Robert Noel Blair

Robert Noel Blair (August 12, 1912 – June 15, 2003) was an American painter and sculptor from the Western New York-Buffalo area.

Art Blair is known for his paintings of Western New York, Maine, Vermont, the American Southwest and the Battle of the Bulge.

Blair, a close contemporary of painter Charles Burchfield, was twice-endowed with a Guggenheim Fellowship, in 1946/1947 and 1951/1952. He was also awarded, amongst other prizes, ten Gold & Silver Medals at the Buffalo Society of Artists Annuals.

Notable exhibitions

Blair's watercolors have been exhibited widely in both in the United States and Europe and they have earned many prestigious awards. Blair was honored with over fifty one-man shows in his lifetime. A tribute to Jeanette Blair, celebrating her own work as a watercolorist, was held at The Benjaman Gallery on June 1, 2012.

Museums and private collections

Today, his work is represented in many museums and private collections including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Butler Institute of American Art, the Munson-Williams-Proctor Institute of Utica, the Bryn Mawr Art Association, the Dubuque Art Association, Colgate University and the Franklin D. Roosevelt Collection of Marine Paintings. Buffalo State College's Burchfield-Penney Art Center maintains over 175 of Blair's paintings.

Most of his World War II paintings were donated by Blair to the Burchfield Art Center, Buffalo, New York, (now the Burchfield-Penney Art Center) after a solo exhibition of these works in 1985 at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., and the Watercolor Society.

Personal life Blair married artist Jeanette Ann (née Kenney; born September 22, 1922) on August 8, 1943, in front of his "Sermon on the Mount" mural, one of a trio of murals he contributed to Anniston, AL, while stationed at nearby Fort McClellan, AL. The Blair's had three children: Jeanne Blair (1945-1965), David Blair (1948), and Bruce Blair (1951). Both sons are also artists.

After Blair's World War II army service, in 1946, the couple settled in Holland, New York, and supported themselves selling their own art and teaching art classes. On June 15, 2003, he died at his home in Holland, New York.