"I find Mr. Donovan's paintings to be much more than landscapes. They prompt intense feelings and pique the viewer's own memories. His Garrison paintings speak to me most deeply, so I would like to comment on them in particular.
For me, each painting is really about an emotion or set of feelings. For example, "Old Albany Post Road," sings about the lushness of summer, the enorrmity of possibilities in youth or in a journey. Its use of light is technically impressive; it seems that the painting could light up the room on its own. But the effect goes beyond great craft. The viewer feels a yearning to follow the earthly light, imagines walking down this road in the painting, and contemplates the human need to feel connected to a divine light and to feel that our paths, however prosaic, are divinely directed...
...Many other painters successfully use landscape composition to depict emotional forces, and perhaps a comparison to Edward Hopper is the most obvious, but there are two things about Mr. Donovan's work that I find unusual. The first is that his compositions are photographic. That is to say, rather than tinker with the lines and proportions in a real scene for greater effect, Mr. Donovan paints scenes as they really are, but chooses his frames and lighting as a photographer does...
...The second is the seeming paradox between the gentleness of the paintings and their staying power in the viewer's mind. Mr. Donovan's work never has to shock in order to push the viewer to thoughts and feelings beyond the usual, and they "haunt" one without being sensationalist. There is an unabashed beauty in his paintings which is never sentimental or superficial, and which coexists with the darker aspects without tension.
I feel that Mr. Donovan's work is moving and thought-provoking, and accessible. Visitors to our house, whatever their background or art tastes, never fail to comment and often at great length on one of Mr. Donovan's paintings hanging in our hall. His current work seems to bring together many of his earlier directions, and I find his Garrison series the most moving and eloquent in his body of work."-Carson Gleberman