Robert Natkin

The artist Robert Natkin is renowned for his lyrical paintings that marry the energy of Abstract Expressionism with luminous Post-Impressionist coloring. Beginning in 1970, Natkin lived and worked in rural Redding, Connecticut, and his compositions may be seen as the artist’s response to the pastoral landscapes of the New England countryside. His signature shapes—amorphous amoebas, dots, soft geometric forms, and fatly sinuous lines—populate his work. The textural effects were achieved through the use of cloth and sponge to apply paint to the canvas. This layering of color and texture produces a sensuously luminous effect, one that draws the viewer into the work and radiates a peaceful pastoralism.

Robert Natkin was born in Depression-era Chicago in 1930. Although his parents were relatively unsupportive of his artistic endeavors, Natkin enrolled in the Art Institute of Chicago in 1948. In 1957, Natkin met and married fellow artist Judith Dolnick. Together, the couple renovated a storefront in a run-down stretch of the Old Town neighborhood of Chicago, creating what became the Wells Street Gallery. From these humble beginnings, Natkin’s Wells Street Gallery grew in prominence, exhibiting works by artists such as Aaron Siskind, John Chamberlain, and even Jackson Pollock.

Two years after opening the Wells Street Gallery, however, Natkin and Dolnick relocated to New York City. There, Natkin began teaching and exhibiting his work frequently, earning the respect and support of such art critics as Sister Wendy Beckett and Peter Fuller. His work flourished in New York, blooming into several stylistically—but not chronologically—distinct series: the Portals, the Apollos, the Steps and Grids, the Field Mouse and Intimate Lightning works, the Bath and Face works, and other anecdotal compositions. (1) Each of these groups took on a signature look, and the artist would return to his different styles again and again over the course of his long career.

After his move to New York, Natkin became interested in the work of Hans Hofmann and Pierre Bonnard. At the time, Hofmann was one of the most influential teachers in the city, and Bonnard and his fin-de-siècle cohort were enjoying a renaissance of sorts, with exhibitions at the Museum of Modern Art and elsewhere. In response to these newfound interests, Natkin flattened his compositions, working closely against the picture plane in an all-over style. He also paid more attention to color, even, in his Apollos, achieving something like the push-pull energy taught by Hofmann.

As he grew older, Natkin withdrew from the New York art world, eventually moving to Connecticut in 1970, where he sold his paintings directly out of his studio. This move solidified Natkin’s reputation as being a particularly eccentric personality in the art world. His artistic mantra was, “You need to look at a painting with the tongue of your eye,” a saying he apparently performed once when he licked a Vermeer at the Frick Collection. (2)

Robert Natkin continued to paint and sell his work from his home until his death in April 2010. Today his paintings are in the permanent collections of such museums as the Whitney Museum of American Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden.

1. Jonathan Fineberg, “Robert Natkin: Intimate Themes,” Robert Natkin. (Philadelphia: Moore College of Art, 1976), 10.
2. Niko Koppel, “Robert Natkin, Abstract Painter, Is Dead at 79,” The New York Times, April 27, 2010.