Robertson Kirtland Mygatt

Who was Robertson Kirtland Mygatt?

Robertson K. Mygatt or 'R.K.', was an American landscape painter and etcher working at the turn of the 20th century. He is often associated with the Tonalist movement which was being experimented with in painting during most of his active years, having emerged as a movement in the 1880s that continued through about 1915. R. K. Mygatt was born in New York City in 1861, where he studied at the Art Students League of New York with noted landscape artist John Henry Twachtman and American impressionist painter William Merritt Chase. He also studied painting in Europe.

Mygatt specialized in painting landscapes and much of his works could be categorized as impressionism falling under the ‘Tonalist’ style. Tonalism emerged in the 1880s, and he was clearly influenced by the trend. Mygatt was also a competent etcher, but his focus throughout his career was most certainly oil painting. He exhibited at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, The Art Institute of Chicago, the National Academy of Design, the Society of American Artists and the Salmagundi Club in New York City. One of his works was included in the Louisiana Purchase Exhibition in St.