john james pron

All artworks shown here are available for sale thru the gallery directly (www.ceruleanarts.com). Each are priced at $500.

Note: Adam and Eve, the Dragon of Kensington and the Street Violence confronting a Block Party are sold.

In the late 1960’s, as a student in the Architecture Program of the University of Pennsylvania, I learned to draw (pen ink sketches) from noted painter Neil Welliver, followed by painting classes by Lloyd Nick. And being the recipient of two Travelling Fellowships at Penn (one given for achievement, the other won in open competition), I travelled throughout Europe, especially Italy- sketching and note taking.

Hired as a faculty member in the Department of Architecture at Temple University, teaching design studio, drawing and graphics, I let two 3-week long summertime Study Tours, lecturing and teaching drawing skills to a group of 15 students through Italy and Greece, visiting lively cities and isolated ruins. I also had the opportunity to teach at Temple’s Rome campus, in 1996 and 2012, with one of my classes being Roman Sketchbook, and I drew alongside the students I taught.

Architectural presentations in the Graduate School of Fine Arts at Penn required rendering those outline sketches- and so light and shade, texture and pattern entered my vocabulary. And also having two sabbaticals that allowed me to set up studio in Rome gave me further opportunity to draw large panoramas as well as precise details- of the sort of traditional classically-inspired architecture that I love.

When the Architecture Program became an integral part of Temple’s renowned Tyler School of Art in 2000, I became more involved in Philadelphia’s art scene, belonging the 3rd St Gallery on 2nd St in Old City and now, presently, at the DaVinci Art Alliance in Bella Vista, South Philadelphia- solo shows, group shows, juried shows. And rather than just draw “what is”…what I saw, elements of creative fantasy entered my oeuvre. And expanded my medium from charcoal renderings and b&w drawings to full-color works-on-paper and collages.

As I continue to make art and continue to move back and forth from the two cities I know best and love- Rome and Philadelphia- the city that is 2500 years old has so many lessons to offer to this “upstart” city of 350 years. And so it continues to deeply influence me, in the making of my art, in my cafeer in teaching, and in my professional practice as a registered architect.

The Rome Program of Temple University has occupied the historic Villa Caproni, directly along the Tiber River, for over 50 years. Still an overseas anchor of Tyler School of Art and Architecture, I was fortunate to teach- in 1996 and 2012, architectural design studios, sketchbook classes and lectures on the History of Architecture and Urban Design in Rome- from the Etruscans to the 21st century. I had two sabbaticals that allowed me to set up studio in Rome and was fortunate enough to be given a solo exhibition in the Program’s Art Gallery.

This large charcoal drawing, titled “Pilgrim” was added to the Program’s permanent collection- hung in the lobby of the Palazzo, adjacent to its large central student lounge. The background setting is the top of the Spanish Steps. The students beneath it are hardly pilgrims, I suspect.

Da Vinci Art Alliance-sponsored show at International House, Philadelphia PA,  23 Jan thru 17 Mar 2018

Juror: Katherine Kurtz

An exhibition encompassing the experiences of artists as they explore aspects of their lifetime and creative practice that reflect social turmoil or respond to a life well lived. 

Presented in conjunction with the UCLA Festival of Preservation at Lightbox Film Center, International House.     

Originally built in 1972, the Desmond Hotel in Albany, New York, grew to become a noted local hospitality and restaurant venue.  Several additions and renovations doubled its size and added convention facilities- important in a state capital.   The overall layout (including two interior atriums- necessary in the cold winter climate) lacks unity and the architectural styles range from authentic 18th c colonial prototypes and detailing to theme-park kitch.  

Enabling the facility to become part of the Crown Plaza global chain means that hotel needs to clarify its circulation and refine its styling- removing the kitsch, minimizing the overtly colonial features and adding new, contemporary renovations that better serve the informal,  interconnected lifestyles of the business travelers and millennial visitors.   The goal is to keep the very best of the old (rooted in the heritage of this historic city), while dramatically counterpointing it with 21st century, upscale settings.

