The art of Robert Louis Caldwell
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The art of 
Robert Louis Caldwell


"Frog Legs"

Graphite on 300# Arches watercolor paper, mounted to 1/2" maple panel and varnished
9 x 14 in
Available through
​Lovetts Gallery
Tulsa, Oklahoma
918.664.4732
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“Frog Legs”
Saddle-billed Stork

“Frog Legs” is the first drawing I drew in my Stork series, a Saddle-billed Stork. It is a beautiful bird to watch in the wild they seem sleek but comical with their movements on those long lanky legs. They have a bright red bill with a black band and a yellow frontal shield which looks like a saddle.

As for most people, 2020 was a challenging year; for me, to put it simply, it was a loss of a business that I had been building for the last six years. I found myself in June 2020 realizing that my art school was most likely not going to survive the pandemic, and I spent the rest of the year working through the process of closing a business. During this time, I did not paint or draw except for instructional purposes for those students who followed me to online instruction. 

In January 2021, I found myself able to focus on my art again. I decided to start with a drawing, graphite pencil is my passion and revisit my 2019 safari to Tanzania by browsing my reference images from that amazing trip. While scrolling through the photos, I found myself stopping and focusing on a group of images with Saddle-billed Storks wading in a watering hole. As I am studying the images, I noticed I was laughing and smiling at the comical awkward dance of this one particular bird, like it was dancing on a set of frog legs. Then I zoomed in on the image, the stork had captured a frog, and it was still in its bill. I knew at that moment this was the inspiration for my reentry back into my beloved world of creating art.

March 2021​

Classical Realism in Oils and Graphite

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Updated: November 3, 2022  Copyright 2022 Robert Louis Caldwell
  • Artwork
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    • Limited Edition Prints
  • Artist
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  • Events
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