle-Orléans , es, Nuev ...

;

Vicksburg, Mississippi Vicksburg is a historic city in Warren County, Mississippi, United States. It is the county seat, and the population at the 2010 census was 23,856. Located on a high bluff on the east bank of the Mississippi River across from Louisiana, Vic ...

; and

Pine Bluff, Arkansas Pine Bluff is the eleventh-largest city in the state of Arkansas and the county seat of Jefferson County. It is the principal city of the Pine Bluff Metropolitan Statistical Area and part of the Little Rock-North Little Rock-Pine Bluff Combin ...

. Subjects painted by Roe as a Dafford muralist include

Native American history The Indigenous peoples of the Americas are the inhabitants of the Americas before the arrival of the European settlers in the 15th century, and the ethnic groups who now identify themselves with those peoples. Many Indigenous peoples of the Am ...

, early settlers such as

Daniel Boone Daniel Boone (September 26, 1820) was an American pioneer and frontiersman whose exploits made him one of the first folk heroes of the United States. He became famous for his exploration and settlement of Kentucky, which was then beyond the we ...

and

Simon Kenton Simon Kenton (aka "Simon Butler") (April 3, 1755 – April 29, 1836) was an American frontiersman and soldier in West Virginia, Kentucky, and Ohio. He was a friend of Daniel Boone, Simon Girty, Spencer Records, Thomas S. Hinde, Thomas Hinde, and ...

, Carnegie Libraries, industries such as river

barge Barge nowadays generally refers to a flat-bottomed inland waterway vessel which does not have its own means of mechanical propulsion. The first modern barges were pulled by tugs, but nowadays most are pushed by pusher boats, or other vessels ...

s and hospitals,

labor unions A trade union (labor union in American English), often simply referred to as a union, is an organization of workers intent on "maintaining or improving the conditions of their employment", ch. I such as attaining better wages and benefits ( ...

African-American African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American ...

heritage, and local notables such as

Rosemary Clooney Rosemary Clooney (May 23, 1928 – June 29, 2002) was an American singer and actress. She came to prominence in the early 1950s with the song "Come On-a My House", which was followed by other pop numbers such as " Botch-a-Me", " Mambo Italiano", ...

. In May 2003 he was photographed painting the

Lewis and Clark Expedition The Lewis and Clark Expedition, also known as the Corps of Discovery Expedition, was the United States expedition to cross the newly acquired western portion of the country after the Louisiana Purchase. The Corps of Discovery was a select gro ...

mural in Paducah by photographer Jim Roshan as part of the '' America 24/7'' project. The image was used in Roshan's book ''Kentucky24/7'' published in 2004. Roe was the only Dafford muralist to work on all of the Paducah murals, completing several of them entirely by himself. In 2007 Roe left Dafford Murals to pursue his own commissions and devote more time to his own artwork under the nam
ChromeSun Productions
. In 2009 he collaborated with Dafford on a poster project for the Zydeco Cajun Prairie Scenic Byway, in which he did the preliminary digital painting for the design. The year-long project highlights many local spots of interest. In 2010, Roe painted two new murals in Paducah and Vicksburg. In July, he painted ''Evening Roll Call'' in Paducah, a mural depicting the 100-year history of local

Boy Scouts of America The Boy Scouts of America (BSA, colloquially the Boy Scouts) is one of the largest scouting organizations and one of the largest youth organizations in the United States, with about 1.2 million youth participants. The BSA was founded i ...

Troop 1. The mural was dedicated on National Scouting Sunday February 6, 2011 with a parade and other festivities. In the fall of 2010, Roe teamed up with another former Dafford muralist, Benny Graeff, to paint the 55-foot "Run Thru History" mural in Vicksburg, Mississippi. Roe's current artwork focuses on the traditional southwestern

Cajun The Cajuns (; French: ''les Cadjins'' or ''les Cadiens'' ), also known as Louisiana ''Acadians'' (French: ''les Acadiens''), are a Louisiana French ethnicity mainly found in the U.S. state of Louisiana. While Cajuns are usually described as ...

celebration of the

Courir de Mardi Gras The ( ) is a traditional Mardi Gras event held in many Cajun and Creole communities of French Louisiana on the Tuesday before Ash Wednesday. is Louisiana French for "Fat Tuesday Run". This rural Mardi Gras celebration is based on early begging ...

. It is a series of hyper-realistic depictions of costumed celebrants playing music, dancing on the backs of horses, and chasing after chickens.

Work

Techniques and style

Roe conducts extensive research to develop his works and shows acute attention to detail. They are typically started as

Adobe Photoshop Adobe Photoshop is a raster graphics editor developed and published by Adobe Inc. for Microsoft Windows, Windows and macOS. It was originally created in 1988 by Thomas Knoll, Thomas and John Knoll. Since then, the software has become the indu ...

sketches, often based on models and surroundings he has lighted and digitally photographed. His

compositions Composition or Compositions may refer to: Arts and literature * Composition (dance), practice and teaching of choreography *Composition (language), in literature and rhetoric, producing a work in spoken tradition and written discourse, to include ...

are often influenced by classical art, and he cites European artists of the sixteenth and seventeenth century

Michelangelo Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni (; 6 March 1475 – 18 February 1564), known as Michelangelo (), was an Italian sculptor, painter, architect, and poet of the High Renaissance. Born in the Republic of Florence, his work was insp ...

Peter Paul Rubens Sir Peter Paul Rubens (; ; 28 June 1577 – 30 May 1640) was a Flemish artist and diplomat from the Duchy of Brabant in the Southern Netherlands (modern-day Belgium). He is considered the most influential artist of the Flemish Baroque traditio ...

