17: Redeeming Suburbia – A Conversation with Charles Ritchie

Charles Ritchie has been drawing, journaling, and painting in watercolors from his studio window in Silver Spring, Maryland for 40 years. Many of his drawings and watercolors are palimpsests created over decades, comprised of overlapping images of his suburban neighborhood captured at various times throughout the day and year. Key themes in his work include light, time, and dreams.  Charles holds an MFA in Painting from Carnegie-Mellon University and a BFA from the University of Georgia, Athens, and his work is held by public and private collections including the Baltimore Museum of Art, Harvard, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York Public Library, Yale University Art Gallery, and elsewhere. In this episode, we discuss his creative process and the aesthetic redemption of the seemingly mundane.