I am working with the architects, interior designers and construction teams of CVC Hospitality, of Winter Garden, Florida, personally serving as the design consultant to the owners, Desmond Hotels.   And so, this set of drawings serves to initiate the process of re-design.  Construction is expected to begin in the summer and fall of 2018.     

The title ARTIST/READER/WRITER (of the October 2018 DVAA All-Member show) predicates on the pairing of visual art with works of literature, creating the work in response to a written text,

This pen-and-ink prismacolor drawing is my graphic response to one chapter in the book INVISIBLE CITIES, by the Italian fabulist storyteller Italo Calvino, published in 1974. INVISIBLE CITIES is the tale of the aged Tatar Emperor Kublai Khan and the young traveler Marco Polo. Polo entertains the emperor with tales of the cities he has seen on his travels around the empire: cities and memory, cities and desire, cities and designs, cities and the dead, cities and the sky, trading cities, hidden cities.

It eventually becomes clear to the Khan that each of these fantastical places is really the same place- Marco Polo’s Venice.

But for me, its seems to me that Calvino’s varied chapters provide insights into ALL cities, ALL habitations, in ALL eras and ALL continents….and so I see myself in Polo’s shoes contemplating my own Philadelphia in the guise of his city of BEERSHEBA.

The real, everyday, everyman’s Beersheba is bracketed by a fantastical celestial city of dreams, goals and fantasies high above, as well as an infernal city of disappointments, failures and ignorance, far below. One is of the future, the other is of the past. And so one lives one’s present, daily life between those two polaries- not feeding into the inflated ego and greed of one’s aspirations, nor wallowing in the failures, disappointments and egregious behaviors of one’s past.

Can I teach myself to be as serene, as accepting, as free of acquisitiveness as the people who live day-to-day in Beersheba? Can my drawing be my self-portrait?

My large charcoal drawing "Bibita Gelati Hamburger" was accepted in the "Connotations" show at the DVAA (Da Vinci Art Alliance) Gallery in South Philadelphia.  Conceptual and text-based artist Gerard Silva juried the exhibit, which examines the use of text in art.  This drawing is Rome-based, a point/counterpoint between the massive pomposity of national monuments versus the modest, hand-scrawled message of Italian street-food.   The little food kiosk is a "scene-stealer".   

Spending a week in the small town but historic town of Hue, Vietnam, I came to know many people on the street and in the neighborhood.   These large (28" x 40") charcoal renderings are a cross-section of the inhabitants.  

Charcoal drawings of people- young and old,

As an adjunct to the designs presented in the larger gallery show, there were numerous freehand drawings of a cross-section of Roman society.  Large scale charcoals, each 28" x 40".

A series of full color renderings of closeup fragments of ancient Greek and Roman architecture.  

A series of charcoal drawings to accompany the architectural designs in the 3rd Street Gallery Show.   Portraits of those Americians who, most likely, would be denied free admission to the Cita-del- the repository of historical and patriotic artifacts.   

Part of a larger 2-person gallery show that featured my architectural designs,

Part of a larger show at the 3rd St Gallery on 2nd Street.   Five new members.  Charcoal renderings on newsprint, each 18" x 26".

A series of fine ink renderings that document the architectural changes to a "businessman's Hilton" to line it with classically inspired interiors.  

On sabbatical, visiting the Greek islands of the Aegean Sea. 

12" x 14" images

As an architectural history professor from Temple University, leading a Study Tour of enrolled students in the summer of 1977.   Assignments were to keep a diary as well as a sketchbook....and I provided the example. 

A favored student assignment in Temple University’s 2nd year architectural design studio (and a bit a ‘palate cleanser”) was to take the class of 100+ students on a wednesday walking tour of Philadelphia’s famous and historic Laurel Hill Cemetery in the Halloween season and then, for the next class, assign each of them to design and build a model of their own tomb. Friday’s class, in a large exhibition room, set up a walled grid enclosure framing 100 burial sites, 10 wide by 10 long, each student inserting and then presenting their own project, scaled 1” equals 1 foot. The four faculty members would each design their own gateway monument. These drawings present mine.

Individual framed pen-and-ink drawings to friends and family.