Fairfield Porter

Fairfield Porter was an American painter, art critic, and poet best remembered for his bold paintings of quiet domestic life, enhanced by his progressive interpretations of light and colour. Inspired by both the intimate, representational paintings of French artists like Édouard Vuillard and Pierre Bonnard as well as Abstract Expressionism by the likes of Willem de Kooning, Porter developed his own signature style combining concrete local detail with overall abstraction.

Born in 1907 in Winnetka, Illinois, Porter studied at Harvard University and later at the Art Students League in New York. Porter became a published art critic, well informed in philosophy. Despite the prevalent current of Abstract Expressionism in the post-war New York art scene, Porter’s painting style remained staunchly representational.

Porter took his immediate surroundings, family members, friends and familiar landscapes as subjects. With small strokes, Porter paints on shadows and highlights in layers of contrasting shades, in a manner almost reminiscent of printmaking. His style is a unique combination of a variety of abstract and realistic techniques and aesthetics.

The artist believed that an artist should be open to experience while creating art. ‘When I paint,’ he said, ‘I think that what would satisfy me is to express what Bonnard said Renoir told him: “make everything more beautiful”.’

While his paintings might not have received similar recognition as his Abstract Expressionist peers, Porter’s writings championed the abstract work of his contemporaries. Fairefield Porter died in 1975, aged 68, and bequeathed about 250 works to the Parrish Art Museum in Water Mill, New York. His paintings can also be found in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York, as well as other major institutions.