PATIENTS PREFER PAINTINGS

Visitors to Dr. Hemchand Kolli’s office at 1215 Wabash Ave., Redlands, no longer have to look at art prints, old magazines or blank walls while they wait to be seen: patient Ronald Caraway has lent nearly two dozen of his original oil or acrylic paintings and drawings to the office. Each room has at least two of his works, and several more adorn the hallways. Some are variations of, famous artworks – for example, “Corona Lisa,” based on Leonard Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa, but Caraway’s image is masked and holding a roll of toilet paper. “I painted that during the pandemic,” Caraway explains.

“I give tours of all the unoccupied rooms and the halls frequently, says Darin Fournier, the office manager. “We get comments from the patients all the time,” he added. At this time no providers are in the office on Tuesdays so visitors that day get the full tour.

Other employees have expressed similar liking for Caraway’s artwork.

Caraway, who is African-American, paints people of African ancestry in most of his art, such as two little Black girls in his original “Halloween Watch,” which hangs in the office’s lobby. One of his favorite forms of art is copying Rockwell’s Saturday Evening Post covers, which depicted African-Americans to subservient roles and which works he “updates” by including African-Americans in larger roles somewhere in his versions. “I highly regard Rockwell’s art,” Caraway says; “I’m not spoofing him.” One of his paintings he calls “Gracing the Problem,” based on Rockwell’s “Saying Grace.” Another is titled “The Appeal: Mommy Will Fix It,” based on Rockwell’s “Shiner.” Still others pay homage to Surrealist Salvador Dali, as well as Auguste Renoir, Henri Toulouse-Lautrec and Rembrandt; at least one is based on past TV program characters. There are also restful landscapes and still lifes.

Caraway is a member of the Redlands Art Association, the Riverside Community Art Association and the Corona Arts Colony. As of this coming July he will have his artwork hanging in all three galleries. His other works can be seen on Instagram at either roncaraway or ronaldcaraway96

All of Caraway’s paintings are for sale, including those at his Mentone home. Interested purchasers may call 909-556-2884.