Reuben Tam

Who was Reuben Tam?

Reuben Tam was an American landscape painter, educator, poet and graphic artist. He was born in Kapa'a on the Hawaiian island of Kaua'i on Jan. 17, 1916. He earned a BA degree from the University of Hawaii in 1937, and also studied at the California School of Fine Art, at Columbia University with Meyer Schapiro and at the New School of Social Research in New York City. From 1946 to the 1970s, he taught at the Brooklyn Museum Art School where his students included Frances Kornbluth. He also spent many summers painting on Monhegan Island in Maine. Upon retirement in the 1970s, Tam returned to Kaua'i and died there on January 3, 1991 of lymphoma.

Tam is best known for his semi-abstract landscapes and seascapes, such as The Island. The Addison Gallery of American Art, the Brooklyn Museum of Art, the Butler Institute of American Art, the Corcoran Gallery, Des Moines Art Center, Farnsworth Art Museum, Fisher Gallery, the Hawaii State Art Museum, the Henry Art Gallery, the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, the Honolulu Museum of Art, the Lowe Art Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, the Newark Museum, Reading Public Museum, the San Diego Museum of Art, Sheldon Memorial Art Gallery, the Smithsonian American Art Museum, the University of Michigan Museum of Art and the Whitney Museum of American Art are among the public collections holding works by Reuben Tam.