Kevin Kadar: A Painter's Painter
Materials, Process, and the Life of Painting
May’s Collector’s Crash Course at Froelick Gallery wasn’t just a meeting, it was a dive into the craft, where guests such as master framer Seth Weber and painter Gabriel Fernandez, who knew Kevin Kadar’s work intimately, reminded us why Kadar was the quintessential “painter’s painter.”
Though he never set foot in Africa, Kevin painted it as if he had. That same gift allowed him to depict vast deserts, farms, or any scene, pulling us into worlds whether he had visited them or not. The artist’s job is to transport us, and in Kevin’s case, he did so through every brushstroke.
If there was one thing that became clear whenever artists spoke about Kevin, it was that he loved the craft of painting itself.
Not just the finished painting. The materials. The surfaces. The mediums. The pigments. The endless possibilities hidden inside a single brushstroke.
Kevin worked across oil, acrylic, gouache, and ink. Those who knew him often spoke about how difficult it could be to tell which medium he was using. He handled materials with such confidence and understanding that the boundaries between them often disappeared. What mattered was not the label on the tube, but what the material could do. He knew paint intimately.
He talked about products, pigments, and mediums with the enthusiasm of someone who had spent a lifetime paying attention. Running into Kevin in the aisles of an art supply store could become a two- or three-hour conversation. What began as a simple question about walnut oil, paint, or surface preparation often turned into a lesson in painting itself.
He understood that talking about painting was not the same as making paintings. As much as he loved conversation, he also protected the silence and isolation required to work. He needed to separate himself from distraction, from interruption, and sometimes from people, so he could enter the flow of the painting and stay there. That isolation was where the work happened.
One comment repeated during a discussion about Kevin captures his approach well: “There’s a lot of information in the brushstroke.”
Looking at his work from a distance, viewers often saw complex passages of color and light. Moving closer revealed something surprising. What appeared to be many layers of information was often contained within a single mark. A highlight, a shadow, and a midtone might all exist within one brushstroke. Kevin understood how to load a brush and place a mark so that it could describe volume, weight, and light all at once.
The result often appeared effortless. Yet that effortlessness was built from observation, practice, and deep familiarity with his materials.
His process was patient. Kevin was not a painter who rushed toward completion. Paintings evolved over long periods of time. He often carried small paintings with him, brought them to drawing sessions, worked on them incrementally, and returned to them later. Most pieces moved in and out of boxes over months or years.
A painting that appeared finished one day might return to the easel the next.
He might look at it again and decide it needed a glaze. Suddenly, the painting was not finished anymore. It had another stage to go through. That willingness to revisit and reconsider was central to his practice. The work remained alive.
Kevin cared about how surfaces were prepared. He cared about how pigments behaved. He cared about the relationship between one layer and the next. The materials were not secondary to the work. They were part of the work.
His paintings contained lessons in color, technique, material, and process. Looking at them was not simply an aesthetic experience. It was an opportunity to see what a lifetime of dedication to a craft looks like.
Kevin revolved his life around painting. He loved the materials, understood them deeply, talked about them generously, and then withdrew into the discipline required to use them. That devotion is visible in every brushstroke.
That is why people called him a painter’s painter.
