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RISD Artist Thomas Sgouros (1927-2012) Original Watercolor Painting - $700 (Johnston, Rhode Island)
condition:
excellent
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Please call me at show contact info with any questions or to view the painting with no obligations to buy. Thank you, Tom.
Unframed, and without the matte, the sight size of the painting is 10 1/2" in height x 14" in width and together with the matte and frame it measures 18" x 21". The vintage frame is in overall good vintage condition with some minor scratches and inperfections consistent with its age, but as you can see, it displays beautifully.
As for the artist, Thomas Sgouros was born in Chicago, Illinois in 1927 to Greek immigrant parents, Rena and Arthus Sgouros. Thomas came to Rhode Island to attend the Rhode Island School of Design from which he graduated in 1950 earning his BFA in Illustration. He began his professional career as an illustrator in Boston, moved to New York, and in 1962 he and his wife Roxie returned to Providence with their family to begin teaching at RISD in the illustration department and invest himself in his studio practice as an artist.
Thomas exhibited his work regularly and became an esteemed member of the RISD illustration department. Among many other recognitions for his teaching and leadership, Tom held the Helen Danforth Distinguished Professor Chair in 1991-1994. In 2001 he received the Claiborne Pell Award for Excellence in the Arts, later of that year, a Doctor of Fine Arts from Rhode Island College.
In a brief six-month period in 1992, macular degeneration devastated the vision in both of Sgouro's eyes. This happened just as he felt he'd come into his own as a painter. Consequently, vision loss seemed at first like "the end of everything" for him.
He continued teaching at RISD and spending time in his painting studio. As he explained many years later: "I had to work and I didn't know quite what to do. I couldn't examine anything based on observation, which turned out to be a pretty good thing, because I don't think an artist should be a reporter of observation, rather something a little more profound." He used masking tape and a T-square to create horizon lines and then began painting the Remembered Landscapes that would constitute the sole subject of his work for the last twenty years of his painting life.
Tom was a Life member of the Providence Art Club, the American Watercolor Society and the Society of Illustrators. Thomas was an elected member of the Prestigious National Academy of Arts.
Thomas was the recipient of several awards, however, the award that gave him the most pleasure was the American Society of Illustrators honoring him as the Distinguished Educator in The Arts in 2009. Tom was passionate about his teaching. His wife Roxie, say that Tom taught her how to see. Tom said he learned so much from his students, some of whom he referred to as "Genius." In 2007, he felt he had given his all so he retired. But, he never stopped painting.
His paintings are in many permanent museum collections, as far away as Anchorage, Alaska Museum of Fine Art, The Cleveland Museum of Art, the Jacksonville, Florida Museum of Fine Art, the Colby College Museum of Art in Maine and the Newport, RI Museum Art Museum and as near as the Rhode Island School of Design's museum.
Thomas Sgouros passed away on Monday, December 17, 2012 in Providence, Rhode Island.
Again, please call me at show contact info with any questions or to view the painting with no obligations to buy. Thank you, Tom.