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Mardi Gras 1991:2021 web

Taking Care of Business-framed

George Rodrigue

1944-2013. Born and raised in southwest Louisiana, “Cajun Country,” George Rodrigue preserved on his canvas what he feared was his dying heritage — including its land, people, traditions and mythology. It was a Cajun legend, the loup-garou, that spawned his most famous series,

The Blue Dog.

Read about George Rodrigue

George Rodrigue in Studio

“I grew up feeling a strong relationship to the old things, to the old culture, and I got a stronger feeling when I went to Los Angeles to school. I really started to understand how different I was and how different my Louisiana was.”

George Rodrigue Biography

George Rodrigue Timelne

George Rodrigue Today

Available Work

Original Paintings by George Rodrigue

Original Paintings

Original Paintings by George Rodrigue

Original Paintings

Signed Silkscreens by George Rodrigue

Signed Prints

Estate Stamped Prints by George Rodrigue

Estate Stamped Prints

Jewelry by George Rodrigue

Jewelry

Rare Editions by George Rodrigue

Rare Selections

Galleries

Exhibitions

George Rodrigue Exhibitions

News & Events

Evangeline: Evolution of an Icon (Exhibition)

West Baton Rouge Museum, Port Allen, LA Evangeline: Evolution of an Icon May 15, 2021 – October 31, 2021 Located in South Louisiana the West Baton Rouge Museum will host the exhibition Evangeline: Evolution of an Icon, highlighting George Rodrigue’s depiction of Evangeline both in his Cajun and Blue […]

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I’ve always approached painting knowing that my job is not to make an accurate representation of a subject–

IT’S GOT TO TRANSCEND THAT.

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In the early 2000s, George Rodrigue returned to ...

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Oct 23

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In the early 2000s, George Rodrigue returned to hi

In the early 2000s, George Rodrigue returned to his interest in rendering the classic female nude with a series he called Bodies. Using thousands of photographs he took of his wife Wendy amongst the Louisiana live oaks and in the famous above-ground cemeteries, he embarked upon a body of work that he continued for the rest of his life. Rodrigue first created a series of black and white paintings with and without the figure, and using scanned images from his computer, he combined the paintings with the images, playing with the color and repetitive design. From these images, he created “remastered digital prints”, which he described as the finished work of art, as opposed to the original black and white paintings.

As an extension of this series he often incorporated the body of the Blue Dog, sometimes superimposed with the female image, and other times, as in Blue Without You, the dog appears alone, surrounded by the looming oak trees.

Blue Without You
2003-05 (from Bodies Series)
Remastered digital print on paper, #14/20
Hand-signed
18 x 13 inches
Newly available at Rodrigue Studios. Call a Rodrigue Gallery or Contact Us at link in bio to learn more.

George Rodrigue paints in the backyard of his ...

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Oct 21

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George Rodrigue paints in the backyard of his Lafa

George Rodrigue paints in the backyard of his Lafayette, Louisiana, home circa 1996. #tbt
.
If you have an original one-of-a-kind work on canvas, the Rodrigue family is interested in documenting those works in preparation of a catalogue raisonné of George Rodrigue’s entire life’s work. Please contact us at info@georgerodrigue.com if your piece should be included.

Evangeline: Evolution of an Icon
West Baton ...

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Evangeline: Evolution of an Icon West Baton Rouge

"The head is too small!" complained ...

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Oct 18

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"The head is too small!" complained George Rodrigu

"The head is too small!" complained George Rodrigue, when asked why he didn’t paint cats more often. However, despite this comment, he did experiment with the shape, painting a total of seven cat-themed works, all painted between 1993 and 2013, including Cat Tie. Rodrigue painted Cat Tie specifically to raise funds for Friends for Life, a no-kill animal shelter in Houston, Texas. Following a frenzied bidding at auction in 2010, the painting raised significant funds for the animal shelter and has been in a private collection until now.

CAT TIE
by GEORGE RODRIGUE
2010
Acrylic on canvas
48 x 36 inches
Available and on display at Rodrigue Studios New Orleans. Learn more by clicking Contact Us in bio.

“Sometimes I incorporate the Blue Dog with the ...

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Oct 17

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“Sometimes I incorporate the Blue Dog with the o

“Sometimes I incorporate the Blue Dog with the old Cajun landscape that I used to paint. But I put a new twist on it, relating the contemporary Blue Dog to the old style. I like to look back…" -G.R.

GOOD MORNING ACADIANA
2010/2017
Stone lithograph designed by George Rodrigue and released posthumously
Printed in Paris, France
Numbered Edition of 90
Official Rodrigue Estate Stamp
25×25 inches
Available at Rodrigue Studios and online at link in bio.

In 1960, Coach Raymond Blanco, husband of former ...

