Rob Swainston is currently a Visiting Artist at Bard College. Born and raised in rural Pennsylvania, healing Rob studied art and political science at Hampshire College, and subsequently lived and worked in Central Europe, pursuing postgraduate studies in political science at Budapest’s Central European University. Swainston received his MFA in visual arts from Columbia University in 2006, attended the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in 2007, the Marie Walsh Sharpe Studio Program in 2009-10, and is alumnus of the Philadelphia art collective Vox Populi. Rob is a cofounder and master printer of Prints of Darkness, a collaborative printmaking studio in Brooklyn, NY. He has had solo shows with Marginal Utility, Philadelphia (2013); Neuwerk Kunsthalle, Konstanz, Germany (2012); Esther Massry Gallery at the College of Saint Rose, Albany, NY (2011); David Krut Projects, NYC (2010); BravinLee Programs, NYC (2010); and Vox Populi, Philadelphia (2008 and 2009). Rob has been in group shows at Socrates Sculpture Park, Queens, NY (2013,11); Arlington Arts Center, Arlington (2012); Provincetown Art Association and Museum, Provincetown, MA (2012); Smack Mellon, Brooklyn, NY (2011); NADA Hudson (Canada Gallery), Hudson, NY (2011); Mason Gross Galleries, New Brunswick, NJ (2010); Philagraphika at Seraphin Gallery, Philadelphia (2010); Canada Gallery, NYC (2008); The Queens Museum at Bulova, Queens, NY (2008) and the Frederic Snitzer Gallery, Miami, FL (2006). He has been featured in V-magazine and contemporary Printmaking books as well as the Printeresting, and Art21 blogs. Rob recently finished a fellowship with the Provincetown Fine Art Work Center (winter 2011-12), a fellowship at the Robert Blackburn Printshop (summer 2012), and is presently a Research Fellow at the Frans Masereel Centrum, Kasterlee Belgium (summer 2014).