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REVIEWS
LINKS
In the 1950s, the countryside of upstate New York and the salt water bays of Long Island began to make a deep impression on the young Thomas Stratton. At the age of five, he began to record these impression in watercolor with such frequency that his family was certain that he had chosen his life's avocation. After earning a B.S. and an M.S. in Art Education from the State University of New York at New Paltz , Mr. Stratton spent a decade teaching. In the 1970s, he left teaching to dedicate himself to painting. His paintings have been shown at numerous one-person and group exhibitions in galleries in New York, Montreal, and throughout the northeastern states. Besides individuals, his collectors include many corporations and institutions and his images have appeared frequently in The Conservationist Magazine .
Stratton's
paintings recall a style reminiscent of
Winslow Homer
and Edward
Hopper
. The subjects, always of a common nature, are given the dignity that
stems from a sense of timelessness. There is a quietness and pastoral
peace, occasionally a hint of sadness. The emotional flavor, seasoned
by the use of light, is derived from a pallet of earth tones and purples,
seemingly scooped from the mantle of New England itself. When human figures
are present, they seem to belong to the landscape; a necessary part that
would be missed by their absence. Perhaps this pastoral myth is the
most prominent departure from reality taken by Mr. Stratton.
Stratton picks the moment when your eye is comforted by that sleeping dog on a railless porch, with the American flag barely moved by a slight puff of a breeze on a balmy day. Emotion is in retreat as he takes you for a walk to the docks to see the trawlers and points out the ship’s rippling shadows in the water. The walk home from the docks finds an artist’s vignettes of American small town treasures; the various wooden victoriana in the houses, a young girl in a country lane passing a farm. The watercolors are clean and simple. Details are emphasized right where they are needed. Other areas are simplified by correct abstraction.William Pellicone, ArtSpeak, April 23, 1981
Stratton in not “into grandeur” and feels more at home with Winslow Homer than with painters of vast panoramas such as Fredrick Church or George Inness. His favorite subjects are people going about their daily lives . . . hanging out wash, conversing, playing with children, working, or just strolling. . . . Other favored themes are the porches and fretted decorations on wooden houses of Victorian times. . . . To capture the intimate play of light and shade on the woodwork, Stratton includes only those details in his painting that give it prominence. These fragments are, at times, backdrops for lovingly cultivated planters, or bottles of flowers.Edward Feit, Cape Cod Life , Early Summer 1985
Mr. Stratton presents realistic landscapes and genre watercolors taken from scenes in the area around Woodstock, New York, and New England. Two qualities inspire Mr. Stratton’s work. One is the event that he is depicting and the other is the light. From a lyrical point of view, he looks for something important, timeless, or peaceful in his subject matter. . . . Also evident in Mr. Stratton’s work is his fascination for what he calls “avocations” the pastimes that are important to us and even define us.North County News, June 8-14, 1983
Thomas Stratton is one of the most skilled watercolorists in this region. Stratton shows fourteen pleasantly ordinary scenes about rural life . . . The moment is always unimportant. Few people appear; only scenes which relate in some way to people are depicted; no effort is made to emphasize absence or recency of presence. There is little stimulus to emotion in the paintings, except vague nostalgia for childhood or rural simplicities. Stratton prefers restful proportions and frequently chooses objects with architectural qualities in which this is especially apparent. . . . The material handling is exquisitely fluid. Stratton is not a risk-taking artisr, and he presents the viewer with an exquisitely finished product . . .Tram Combs, Woodstock Times , June 24, 1982
LINKS
Ulster County, New York
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Created by S.M. Schultz