Thomas Roese

(Bay Village, Ohio, 1948 - )

Thomas Roese grew up in Old Brooklyn, a neighborhood of Cleveland which overlooks the Cuyahoga Valley and the industrial flats. His father worked in a factory, and his childhood featured blue collar workers, steel mills, chemical plants, smoke, noise, with much time spent drawing the houses of his neighborhood. Roese went on to study at the Cleveland Institute of Art (BFA, 1971), Cleveland State University (teaching certificate), and the University of Northern Colorado (MA in drawing and painting, 1977). He worked as a high school art teacher and art department chair in the Parma City School District from 1973–2002, and in the Continuing Education Department of the Cleveland Institute of Art from 1973–2004. He became an archived artist with the Artist Archives of the Western Reserve in 2001. In 2002, after retiring from teaching, Roese found himself working with a much greater intensity. His drawings, which he refers to as “urban landscapes,” became more focused, polished, detailed, and more consistently in color where previously they had often been grayscale. In 2010, Roese enjoyed a productive period working in Ballycastle, Ireland through a Fellowship with the Ballinglen Arts Foundation.

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