Owen Ratner

Owen Ratner practised as a solicitor for 48 years but has always drawn and painted part-time. Owen attended short courses and studied part-time at the National Art School, Julian Ashton and with private tutor Roger Crawford. He participated in life drawing groups over many years and has been a finalist in the Mosman Art Prize, Hunters Hill, won the inaugural Pyrmont Art Prize and had several joint exhibitions in Paddington, Balmain and Rozelle. 

Owen’s early creative influences were impressionists and post-impressionists including Edward Hopper, Dorrit Black, Roland Wakelin, Margaret Preston and Jeffrey Smart. He was drawn to the strong narratives of Hopper and Smart and the way Black, Preston and others simplified the images without losing impact.  As he continued to paint landscapes and urban scapes he sought out other artists who took the reduction or distortion of images to another level including Richard Diebenkorn, William Scott, Raimonds Staprans, Nicholas de Stael, Peter Doig and Giorgio Morandi. 

Owen’s approach to painting is to create minimal landscapes, reduce, eliminate, define and hone compositions to essentials, to abstract, and to create broad fields of colour. 

“Although I visualize many components as patterns on a flat plane I also imbue forms with three-dimensionality through the use of perspective, light and shadow. I am drawn to the process of incorporating all these elements in my paintings, not just as an intellectual exercise (which I enjoy) but as a means of creating for the viewer feelings of curiosity, belonging, harmony and dissonance.”