(b. 1935) Arizona-based still-life painter, Chuck Sabatino, has long studied and collected the historic and prehistoric Southwest pueblo pottery he has become so well known for painting.
Sabatino was born in 1935 in Bronx, New York. He grew up with a fascination for the West, and as a child he liked to draw scenes from Western movies. Sabatino was an avid painter by the time he was in high school, and then he became interested in advertising.
He attended the Cartoon & Illustrator School in New York, which later became the School of Visual Arts. For the 25 years that followed, he painted consistently in his free-time while he worked in New York City as an art director and T.V. producer creating countless ads and commercials for companies including American Motors, Johnson & Johnson and Proctor & Gamble. Some of his most well-remembered commercials feature Jeeps trekking across Southwestern deserts.
Not only did his commercial work during this time earn him 24 awards, it also exposed him to the Southwest through travel where he became very interested in Native American art and history. Upon retiring in 1988, he and his wife Millie moved to the home they had built in Scottsdale, Arizona, where Sabatino turned his full attention to his painting.
Sabatino’s works are meticulously detailed renditions of his beautifully composed still-lifes in rich warm hues. He paints the pottery of the Zuni, Acoma, Santo Domingo, Cochiti, San Ildefonzo and Santa Clara pueblos, often arranged alongside beaded moccasins, arrow bags, dresses, flowers and paper works like the photography of E. S. Curtis. His combinations create a multiplicity in texture and color, and represent a range of visual and historical interests.
Sabatino’s work has been featured in books and such publications as Southwest Art and Art of the West. His pieces have been displayed at Leanin’ Tree Museum of Western Art, the New Mexico Museum of Art and adorn a growing number of private collections internationally.
