Typesetter, poster artist to rock groups and movie studios, and now working in oil to produce fine art, Roberto Grande's journey remains a work in progress.

08:57 AM EST on Thursday, January 8, 2004

BY ALISHA A. PINA
Journal Staff Writer

BARRINGTON - Art thrives in a renovated garage on a dead-end street near Drowne Cove, the home of Roberto Grande, a gentle, introspective man whose life embraces cultures, nature and people.

Insights reveal themselves in shape and color throughout a body of work that has brought Grande success in two careers.

In the 1960s and 1970s he was well known on the East Coast for his music and movie promotional posters.

Now, he turns his talent to oil paint, brush and canvas.

Roberto Grande's journey as an artist is not uncommon, struggling between creating art and making a living. Yet he managed to merge the two easily while taking over his father's printing press shop. It did business for 70 years before closing in 1998.

The shop's phone rang often when an athlete, celebrity or big event came to Boston or the East Coast. Grande remembers a few telephone chats were brief and frantic: "I need this right away, Bobby. The concert's in a few days."

The orders were a welcome challenge. The facts -- who, what and when -- weren't just thrown on a poster board in big, black, block letters. They were advertising masterpieces, whether they were promoting a simple visit to Boston College by Dick Gregory, or a rare joint concert of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi and the Beach Boys.

One promo for a Chambers Brothers concert at Boston Common needed to be changed at the last minute. Former Mayor Kevin White pleaded with Grande to alter the poster's tag line: Plenty of Music. Plenty of Grass.

The mayor wanted "grass" to be replaced with "fun." The mayor got what he wanted.

Journal photo / Bob Thayer Roberto Grande at his studio in Barrington.

Another well-circulated 17-by-22-inch poster gave Grande's interpretation of JFK's assassination -- a large, red splat on white paper with the words, "Who killed JFK?"

What's missing beyond the apple-red front door of Grande's Shore Drive studio are the icons that herald his status as a semi-celebrity: awards and photographs of him posing with the famous. These objects are not important to Grande. The modest 67-year-old greets visitors with a warm smile or hug and begins a conversation as though a long-lost friend just stopped in for tea.

Grande's paintings hang on bleach-white walls, propped against crystal vases and leaning on the wooden steps that lead to his studio upstairs. The draw the eye while he tells of his journey to this point in life.

"When I look at what God creates, it's just humbling," he says. "When you're on a mountain and the sun is shining and the wind is playing a song, you just feel tiny. The whole world is sending a vibration and people don't stop and look."

Grande became the frog in his series, "A Frog's Eye View," which was displayed in July at the Rockefeller State Park Preserve in Tarrytown, N.Y. He spent countless hours in California staring at a lily pond to capture the moss and pads as a frog underwater might see it.

He and his wife, Gail, had arrived in southern California on Sept. 10, 2001, flying from Boston's Logan Airport on an 8 a.m. flight just one day before the terrorist attacks at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

"That beautiful, intriguing pond outside our cottage is a microcosm of a world," the artist recalled. "Its beauty helped me cope with the unthinkable news."

Of Grande's work For Grande, even a dead fish at a market becomes an artistic wonder -- he sketched one from a photograph taken in Barcelona, Spain, one of many countries he has visited in the pursuit of his craft.

He has traveled through Eastern and Western Europe and Africa studying the masters from before the Renaissance through the 19th century.

Grande received his first formal art training in 1948 in Sardinia, Italy. Before that, he drew caricatures and then realistic drawings of family members and South Boston neighbors.

But fine art Grande was often allowed backstage -- and sometimes sneaked in -- at a South Boston nightclub. Once, Frank Sinatra and Dionne Warwick were there, too. Grande's eyes twinkled, his laugh lines deepening, as he told what happened next.

"Dionne was watching [Sinatra]," he said. "Her cigarette was falling out of her mouth. She was leaning against the curtain. She was in awe of him."

His "Sight of Sound" series is a tribute to all that jazz. The paintings resemble smoky, dark nightclubs. They are primarily black pieces with neon streaks of paint that represent the musicians' tunes cascading from their instruments.

