Robert Wienert Nickle

Background

Robert Nickle was born on May 22, 1919, in Saginaw, Michigan, United States.

Education

In 1943 Robert graduated from the University of Michigan where he studied architecture and design.

Career

Robert Nickle enlisted in the Navy that May, and served in the South Pacific. Nickle worked and taught primarily in Chicago, Illinois where he was affiliated with the New Bauhaus under László Moholy-Nagy, then with the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC).

Nickle’s sumptuous abstractions were constructed of weathered bits of paper and cardboard he found on the street. Each of the small pieces took years to make, the artists waiting for precisely the correct element to add to a specific spot. Associated with the New Bauhaus for years, Nickle’s work has its affinities with Kurt Schwitters and Alberto Burri, but his sensibility is wholly personal, as is reflected in his elaborate and unusual manner of framing. The works all have a little window on the verso with a photo of the artist on the day he finished the collage, a literal portal onto the visage of the maker.

Robert Nickle's work is included in the permanent collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, David and Alfred Smart Gallery, Whitney Museum of American Art, the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, the Indianapolis Museum, Smithsonian Museum, Carnegie Institute Museum and the National Gallery in Washington. Unfortunately, that is the only information known about his artistic career. The artist died on November 12, 1980.

Achievements

• Robert Nickel was known primarily for his "street scrap" collage work.

Works

More photos

• painting

  • Untitled

    1961

  • Untitled

    1962

  • Untitled

    1963

  • B5

    1964

  • Untitled (black on orange)

    1969

  • Untitled

    1969

  • Untitled

    1973

  • Untitled

    1974

  • Untitled

    1975

  • Untitled (Enclosed)

    1978

  • Untitled

    1979

  • Untitled Collage

    1979

  • Untitled

    1979

Views

Robert Nickle adhered to the artistic traditions of Abstract Expressionism.

Connections

tutor:

Laszlo Moholy-Nagy

References

• Robert Nickle collages
  1978