[3] Gatch graduated from the Maryland Institute College of Art in the early 1920s; there a visiting instructor, New York painter John Sloan, made a strong impression on him and confirmed him in his sense of his vocation.

While in Paris, he was a particularly avid student of the French modernism of André Derain, Édouard Vuillard, and Pierre Bonnard, inspirations which are evident in his own refined color sense.

The Phillips Collection article asserts that "Gatch strove throughout his career to maintain an individual style based on the American representational tradition while reaching beyond appearances to find meaning through design and color."

Despite the admiration of discerning men like collector Duncan Phillips and the art dealer J.B. Neumann, Gatch had a difficult time creating a stable career and attracting the critical and public attention he felt he deserved.

His marriage to Driggs, who gave up her own career until Gatch's death in 1968, was source of essential support to him during his darker periods, and the couple lived a financially straitened life in rural Lambertville, New Jersey.