It was with great sadness that we learned of the death of the English-born artist Graham Nickson on January 28 at the age of seventy-eight. Graham was a close friend of Hilton Kramer, the founding editor of The New Criterion, who aided and abetted Graham’s work while the artist was the dean of the New York Studio School of Drawing, Painting and Sculpture. Graham presided over that atelier-like institution for thirty-six years, ascending to the status of dean emeritus in his final, health-compromised year.
A remarkable artist in his own right, known particularly for his highly saturated, acid-bright palette and taut modeling, Graham was represented by some of the most illustrious galleries in New York. His work is held by major museums worldwide. “Indelible” is an over- and often misused epithet, but Graham’s many pictures of bathers on the beach deserve the commendation. They are among his best known and most powerfully rendered works.