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Oct 13

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In 1960, Coach Raymond Blanco, husband of former L

In 1960, Coach Raymond Blanco, husband of former Louisiana Governor Kathleen Blanco, notoriously tossed George Rodrigue from his classroom at New Iberia’s Catholic High for drawing. Unfazed by this action, Rodrigue continued his passion for drawing throughout his years at art school in Los Angeles and beyond. He loved drawing, and filled the pages of dozens of sketchbooks with portraits of Jolie Blonde and Cajun figures, landscapes, cars, and Blue Dogs. Some of the drawings were ideas that later became paintings; others were his favorite subjects which he revisited over and over. Each one is special and different, and often shares a slice of Cajun folklore and history.

Untitled / Landscape with Cabin
ca. 1991
ink on rice paper
8 x 12 inches
SOLD

Untitled / Portrait of a Cajun, possibly Tee Coon
ca. 1991
Ink on rice paper
11.5 x 7.25 inches
Available

Untitled / Jolie Blonde
ca. 1991
Ink on rice paper
5.5 x 8 inches
Available

In 2006, winemakers Heidi Barrett and John ...

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Oct 11

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In 2006, winemakers Heidi Barrett and John Schwart

In 2006, winemakers Heidi Barrett and John Schwartz of Amuse Bouche winery contracted with George Rodrigue for the label design of their 2006 vintage. The Napa Valley, California winery has traditionally devoted their labels of exquisite, small-production wine to American artists, and Rodrigue created two for them over the next few years. The tradition of pairing art and fine wine was not new; the famous Chateau Mouton Rothschild had been doing this since 1945, bringing together some of the most celebrated artists of their day including Miro, Chagall, Picasso and Braque.

Therefore, Rodrigue was delighted to be selected for this honor. To accompany the release of the vintage, Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner was printed in Paris, France on high quality rag paper in an edition of 900. There was a smaller AP edition of 50, all remarqued by the artist. Both editions have been long sold-out.

Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner
2007-08
Lithograph on rag paper, Amuse Bouche edition of 900
40 x 30 inches
Hand-signed, and numbered 33/900
Contact us at link in bio to learn more

"Evangeline: Evolution of an Icon" at ...

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Oct 9

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"Evangeline: Evolution of an Icon" at the West Bat

George Rodrigue would often talk about his long ...

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George Rodrigue would often talk about his long dr

George Rodrigue would often talk about his long drives from art school in California to his home in Louisiana, reliving the dramatic visual changes in the topography. He loved crossing through Texas noting the truly big sky as compared to the tiny one experienced in Louisiana by the massive oak trees. He also noted how much Texans love Texas and everything that goes with it.

When Rodrigue bought a home in Carmel, CA, in 2000 he would now make this journey, once, sometimes twice a year, always looking forward to the big chunk of time spent crossing through Texas.

Over the next ten years, he created a number of silkscreen incorporating cowboy hats, the long road, cactus, and skulls — all nods to his fascination with, and love of all things Texas.

High Noon
2002
Silkscreen, #17/70, hand signed
22 x 27 inches
(sold as is, framed)
One Rare Selection available. Learn more by contacting us at link in bio

Artist George Rodrigue in his studio; Jefferson ...

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Oct 7

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Artist George Rodrigue in his studio; Jefferson St

Artist George Rodrigue in his studio; Jefferson Street, Lafayette, Louisiana, 1980 #tbt

Beginning in the early 1980s, George Rodrigue ...

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Oct 6

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Beginning in the early 1980s, George Rodrigue crea

Beginning in the early 1980s, George Rodrigue created dozens of posters for local festivals. He sold thousands of these offset lithographs, each benefitting the festival’s community.

Among those festivals were the Crawfish Festival in Beaux Bridge, the Festival Acadiens in Lafayette, the New Iberia’s Cajun Fun Fest, and many small town Mardi Gras festivals. Some of the more popular festival prints were from a series of silkscreens he did for three consecutive years for Shreveport’s Red River Revel, beginning in 1997.

The silkscreen created as the official poster for the Red River Revel in 1998 is Pop Goes the Revel, which features the Blue Dog with a jack-in-the-box.

Pop Goes the Revel
1998
Silkscreen, AP, hand signed
32 x 24 inches
(sold as is, framed)
Newly available Rare Selection from Rodrigue Studios. Learn more by clicking Contact Us in bio.

In 1980, Professor Maurice W. duQuesnay ...

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Oct 4

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In 1980, Professor Maurice W. duQuesnay (1936-2021

In 1980, Professor Maurice W. duQuesnay (1936-2021) established the Flora Levy Humanities Series at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, thanks to a generous endowment to the university by his friend and philanthropist Flora Plonsky Levy. The annual Levy Lectures brought internationally renowned writers and thinkers to the campus of UL Lafayette, including Nobel Prize-winning author Isaac Bashevis Singer, psychologist and Holocaust survivor Bruno Bettelheim, and author Shirley Ann Grau, winner of the 1965 Pulitzer Prize for her novel The Keepers of the House, one of the six novels and four collections of short stories she wrote during her career.

