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Featured Artists |
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Copyright © 2008
The Redstone Gallery
All Rights Reserved |
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Thomas Easley |
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Thomas Easley
was born in the United States in 1949 and grew up in
the Sierras. Originally a writer, he is a
self-taught artist who began developing his artistic
talents 25 years ago.
He has lived in many places across the globe that
have provided inspiration for his art and technique.
From the snow-capped Sierras and the verdant hills
of England to the canals of Venice and the banks of
the Ganges in India, all have influenced his work.
Thomas Easley’s art career began in 1979 when he
illuminated selected poems for his book “Rainwater.”
Through the process, Easley realized he had an
unexpected talent for painting. He originally
mastered his craft by copying Old Masters paintings
in museums across Europe. These early copies of
originals such as Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa and
the Virgin on the Rocks were so remarkable that
collectors purchased them.
In 1980 he moved to England where he refined his
skill as a classical realist specializing in
miniature paintings, which he sold to the
aristocracy. He had successful shows at the Royal
Miniature Society gallery and at the prestigious
Medici Gallery on Bond Street. In 1984, he was
elected a full member of the Royal Miniature
Society, the first American to be included in the
organization.
A traveler at heart, Easley then moved to Venice,
Italy, and began painting large-scale cityscapes
using glazed oil, a technique he learned through
studying the works of Canneletto and Guardi. He also
developed a pencil, chalk and watercolor style for
painting female nudes on paper. His works were
purchased by serious art collectors across Europe
and America, including the Prince and Princess of
Wales, the Ciga Hotels group, Villeroy and Bosch,
Harry’s Bar, English playwright Alan Ayckbourn and
Thomas Hoving, long time director of the
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
In 1988, Easley moved to India, a country gloriously
laden with rich colors and an ancient culture that
enthralled every aspect of his creative interests.
He began painting Indian subjects in oil and
developed a new style of surrealism called
“dimensional realism.” The style arose from Easley’s
need to create a visual reference for some of what
he learned from years of studying ancient knowledge
systems.
From India, he returned to Italy, and then traveled
to Spain, Turkey, Greece and France, all of which
influenced his art.
In the early 1990s, he had a series of shows in the
United States and England, including (in London) the
Victoria and Albert Museum, Dunhill’s and Asprey’s
Gold Room, Vassar College in New York, the Londra
Palace, Venice, and the Genesis Gallery in Calcutta,
India.
In 1997, Easley returned to the area of his
childhood: Lake Tahoe in the high Sierras. He began
painting forest scenes and grand vista landscapes in
oil. Then late one night, awakened by an image of
the sun setting on a distant peak, Easley pulled out
the plywood stiffening his mattress, the only
available canvas, and |
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Burst of Pride |
Powder Hound |
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Call of the Wild |
One Hefty HoGeeDoe |
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Vertical Pleasure |
Beast of Serious Fun |
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Beating the Odds |
Suspended Pause |
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Sunny Day Simplicity |
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using palette
knives, painted his first “extreme impressionist”
image, a landscape titled Power Mountain.
Extreme Impressionism represents that fine line we
draw between works in abstract and impressionism.
The best adjectives to describe his current style
are “VIBRANT” and “LIFE AFFIRMING”. Thomas Easley’s
work is truly unique in several respects:
–A
flamboyant use of color that plays on contrasts and
multiple contrasts to create an image that almost
appears to move.
– Amazing
texture –
the use of palette knife techniques with heavy
paints provides an incredible texture of
unusual intensity.
Thomas Easley’s classical and sophisticated fine
wine still-lifes are born of two styles, classical
realism and extreme impressionism; with the one we
see refined brushwork and subtlety and the other
thick celebrations of robust color. This blending of
textured impressionism and fine bush work on the
bottles and labels make these paintings truly
unique.
An Easley rooster is more than a rooster; it’s an
event of creation with the joy of living at its
center. And roosters are proud to be roosters, they
are sure of their role in the world; to a rooster he
is the King of Beasts. Easley roosters convey this
attitude with vibrancy and fun. Simply put, Easley
roosters are art for fun with fun being an
expression of profound gratitude. While bright with
youthful enterprise they are, as well, mature images
made wise by reserved contemplation.
Having skied professionally from his late teens to
his early twenties, Easley has a sure sense of the
effort required to achieve competitive competence in
sports. He plays golf, has covered the Buick Classic
for The Times of India in 2002 and 2003, and, as he
has said many times, “golf is not an adrenalin
sport, you win in golf with your mind more than your
body.”
Easley’s putt and swing images tell the story of his
love of sport, of the deep investment a professional
golfer makes in mastering the game. They talk of how
that “just right” touch so magically drops the ball
into the cup, how the chip shot achieves recovery
and how the sound punched into a still air off a
perfect drive lights the smile with want of more.
Landscapes represent a personal allure for Thomas
Easley as the presence of expansive forest terrain,
alpine meadows, lakes, summits high, clear blue
skies saturated, at times, with biblical brilliance
draw much on what he loved most about growing up in
the Sierra Nevada mountains.
The often fragmentary and fleeting details in an
Easley landscape gain the strength of reality
through his years of mastering the standards
developed by the “Old Masters.” Easley landscapes
are refreshing uncomplicated excursions into a world
inhabited by storytelling and the games children
play when adults aren’t looking. They are unique, an
original investigation into the arena of tactile
feelings. Some of his most popular works are lush
forests, wide meadows with a rich celebration of
wild flowers rushing toward the viewer like an eager
river.
Like many great artists, his art continues to
evolve. He currently lives in New York’s Westchester
County with his wife and son. His interest in
classical art remains. |
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