Robert Zakanitch

Robert Rahway Zakanitch (b. 1935) is an American painter and a founding figure of the Pattern and Decoration movement. Originally trained in abstract and minimalist styles, Zakanitch began his career experimenting with Color Field painting in the 1960s. By the mid-1970s, inspired by decorative arts and a desire to challenge the boundaries of fine art, he shifted toward a more expressive and ornamented visual language. Incorporating floral motifs, bright colors, and painterly flourishes, his work played a pivotal role in elevating decorative imagery within contemporary art.

Born in Elizabeth, New Jersey, and raised in Rahway, Zakanitch lived and worked for many years in New York City before relocating to Yonkers, New York. He began exhibiting in New York in the late 1960s and gained broader recognition after meeting fellow artist Miriam Schapiro in 1975. Together, they helped establish a network of artists dedicated to Pattern and Decoration, a movement that pushed against the austerity of Minimalism and embraced beauty, ornament, and craft.

Zakanitch's work is represented in the collections of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Museum of Modern Art, and the Whitney Museum of American Art, among others. His vivid, large-scale works—such as the Hanging Gardens Series—exemplify his lifelong commitment to expanding the language of abstraction through decoration and expressive form.