Keeping an Eye on the Eyes

A curated collection of pencil and charcoal drawings by Texas artist R.G. Rives will be exhibited during the month of July at the Lake Travis Community Library. Rives will donate all proceeds from art sales back to the library to support community programs.

R.G. Rives will host a reception on Saturday, July 16th from 1:00 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. in the Lake Travis Community Library’s meeting room. The community is invited to attend this in-person event.

Born and raised in Tennessee, Rives served in the military, completing a tour of duty in the U.S. Army. He attended Texas A&M University and the University of Alabama and earned a degree in Math and Physics. During his thirty-year career, Rives spent most of his time working as an international petroleum exploration geophysicist. When it was time to retire, Rives and his wife
decided to move to a ranch and manage cattle. While there, he took up woodcarving, and after moving to Lakeway at the age of eighty, he began to draw.

Rives primarily creates portraits of people, often using a photograph as a starting point. His favorite subjects are Indigenous Americans.

“One must pay attention to the overall structure of the face and its proportions, because anything that is askew will instantly distract from the drawing,” Rives said. “But most of all, I pay special
attention to the subject’s eyes. It is amazing how much of the human character can be seen in eyes!”

R.G. Rives

Rives spent years overseas living and working in over fifty different countries. “The many types of culture and people have given me an awareness of the wonderful diversity and the exceptionalism of humans that live in this world,” Rives said.

To learn more about the artist, please visit Art by Rives at rgrives.com.