Central Park resident Ed Natan is a common sight on Denver streets, with his wide-brimmed hat, watercolor pad, and paint palette. On this unseasonably warm December afternoon, he was painting the iconic signs and buildings at the intersection of Beeler and East Colfax. Front Porch photo by Steve Larson
Sporting a wide-brimmed hat and a large paintbrush, artist Ed Natan can often be found on Colfax Avenue, South Broadway, in the Uptown neighborhood, or in one of Denver’s municipal parks, chatting with locals or tourists as he creates vivid watercolor paintings of some of the city’s most iconic street scenes. He calls it his mission to document Denver life by focusing on its diverse streets. “I believe it’s at the street level where you get to know the city. There is no barrier. It’s a public space,” says Natan. “I feel like when I share with people what I’m seeing and feeling, that maybe other people will start relating to these places in a more enriching way. The streets are where much of Denver’s soul is revealed.”
Artist Ed Natan has seen many changes in Denver over the last 60 years.
A new exhibit of his work is now on display in nine different locations throughout downtown Denver. It’s called “Iconic Denver: A Self-Guided Tour.” The paintings are showcased in restaurants and small businesses near the intersections where the paintings were created. “In some cases, you can look at the painting and then look out the window and see the exact street scene that I’ve painted,” says Natan.
Lindsey Bell is the curator of the exhibit and has featured some of Natan’s paintings at her Bell Projects Gallery on 17th Avenue. Last September, she organized a one-night pop-up exhibit of Natan’s work at Tom’s Starlight restaurant. When many of the attendees mentioned that they would love to see where the paintings originated, Bell got the idea for a self-guided tour. “It felt natural to do it that way: to encourage the viewer to experience the paintings in the same way they were created,” says Bell.
Bell believes that viewers will appreciate the energy and immediacy in his work. “I love Ed’s tenacity and that comes through in the paintings. It takes a special kind of person to paint on the street as people walk by. People stop and ask him questions and he has a knack for making that engagement warm and welcome.”
Natan, a Central Park resident, says he’s met some interesting characters while painting on Denver streets. “Some aren’t always easy to deal with. But I’ve found that painting is a universal language, and even some of the roughest people I meet see me working and we end up getting along marvelously.”
Ed Natan’s painting called “Sam’s” is displayed at Vibe Coffee and Wine in downtown Denver. It’s one of the stops on a new self-guided tour of the artist’s work where viewers can see exactly where Natan created his paintings. Front Porch photo by Christie Gosch
A longtime Denverite, Natan has seen many changes to the city over the last 70 years. His father originally had an art gallery at 16th and Glenarm, but when the City announced it was building the 16th Street Mall, sky-rocketing rents prompted Natan and his father to buy a property at 16th and Pennsylvania to set up a new gallery in the Capitol Hill neighborhood. He says there were several strip clubs and rough bars nearby. “It was kind of a no man’s land then. It had a stigma as being dangerous, but we got some property owners together to figure out how we could attract more investment to the area. I came up with the idea to name it Uptown. I did it kind of jokingly, but the name stuck,” says Natan.
As he started watching some of the dramatic changes that were happening in Denver during the 1980s and 90s, Natan was inspired to start documenting some of the iconic streets and buildings. “I decided to use watercolors that you can set up quickly, change things quickly, and the medium itself kind of shows how things are always changing and impermanent.”
“Colfax Howdy” captures some of the “snazzy” motor lodges that greeted motorists of a bygone era as they arrived in Denver on Colfax Avenue.
Natan has painted several iconic landmarks that once were filled with life but now have been demolished or are sitting vacant, including the former Royal Crown Hotel at Colfax and Colorado Blvd. Natan also painted a building that had a sign with red arches at Colfax and Valentia that was one of Denver’s first discotheques called Fridays and Saturdays. Later it became a strip club called Saturdays before it was demolished. Last year, new affordable housing apartments were built on the site.
He also painted the green building at Hudson and Colfax, which most recently housed the Axum Ethiopian Restaurant. “I remember years ago when it was a Greek restaurant and there was folk dancing. It was fabulous.” Now, the property is fenced off and the building is scheduled for demolition.
Natan says Colfax has been of particular interest to him because of its storied history as the longest commercial street in the country. “Before I-70 was built, Colfax was the main entry to the city for anyone traveling from the East. And folks were greeted with these motor lodges that had outdoor pools that were very clean and snazzy.” While many people now think of East Colfax as rundown or sleazy, Natan is more philosophical about how neighborhoods change and grow. “It’s all just part of the rhythm of the city.” And for Natan, each incarnation becomes a new subject for his paintings.
“Iconic Denver: A Self-Guided Tour” will be on display through the end of March. For more information, visit https://www.ednatanart.com/iconic-denver-self-guided-tour or use this QR code: 
I have an collage of North Denver/highlands that I just pulled out of storage. I lived in Highlands for years and loved it. This was a promotion for Centrall Bank. I think!
Just wanted to tell you how much I enjoy it