Collection: Ron Burkhardt

Ron Burkhardt, founder of Notism, describes it as "...a unique genre of contemporary American art which fuses abstract semiotics and organic writing to record symbols, words and cultural artifacts, even as they drift slowly into the distant black hole of the past. No sooner do we experience “Now,” then that moment starts to recede, leaving us facing a nostalgic void for the fading experiences and people no longer near to us, as we desperately strive to keep those memories alive."

Burkhardt’s obsessive assaults on blank space, imbued with his compulsive detail, also depict a city-dweller’s incessant drive to harness the information overload of modern society. His intuitive work confers an ordered power on the daily chaos and confusion of our multi-tasking, computer-driven world.

Notism exalts the power of private thoughts expressed in hand-written text–its style, texture, intensity, dynamism, aestheticism, and the primal exuberance of precious memory recall.

These paintings and concepts also connote the eventual non-existence (“not-ism”) of life as it drifts slowly into the distant black hole of the past. Even as our memories and achievements surround us with grace and aesthetic richness.

Working in his idiosyncratic system of “notes as substrate” for over three decades, Burkhardt’s Notist art is both primitive and evolved. The spontaneous, high-voltage images are a testament to the complexity, speed and intensity of modern urban life, with its disparate pulls on one’s soul.

Burkhardt won a prestigious Lorenzo il Magnificio de Medici medal for his mixed media work in Notism at the 2005 Florence Biennale, a contemporary art extravaganza held every two years in world famous Florence, Italy. 

Ron has won over 200 creative awards and been interviewed on NBC, CBS, CNN, Plum-TV, Aspen’s PBS-TV, and Hamptons/WVVH Television. His paintings are held in numerous museums, private, corporate and university collections in  the U.S. and Europe.