Patrick Nagel

Patrick Nagel photo

Patrick Nagel (1945 - 02/10/1984) was born in Dayton, Ohio, but was brought up in the Los Angeles area, where he spent most of his life. After serving in the United States Army with the 101st Airborne in Vietnam, he studied art at Chouinard Art Institute. In 1969 he received his Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from California State University at Fullerton.

Nagel first put his talents to work as a freelance artist; then in 1971, he joined ABC-TV where he produced television graphics for promotion and news broadcasts. After a year, he returned to freelance assignments, accepting commissions from major corporations and magazines, including IBM, ITT, United Artists, MGM, Universal Studios, Playboy, Beginning in 1976, Nagel began contributing regularly to Playboy, which extended the exposure and popularity of "the Nagel Woman" to a huge and loyal audience. In 1978, he created his first poster image for Mirage Editions.

The feeling of Nagel's work is reminiscent of Japanese woodblock prints as well as of Art Deco styling, yet it is completely contemporary and universal in appeal. Starting from a photograph, he would create a simplified drawing, then translate the drawing to a painting always simplifying, working to get more across with fewer elements. Bold, dark lines shape perspective out of flat, cool colours and stark white spaces; the result is what some have described as "fantasy realism."

During his lifetime, Nagel's work was exhibited in several one-man shows; his first exhibition of painting sold out within fifteen minutes. His posters have been collected by such prestigious institutions as the Library of Congress, the Oakland Museum, and the Grunwald Centre for the Graphic Arts at U.C.L.A. Permanent collections of his work are housed at the Bibliotheque des Arts Decoratifs, Paris, and the Smithsonian Institution. Among the awards Nagel received were recognition by Communication Arts, Art Direction, and Graphics.

Patrick Nagel died of a heart attack in 1984 at the age of 38, but his art lives on. In 1986, a retrospective book on his art was published by van der Marck Editions, and sold nearly 240,000 copies in hardcover in just one year. <Extracted from the official Patrick Nagel Homepage> Architectural Digest, Rolling Stone, Oui, and Harpers.

Style

Nagel would start with a photograph and work down, always simplifying and removing elements which he felt were unnecessary. The resulting image would look flat, but emphasized those elements which he felt were most important.

According to Elena G. Millie, curator of the poster collection at the Library of Congress:

Like some of the old print masters (Toulouse-Lautrec and Bonnard, for example), Nagel was influenced by the Japanese woodblock print, with figures silhouetted against a neutral background, with strong areas of black and white, and with bold line and unusual angles of view. He handled colors with rare originality and freedom; he forced perspective from flat, two-dimensional images; and he kept simplifying, working to get more across with fewer elements. His simple and precise imagery is also reminiscent of the art-deco style of the 1920s and 1930s- its sharp linear treatment, geometric simplicity, and stylization of form yield images that are formal yet decorative.

Nagel's figures generally have black hair, bright white skin, full-lipped mouths, and distinctive eyes, which are often squared off in the later works. Because of the intense stylization and reduction of facial features into clean lines, generally the figures resemble each other, though Nagel worked with many models, including Playboy Playmates Cathy St. George, Tracy Vaccaro and Shannon Tweed. Nagel also painted several celebrity portraits including those of Joan Collins (whose portrait was subsequently released as a limited edition print) and Joanna Cassidy.