Hello, and welcome to the official blog of Anthony Ross Studio. Here we will post information, news, and musings from the studio. We have two series of fine art and reproductions that we produce and sell, one is “Road/Signs: Adventures in the Driver’s Seat” which depicts images of the fast disappearing neon and old signage. The other series is called “FantaSigns, Your Name in Art”. FantaSigns are customizable art prints where the customer can become part of the picture. FantaSigns are an offshoot of the “Road/Signs” and in future posts I will go more in depth about the series
To see the works go to http://www.ross-art.com or for the FantaSign series go to http://www.fantasigns.com

“66 Motel” Acrylic on Canvas Painting

“Deco Theater” FantaSign

The Work

My work has two components: the road, the means we use to “get there” and signs, the visual attractions that beckons us to eat, sleep, or play. I hope to achieve a memory trigger in the viewer that brings back a happy time of a long ago vacation, a brief stop at a hamburger stand in the middle of nowhere, or an air conditioned theater as a rest from a long trip.

I am fascinated by the duality of the communicative need that road signs have to convey; they need to be both functional during the day, and at night. The form and function aspect of neon creates an unintentional process that occurs as you look closely at these images. If the sun is in the right position, shadows form to create an unintentional visual dialog all their own. The neon also develops an abstractive quality that goes beyond their intended functionality. The shapes that compose the images, squares, rectangles, triangles, and arrows, all create complexity from simplicity.

Some of the images I’ve captured are lost to history. “Star” and “Kona Lanes” have been demolished. Others, such as “West” and “Orpheum” are in danger of becoming a distant memory. Most of the images in my work still exist, a tribute to the past and, with some images, a hope for the future. The great period of neon signage, from the thirties to the sixties, was an explosion of creativity and an era of imaginative mixtures of light and steel and a marriage of design and construction.

While researching possible imagery I’m beginning to notice a resurrection of the glory days of road images and, in spite of many municipalities obsession with conformity, insisting on creating “tombstone” style signage (a metaphorical death message?), there is hope that we could be looking at a renaissance that will create new memories for future generations.

Anthony Ross