Tomlin seems to have been troubled by the vestiges of Cubism in his work, and toward the end of 1952, he purged as many of them as he could. I imagine that he believed that Cubist design was outworn and that he needed to risk the appearance of greater randomness and openness. Tomlin abbreviated the streamers of pigment into patches of color-a kind of magnified pointillism-no longer meshed into lattice like grids but scattered over the picture surface, like floating petals of flowers. At first glance, the shapes seem haphazard, lacking in focus. But the more one studies them, the more ‘...a whole series of weaving movements emerge,’ as John I. H. Baur remarked, ‘...the more apparent it becomes that every rectangle and circle has been placed with infinite calculation to create a subtler and more shimmering architecture than that of the boldly linear canvases.’ It is with difficulty that the term ‘abstract-expressionist’ is applied to Tomlin. He is primarlily a colorist and the subtlety of his paintings has caused certain critics to call him an artist whose style was primarily decorative. The subtlety of his works, however, often raises him to the level of a painter’s painter who achieves a great deal of refinement and sophistication although with perhaps, less immediate impact. Several critics have emphasized his eclecticism, yet he was certainly as original as many other members of the NewYork School and, according to his closest associates, really a quiet innovator from whom others borrowed. I. Sandler, Bradley Walker Tomlin: A Retrospective View, Buffalo, 1975, pp. 5-7