An older painter gave me some advice: “Figuration is obsolete and color is French.” I said to myself, “To you, baby.” Actually, I had no idea whether what I was doing was going to find an audience, but my instincts told me there was no other way for me.
– Alex Katz
The work of Alex Katz ( b.1927) has always eluded being defined by any of the art movements that have come along during his more than sixty-year career. His distinctive portraits and landscapes are bold, simple and full of striking colors.
His retrospective at the Guggenheim this year was not just well-deserved; it was spectacular and received rave reviews from art critics, some who seemed surprised by Katz’s incredible oeuvre.
Katz never affiliated himself with any group, and early in his career his work was often overlooked by mainstream art critics. “My paintings were not getting any response from the outside world. But the poets all like it. So I went into the poetry world. And they asked me to do commissions. They bought my paintings.” the 96-year-old artist told his son, Vincent, in an interview for the Poetry Foundation. “I don’t think it was until 1964. I was fifteen years out of art school that someone who wasn’t a poet bought it, you know. And so, I was very sympathetic to the poets. They were my audience.”
Poets were not only Katz’s audience, they were his friends. He painted their portraits, and created portfolios that included their poems. One of his closest friends was Frank O’Hara (1926-1966), who was not only a poet but was also involved in the New York art world. O’Hara was a reviewer for ARTnews, and worked as an assistant curator of painting and sculpture exhibitions for the Museum of Modern Art.
Born and raised in New York, Katz painted his family and friends and the landscapes around his summer home in Lincolnville, Maine. His son, Vincent, is a poet and an award-winning literary translator. Vincent has collaborated with his father on art books and exhibits.
Katz has upcoming solo exhibits in Japan and New York a current exhibit in Rome. A special exhibit at the Portland Museum in Portland, Maine, which Katz helped to curate, focuses on his interest in figuration and fashion. Alex Katz: Wedding Dress will be on exhibit through June 2, 2024.
The works of Alex Katz can be found in nearly 100 public collections worldwide, including the Art Institute of Chicago, the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden at the Smithsonian, the Met, MoMA, the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, in Madrid, the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, and many others.
