Following his parents’ separation when he was in the first grade, Robert O. Caulfield was entrusted to the care of his alcoholic maternal grandmother. He spent the next six years under her tipsy supervision, running wild on the perilous streets of Depression-era Roxbury, Massachusetts.

 

Horrified by the neglect he was suffering, Robert’s paternal grandparents adopted him when he was on the verge of adolescence. Overnight, Robert moved from a cockroach-infested hovel to a roomy house in a comfortable suburb on Boston’s North Shore. Despite the middle-class comforts that transformed his life, the wounds inflicted by his childhood would never completely heal.

 

A gifted athlete, Robert was a reluctant student who turned down scholarship offers from Harvard and Holy Cross. After a stint in the Marine Corps, he eloped with his high school sweetheart, Marilyn Le Blanc. During the first few years of their marriage, Robert studied art at night in Boston. Those studies ended when the financial demands of his growing family took precedence over his artistic dreams.

 

Over the next thirty years, Robert worked his way up from laborer to upper management in a utility company. Working sixty-hour weeks to support his family, he grabbed time to paint whenever he could, exhibited his landscapes locally and sold about five paintings per year. Although Robert sometimes struggled with self-doubt, Marilyn’s faith in her husband’s talent never wavered.

 

Marilyn persuaded Robert to take early retirement shortly after one of his paintings received national exposure in Yankee magazine. Together they opened an art gallery in Woodstock, Vermont showcasing Robert’s work when he was fifty-six. Their partnership proved spectacularly successful.

 

Robert is the author of three books reflecting on his life and career: The Art of Robert O. Caulfield, Ruggles Street, and Dancing with Light. Over the past three decades Robert O. Caulfield has risen to prominence as one of the best-selling artists in the world. More than three thousand of his original oil paintings and watercolors hang in public and private collections, from Boston to Brisbane.

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