The Felder Gallery is very pleased to show the work of San Antonio artist Rick Kroninger. Rick has never been one to limit himself to one particular medium. He is equally at ease with photography, sculpture and painting.

Sculpture:
The Gallery is currently featuring Kroninger’s stunningly realistic trompe I’oeil sculptures. Artifacts placed appropriately on table-like surfaces from the 1950’s and 1960’s bring back memories of his childhood in Los Angeles. But what’s amazing about these precisely detailed, authenticlooking collector’s items is that they are all carved out of wood. “I’m drawn to these objects because they remind me of a less politically correct period of time – pulp fiction, film noir, even the pleasures of smoking now gone,” Kroninger says. “I’m kind of fascinated with what my age considers taboo. The slightly sleazy associations conjured up by these tableaux are in contrast to our puritanical society.”

“Stork Club” was the first of this series. “My first piece just popped into my mind one day and it wouldn’t go away. It haunted me. I was busy with other things, but I couldn’t resist it. I chose wood because of seeing a miniature Egyptian 5,000-year old boat made of wood in the Chicago Art Institute. Its permanence impressed me so much and I never forgot it.”

“These pieces capture a moment that has disappeared. They are stories. I even think about the person behind the objects, and these characters came alive for me as I worked on them. By re-creating these things from the past – as mundane and as ordinary as they are – I really enjoyed giving emphasis to them and the memories they are able to trigger.”

Rick Kroninger spent more than three years carving these pieces currently showing in the Gallery. He used small dental tools to in order to precisely duplicate each object in the scene. “I think of these works like telling stories – you have to pay a lot of attention to detail in order to convey the story and hold everyone’s interest.”