Seattle-based artist, Robert Allan, has a life story that resembles an outline for Gulliver’s Travels. Allan has traveled all over the world and worked so many different jobs that his resume looks like it was written for two or more people. Merchant seaman, longshoreman, truck driver, art director, filmmaker, pastor, school teacher and artist. Robert Allan has done it all.
Born in Cleveland in 1946, Robert Allan grew up in the rustic settings of rural northeastern Ohio. Allan attended Ohio University and Cooper Art School where he graduated with a degree in Design and Photography with a minor in painting.
The day after graduation, Robert Allan interviewed with Gene Walker of Photo-Illustrators Marketing Corporation and was immediately hired. Within a year, he was an associate art director working with a number of clients. In the next few years, Bob won many awards at art shows and exhibited in galleries across the Midwest.
1969 was a watershed year for Robert. Like many of his generation he was drafted into the U.S. Army. Allan was assigned to a photo unit in Germany and served as a U.S. Army photographer until his discharged in 1971.
Robert Allan moved to California where he attended Columbia College of Film in Los Angeles, graduating with a B.A. He began working for a small studio in L.A. where he began his film career.
Before Robert could expand his film career, he experienced a life-changing encounter with God that resulted in his call to the ministry. He gave up his film and art career and spent many years in the ministry until the onset of visual problems in 2002 which began his battle with blindness. After five operations his vision deterioration was arrested. The prospect of blindness prompted him to enter a period of soul-searching that resulted in his decision to re-establish his career in the arts. Bob grabbed a brush, paints and a canvas and began to paint. Within a year, his paintings attracted the interest of art shows and galleries in Seattle. Bob’s career, although jump-started later in life, is propelling him back to the center of the art field.
Selected Collections:
Robert Rivard
Joseph Gemar
Julie Batson
Robert Creamer
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