Also beginning in 1980 George Rodrigue painted ten portraits, one each year, honoring the lecturers of the speaker series.

The images in the Portrait of Shirley Ann Grau (1929-2020), painted by Rodrigue for the 1983 lecture, reflect symbols from her various novels and short stories. For the painting, Rodrigue photographed the author in her home in Old Metairie, a suburb of New Orleans.

Rodrigue Studios, saddened by the recent passing of Dr. Maurice duQuesnay and the passing of Shirley Ann Grau in August 2020, is pleased to exhibit this painting in honor of these two great Louisiana treasures.

Shirley Ann Grau
1983
Oil on canvas
40 x 30 inches
Private Collection
Now on display at Rodrigue Studios of New Orleans

Above all else, George Rodrigue loved having fun ...

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Oct 2

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Above all else, George Rodrigue loved having fun w

Above all else, George Rodrigue loved having fun with his work. He enjoyed the process, trying different variations in themes, placement, color and design. He was confident in his work by the late 90s, and was printing a six-color dog and playing the backgrounds and split fonts as well.

In this untitled silkscreen, he payed with the extension of the dog’s ears and feet from the background block of color. While there are a handful of silkscreens that employed this technique, such as Unplugged and Let Loose (1995) and a few untitled prints, it was not a device he used often. Rodrigue did not release this particular image as a silkscreen edition, although he did produce a very small amount of Artist Proofs.

Untitled/Blue Dog with Tie
ca. 1997
Silkscreen, AP, hand-signed
24 x 17 inches
(Only one avialable, Sold as is, Framed)
Learn more by clicking Contact Us in bio

Did you discover George Rodrigue because of his ...

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Did you discover George Rodrigue because of his fi

Did you discover George Rodrigue because of his first "Blue Dog" book from 1994? Thanks to The Canvas, a creator of Art History videos, for recently profiling the publication.

"Cajun artist George Rodrigue painted this blue dog many times and built a myth around it. Here's how I encountered this myth at my local used bookstore."

You can watch their entire video feature on their YouTube channel at link in bio.

"Evangeline: Evolution of an Icon" at ...

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"Evangeline: Evolution of an Icon" at the West Bat

The painting All for One, One for All (2011) is ...

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Sep 29

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The painting All for One, One for All (2011) is vi

The painting All for One, One for All (2011) is vintage Rodrigue – it contains all the elements of his oeuvre within one composition.

He renders the oak trees with the same rules he set for himself in the early 1970s – with hard edges and the trees dissected at the top, so that the sky is small, and defined by shapes beneath the branches. The three dogs appear like Cajun figures, as though they are cut out and pasted onto the landscape, in the same way George Rodrigue’s ancestors were displaced from their Nova Scotia homeland and pasted onto Louisiana. The dogs glow brightly, like ghosts, rather than shadowed beneath the oaks. They appear to float within the landscape, locked in so that they cannot move.

In this newly released print, Rodrigue Studios utilized a 20-color screening process on cotton Coventry Rag paper by a new fine art printing company (pictured). In his first Blue Dog silkscreens, Rodrigue created simpler designs with often more than 10 large areas of solid layered colors by using hand-cut screens and multiple color runs. However, in many of his later prints, Rodrigue used the latest technology available to him in order to reproduce more complicated designs by simplifying the printing process with fewer layered silkscreen colors.

Now, with advances in computer design and printmaking technology, digital artists are able to separate and print the colors appearing in even the most intricate paintings designed by Rodrigue which simulates Rodrigue’s first hand-cut multiple color screening process. The result is a more complex, rich reproduction that closely resembles the stone lithographs on soft rag paper, printed in Paris, France for Rodrigue Studios such as Looking for a Beach House, Blue Dog Oak and most recently the estate release of Mardi Gras Dog.

ALL FOR ONE, ONE FOR ALL
Silkscreen by George Rodrigue
Designed 2011/Printed 2021
Numbered Edition of 90, including the Rodrigue Estate Stamp
22 x 28 inches
Available at Rodrigue Studios and online at link in bio

Thank you to @countryroadsmag for highlighting ...

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Sep 28

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Thank you to @countryroadsmag for highlighting Rod

Thank you to @countryroadsmag for highlighting Rodrigue in three articles this month to celebrate the West Baton Rouge Museum’s “Evangeline: Evolution of an Icon” exhibit. Learn more at #linkinbio

The above-ground tombs in Louisiana cemeteries are...

