Ron Romain

Ron Romain came to fine art after a long career in graphic design. Since retiring about two years ago, he has returned to a practice shaped by early training, professional experience, and a sustained interest in art as a way to think through public life. Screen printing has become his primary medium, valued for its clarity, economy, and force.

Romain grew up in a household where art was a constant presence. His father was an industrial and graphic designer with an interest in architecture, while his mother was a teacher and pianist. The family’s walls were covered with art, its shelves filled with art books, and reading was part of everyday life. His parents encouraged his artistic interests early, arranging private lessons and supporting his attempts at other pursuits, including a brief period playing the violin before baseball took over.

He earned a BFA in Graphic Design from California State University, Long Beach, taking fine art courses alongside his design training. Screen-printing classes in particular established an enduring interest in the medium. Though his professional career moved in a different direction for decades, the formal principles of graphic design continue to shape his art: concise imagery, strong composition, readable contrasts, and an emphasis on communication.

Romain does not regard his current practice as a return to a settled artistic identity. He sees it as the beginning of a new phase, one in which he is still determining how much of his design background he wants to retain and how much he wants to move beyond it. His work is informed by graphic design, but its style remains open to change.

Screen printing provides the right structure for the subjects he is addressing. “I primarily choose to screen print due to the boldness and directness of the medium,” he explains. “It feels most appropriate to the messages driving my art.” The work responds to American political and social culture, particularly the anger, anxiety, and sense of disillusionment he associates with the current political moment.

For Romain, this is not a generalized interest in politics. He is concerned with the rise of hostility and contempt in public discourse, the erosion of empathy, and what he sees as the strain placed on democratic institutions. Social media is also central to his thinking because of its capacity to narrow people’s exposure to opposing views and intensify polarization. His images give those frustrations a defined visual form.

The process begins with an immediate question: what is currently bothering him most? He then makes a series of small, fast sketches, a process he knew in design as thumbnailing. These drawings allow him to externalize multiple ideas before deciding which one has the strongest emotional and visual potential. Once an image is selected, he moves into the production of the print.

That method keeps the work connected to current events without making it merely reactive. Romain identifies a subject, tests its visual possibilities, and chooses the idea that continues to carry the greatest charge. His influences reflect that combination of design, commentary, and humor. He cites graphic designers Milton Glaser, Seymour Chwast, and Paula Scher, along with political cartoonists Michael Ramirez, Mike Luckovich, and Garry Trudeau. What draws him to these figures is “a strong concept or point of view” and a sense of humor.

Humor is an important element in Romain’s work because it offers a way to confront what he finds troubling without reducing the work to despair. Mocking or laughing at the forces that cause him anxiety, he says, can be empowering. The point is not to make politics lighter than it is, but to create enough distance to examine it.

His print Bent Not Broken brings these concerns into focus. Romain describes it as a response to the persistent pressure of the news cycle and the effect it can have on daily life. The title, however, also registers his hope that the present period is not permanent, and that public discourse can return to greater respect and care for democracy.

He measures success privately rather than through professional recognition. Having already completed three satisfying careers, Romain does not view art as a fourth career to be managed or validated. Success, in his words, is making the work he wants to make and enjoying the process of doing it.

At present, he is working on a small book he describes as an unauthorized fable about the current president. Whatever direction his work takes as the political climate changes, Romain expects the central impulse to remain: using print, drawing, and visual wit to move difficult thoughts out of his head and into a form that can be shared.