That series has been showcased in Boston galleries over the years. Some proceeds of the art sold have benefited the Boston Jazz Society Scholarship Fund.

"I have more [Grande paintings] than most," said Michelle Berube, of North Easton, Mass.

Her husband bought their first Grande piece as a wedding present to his wife. It was of a walkway in Bermuda, which they visited during their honeymoon. She now has five paintings.

"They're so incredible," she said. "Oh, I can't say enough about them, him. I've never seen a man capture a face [so well]. And the colors and detail... I need a bigger house so I can get more."

Grande says, "I don't have a formula. ... I have no particular style... I just paint. I'm giving back to God what he's shown you, us."

Journal photo / Bob Thayer WHO'S WHO? A collage of Roberto Grande's posters reflects the wide range of musicians for whom he has created art.

Nothing and no one is overlooked. Grande enjoys taking public transportation -- train, then bus -- from his Boston home to the studio. He admires lovers, and pauses to feed peanuts to squirrels in Haines Park. He has even formed a friendship with a RIPTA bus driver, who gave Grande his grandmother's coffee cordial recipe.

Portraits of longtime friends, random acquaintances and fictional creations show his careful attention to detail.

A textured piece of an older Muslim man -- one of his former teachers -- greets studio visitors. The man's white turban contrasts with blue-black, purple lips. The portrait captures his scraggly mustache, soulful eyes and slight skin blemishes.

His wife of 22 years, Gail, served as the model for another painting. The velvet canvas shows a diva posing with overdone, theatrical makeup and a white feathery hat.

"My wife is a heck of a lot prettier," Grande said. "... She's the best friend I've ever had. She's just precious. God sent her to me."

She's also been his manager through the transition to oil painting from celebrity and event promoting, which came to an end partly because of the rising popularity of computers and photocopy machines.

"Life is like a maze, don't you think?" Grande said. "You go through it and you turn. I thought I was going to be an actor. And then I did track, a five-year state champion, you know."

Grande worked in his father's shop in Dorchester, Mass., -- Metropolitan Show Print -- for many years before taking it over, leaving him less time to spend with his paintbrushes. He quickly mastered the Linotype machines, offset presses and wood type.

He sometimes designed as many as five or six posters a day. His main concern with each: make sure the date and time is as large as possible. It was so large that the year was often left off the finished work.

He created promotional posters for Muhammad Ali's last fight, which had Marvin Hagler as an opening fight boxer. He did posters for Jimi Hendrix's first concert, and for the original Godfather movie when it arrived in the Boston cinemas.

"I designed them in my head," he said. "I have this carousel thing in my head and it just spins around and when I see it, I just pluck it out."

Grande made advertisements for a concert by the 1970s acoustic group Hot Tuna. Bruce Springsteen was the opening act. He created fliers to promote the Northeastern University distinguished speaker series, which hosted Ralph Nader once for a discussion of "America being consumed by big business."

In the final years with the 70-year-old printing press shop, in the late 1990s, Grande transformed a corner of the office into an oil painting sanctuary.

"It's not an unusual transition" for an artist, said Fred Taylor, a former client who is a Boston entertainment director for various jazz nightclubs. "The commercial work is [for artists] to sustain themselves. In order to stay alive, such as in the music world, you play the weddings, funerals and bar mitzvahs." The posters, he said, were "Grande's commercial work. His painting is not."

Taylor said the first artwork on canvas "was incredible stuff. The one I remember is a portrait of this neighborhood guy. Amazing."

Grande says, "There's a lot of people trying to make their mark.... Art speaks for itself. Ifit's going to remembered, it's going to be remembered."

Either way, he says people should make the most of their lives because "everybody only gets so many beats to their heart."

His studio is open three to five days a week. For an appointment, call (401) 246-0335 or (617) 262-4993.

Alisha A. Pina can be reached by phone at (401) 253-1200 or by e-mail at apinaATprojo.com.