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Sep 27

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The above-ground tombs in Louisiana cemeteries are

The above-ground tombs in Louisiana cemeteries are a part of the cultural landscape, as much as the live oak or the swampy bayous. Borne out of necessity due to the high water table of the area, these mysterious and often eerie structures have taken on a life of their own. The cemeteries have even become part of the local tourist itinerary where one can visit the final resting place of pirates, politicians and the area’s most notorious voodoo queens.

These structures were always part of George Rodrigue’s life, as he often helped out in the family business, ‘Rodrigue’s Portable Concrete Burial Vaults.’ After heavy rains, these massive concrete vaults would sometime float out of the ground, and it was the young Rodrigue’s job to wade into the flooded area and help re-set them.

By the late 1960s, these tombs and cemeteries had become a common subject matter in Rodrigue’s art. As his work began to incorporate the Cajun people into the landscapes, he showed them living in and around these mysterious settings. The inclusions of tombs fit in very easily within the Blue Dog series, which grew from the legend of the loup-garou. This mythical werewolf or ghost dog from a French-Cajun myth lurked in cemeteries and sugarcane fields, and were often depicted by Rodrigue as sitting on a tomb. By the time Rodrigue painted All the World’s a Stage, most of the references to the loup-garou were gone, replaced by the less frightening Blue Dog, and the surrounding landscape filled with bright skies signaling hope for a brighter tomorrow.

All The World’s A Stage
1992
Oil on linen
24 x 36 inches
Recently made available at Rodrigue Studios this weekend and SOLD. To be among the first to know when new paintings are available, please contact us at the Contact link in bio.

As he did for many of his museum exhibitions, ...

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Sep 26

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As he did for many of his museum exhibitions, Rodr

As he did for many of his museum exhibitions, Rodrigue created this silkscreen for his solo show at the Nantucket Atheneum, Preservation Institute in Nantucket, Massachusetts in August 2004.

The full-bodied Blue Dog sits on the shore of Nantucket with one of the island’s three lighthouses, the Sankaty Lighthouse in the background, distinctly identified by the bright red stripe. However, Rodrigue did take a bit of artistic licensing in his design. While he portrayed the unique Sankaty lighthouse, the physical location more closely resembles the shore where you can find the less colorful, Brant Point lighthouse. The Brant Point lighthouse is the one seen by visitors as they arrive to the island by ferry. It is probably the most recognizable of the island’s lighthouses, as it has become customary to throw a penny in the water at this point when leaving to ensure a return visit.

Quite often Rodrigue was clever in his titles, often drawing from art history. The title is reminiscent of Rembrandt’s largest and most famous painting nicknamed, The Night Watch, (1642), which showed a group of civilian soldiers ready to defend Amsterdam from attack. Rembrandt's use of the light to focus on particular details of the preparation to defend the city can be compared to the lighthouse’s beacon emitting a bright light to aid in maritime navigation.

Nightwatch (Nantucket Exhibition)
2004
Silkscreen on paper, ed. of 150
15 x 15 inches
Hand-signed
Newly available from Rodrigue Studios for the first time in years. Contact us to learn more at link in bio

Rodrigue Studios Presents a New Estate Completed ...

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Sep 25

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Rodrigue Studios Presents a New Estate Completed E

Rodrigue Studios Presents a New Estate Completed Edition:

Cow Dogs, Pink
2012
An original silkscreen by George Rodrigue
30 x 40 inches
Estate Completed Edition of 150 (#’s 55-150 estate stamped)
Available by contacting us at link in bio.

George Rodrigue held a lifetime interest in the American West. He had fond memories of long drives between Louisiana and California while attending art school in Los Angeles. Early in his career he made frequent trips through Texas, selling paintings from the trunk of his car. After opening a studio and buying a home in Carmel, CA, he made that drive more often, embracing the journey even more than the destination. He looked forward to those annual pilgrimages to small, out of the way places through West Texas and New Mexico, often making purchases of interesting pieces that later found their way into his art, such as the beaded cow skull featured in his silkscreen editions, Cow Dogs.

In Cow Dogs, Rodrigue incorporates the cow skull flanked by two Blue Dogs, reaffirming his love of symmetry as well as color, in this one composition.

When asked about his use of these symbols, Rodrigue replied:
“It seems like every artist throughout time interprets the heads or skulls of horses or cows.... It’s a traditional fascination within art, inspiring creative interpretations, connecting man with animal. In the end, each artist puts his own indelible mark on basically the same subject matter. In this case I adapted a South American folk art beaded skull interpretation into my own design, connecting the cow’s skull not only to the American West, but also to Mesoamerican cultures, and through the Blue Dog and its loup-garou origins, the Cajuns."

For more information on Rodrigue’s use of the cow skull please see Wendy Rodrigue's blog: https://legacyarttour.org/2012/08/20/cow-dogs/

Note: Although Rodrigue printed this edition, he did not complete signing it. In other words, this is not a new print. It is the remaining unsigned original Rodrigue edition now estate stamped.

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