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“Prentice is possibly, even probably, the finest overlooked master painter in Hartford Art School – a part of the Wadsworth Atheneum in
the current era of money-driven gallerists now dominating the New York Hartford, Connecticut. He soon found himself a regular among
art world…Pieces from that series were acquired by the Smithsonian, the the cast of artists and characters hanging out in the vibrant
MoMA, Yale University, the Wadsworth Atheneum, and other public and Manhattan art scene. “The art world was much more collegial
private collections.” at that time,” notes Prentice.

As he moves out of his NoHo loft home of more than fifty It was at The Factory, Andy Warhol’s studio and the vortex of
years, the ever-convivial artist David Prentice seems nonplussed the avant garde at the time, that Prentice met Henry Geldzahler,
as much as bittersweet about the situation. “It’s time to move the influential Belgian-born critic and art historian who was
on,” he says with a shrug. His large, meditative landscape paint- curator of American painting for the Metropolitan Museum
ings will be the last things to be displaced. of Art and eventually served as Cultural Commissioner for the
City of New York. Geldzahler introduced the young artist to
Prentice is possibly, even probably, the finest overlooked mas- Jasper Johns, who offered Prentice the job as his studio assis-
ter painter in the current era of money-driven gallerists now tant. From there, Prentice went on to work in the studios of Cy
dominating the New York art world. “The money has become Twombly, Robert Rauschenberg, Helen Frankenthaler, Robert
the art, and that’s spiritually destructive,” he says. Fortunately, Motherwell, Malcolm Morley, and Alexander Liberman, often
over decades, sensibilities elsewhere on the planet, particularly working a day a week for each artist, stretching canvases for
Japan and Europe, led private collectors and public collections scores of paintings that now sell for tens of millions of dollars.
to embrace the work of this artist. His paintings will endure.
Pop and Minimalism were coming into their own, as a response
David Prentice arrived in New York in 1964, fresh from the to the second generation of Abstract Expressionists, a group

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