Uncle Peter

It has been said that Robert Nettleton Field formed the first cell of modern art in Aotearoa. Certainly, he had an important impact on artists like Colin McCahon and Toss Woollaston. He used a pointillist technique in some of his paintings. In others, like Uncle Peter, he laid bright colours side by side without bothering to modulate them with smooth transitions. However, he ignored the strong faceting and fragmentation of form found in the work of Paul Cézanne and the Cubists. He has been described by Michael Dunn as a Post-Impressionist and mildly modernist.