, and

Caravaggio Michelangelo Merisi (Michele Angelo Merigi or Amerighi) da Caravaggio, known as simply Caravaggio (, , ; 29 September 1571 – 18 July 1610), was an Italian painter active in Rome for most of his artistic life. During the final four years of hi ...

as major influences. For his historical murals, he will often pick a particular artist or illustrator from the time period he is depicting to emulate; thereby he can stylistically invoke the era. After the composition is decided upon, he transfers it to the painting surface either by

scaling Scaling may refer to: Science and technology Mathematics and physics * Scaling (geometry), a linear transformation that enlarges or diminishes objects * Scale invariance, a feature of objects or laws that do not change if scales of length, energ ...

the design and doing a grid transfer or with an

overhead projector An overhead projector (often abbreviated to OHP), like a film or slide projector, uses light to project an enlarged image on a screen, allowing the view of a small document or picture to be shared with a large audience. In the overhead project ...

. He paints the murals either with industrial

acrylic enamel Enamel paint is paint that air-dries to a hard, usually glossy, finish, used for coating surfaces that are outdoors or otherwise subject to hard wear or variations in temperature; it should not be confused with decorated objects in "painted enam ...

s or the longer lasting

silicate mineral paint Silicate mineral paints or mineral colors are paint coats with mineral binding agents. Two relevant mineral binders play a role in the field of colors: Lime and silicate. Under influence of carbon dioxide, lime-based binders carbonate and water sil ...

s. His oil paintings are done in a classical realist style, and subjects include portraiture, photo-realist abstract compositions, and historical illustration. These oil paintings may contain from three to 20 layers, from underpainting to the final colored glazes. Roe also does conservation work on murals.

Exhibits

* In 2002 Roe was part of an exhibition with artist Wayne Ditch at the Cite des Arts in Lafayette, Louisiana during the

Festival International de Louisiane The Festival International de Louisiane is an annual music and arts festival held in Lafayette, Louisiana celebrating the French heritage of the region and its connection to the Francophone world. The festival was first held in 1987 and has beco ...

. * In 2008 he was included in the Acadiana Center for the Arts "Southern Open", an annual juried show open to residents of Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida. The juror for the show that year was Peter Frank. * Solo Exhibit at the A.I.R. Studio in Paducah, Kentucky in September 2009. * ''Masks & Mayhem – The Courir de Mardi Gras'': An exhibit of Roe's oil paintings and graphite drawings of the traditional Cajun ''Courir de Mardi Gras'' during February 2012.

Murals

* In 2006 Roe completed three murals in the new Portsmouth High School. The murals depicted the previous high school building (now demolished), school mascot Trojans welcoming new students into the building, and an indoor sports-themed mural at the entrance to the gymnasium. * In 2009 Roe completed three sports-themed murals on the new Clark Athletic Complex in Portsmouth, Ohio. The murals depict the three sports played at the new facility: a baseball game, tennis match, and football game. *In the summer of 2010 Roe added a new mural to the Paducah Wall to Wall Project, showing the 100-year history of the local

Boy Scout A Scout (in some countries a Boy Scout, Girl Scout, or Pathfinder) is a child, usually 10–18 years of age, participating in the worldwide Scouting movement. Because of the large age and development span, many Scouting associations have split ...

troop. Troop 1 is one of only a handful of troops who share their centennial with the centennial of the national scouting organization itself. The dedication for the mural was held on National Scout Sunday, February 6, 2011. * Roe teamed up with Benny Graeff, a fellow former Dafford muralist, to paint the 55-foot long "Run thru History" mural in Vicksburg, Mississippi in the fall of 2010 . The mural is located across the street from the Vicksburg Riverfront Murals Project on Grove Hill. The mural's subject matter is the annual 10k run through the

Vicksburg National Military Park Vicksburg National Military Park preserves the site of the American Civil War Battle of Vicksburg, waged from March 29 to July 4, 1863. The park, located in Vicksburg, Mississippi (flanking the Mississippi River), also commemorates the greater ...

, and it shows several prominent monuments from the park.

Gallery

File:Kincaid Site mounds HRoe 05.jpg, Herb Roe painting of the

Kincaid Mounds State Historic Site The Kincaid Mounds Historic Site ( 11MX2-11; 11PO2-10) , is a Mississippian culture archaeological site located at the southern tip of present-day U.S. state of Illinois, along the Ohio River. Kincaid Mounds has been notable for both its sig ...

used at the site File:Courir de Mardi Gras Number 4 HRoe 2009.jpg, Oil painting of a

References

External links

Official website

Interview on "The Exchange" with Cheryl Castille

KRVS KRVS (88.7 FM) is a radio station broadcasting a public radio format. Licensed to Lafayette, Louisiana, United States, it is currently owned by the University of Louisiana at Lafayette and features programming from American Public Media, Nation ...

The artistic side of the wall

The Plain Dealer ''The Plain Dealer'' is the major newspaper of Cleveland, Ohio, United States. In fall 2019, it ranked 23rd in U.S. newspaper circulation, a significant drop since March 2013, when its circulation ranked 17th daily and 15th on Sunday. As of Ma ...

Palm Desert Artist Registry
{{DEFAULTSORT:Roe, Herb 20th-century American painters American male painters 21st-century American painters American muralists People from Portsmouth, Ohio People from Greenup County, Kentucky People from Lafayette, Louisiana 1974 births Living people Columbus College of Art and Design alumni 20th-century American male artists