Robert Leigh Erdle passed away December 30, 2006, in Denton, TX. Born August 17, 1949, in Selma, CA, to Dean and Joyce Byrne Erdle, Rob is survived by his wife Millie Giles of Denton, his father, and step-mother Bernice of Fredonia, NY; his sister Martha Waterman (Neil) of Forestville, NY; his brother Richard (Susan) of Silver Creek, NY; his nephews Leigh Waterman of San Francisco, CA, Colin Erdle of Buffalo, NY, and Andrew Erdle of Syracuse, NY, and several aunts, uncles and cousins. He was predeceased by his mother.
After receiving his BA from the University of California at Fresno and his MFA from Bowling Green University in Bowling Green, Ohio, he joined the undergraduate/graduate painting and drawing faculty at the University of North Texas in Denton, where he taught for the last 30 years. While at UNT he was also an instructor for 10 years at the American College of Switzerland, and a past director of the Chautauqua Institution Art Gallery and director of the Summer School of Art. He was honored as a Regents' Professor and Regents' Faculty Lecturer, and received the President's Council Teaching Award and Distinguished Service for International Education Award by UNT. Other honors include the Distinguished Alumni Commencement Award by Bowling Green University and the Honorary Award for Life Service by the Chautauqua Art Association, Chautauqua Institution.
Rob's students benefited from his own vision, use of color, and artistic philosophy as a watercolorist. At 24 he was the youngest artist to receive an award and full portfolio acceptance by the National Watercolor Society. With the opening of his 1995 one-man show at the Shanghai State Art Museum in Shanghai, China, he became the first solo artist to show in China from the West since J.M.W. Turner's exhibit in 1960. Rob's work in China included 13 years of teaching at the premiere Luxun Academy of Fine Arts in Shenyan, where he was most recently named Distinguished Visiting Professor. For 20 years he participated in Watercolor USA, having first been chosen as a young artist in 1973, and later serving as president of the Watercolor USA Honor Society. His 47 one-man exhibitions in the U.S., Europe and Asia spanned 35 years and included the 2006 exhibits: Luminous Landscapes: Watercolors by Rob Erdle, an 18-year retrospective at the Louisiana Art and Science Museum in Baton Rouge, and Recent American Watercolors in Niigata, Japan, where Rob served as honorary president of the International Watercolor Institute. A group exhibitor in more than 170 shows, he was also a juror for many watercolor exhibitions, including the National Watercolor Society and Watercolor USA. He conducted seminars and lectures across the U.S. and in more than a dozen countries, and enjoyed critiquing watercolor groups in the local Dallas area. In January of 2006 he was honored at a gala by the Visual Arts Society of Texas, at which it was announced that the Rob Erdle Award Fund, an endowment to provide financial support to future watercolor students, had been established by the School of Visual Arts at UNT.
Rob will be sadly missed by his family, friends and students for his dedication to the study of watercolor, his irrepressible spirit of adventure, and his wonderful sense of humor. Private services will be held in Silver Creek, NY.