Frederick Spratt (1927 – April 29, 2008) was an American artist and educator, best known for his

color theory Color theory, or more specifically traditional color theory, is a historical body of knowledge describing the behavior of colors, namely in color mixing, color contrast effects, color harmony, color schemes and color symbolism. Modern color th ...

paintings.

Early life

Born in

Iowa Iowa ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the upper Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders the Mississippi River to the east and the Missouri River and Big Sioux River to the west; Wisconsin to the northeast, Ill ...

, Spratt was the grandson of a house painter from whom he received his first lessons in painting. He later built upon this early training during his adolescence as a sign painter. He received his MA in

Studio Art An art school is an educational institution with a primary focus on practice and related theory in the visual arts and design. This includes fine art – especially illustration, painting, contemporary art, sculpture, and graphic design. T ...

from

University of Iowa The University of Iowa (U of I, UIowa, or Iowa) is a public university, public research university in Iowa City, Iowa, United States. Founded in 1847, it is the oldest and largest university in the state. The University of Iowa is organized int ...

in 1951, and in 1954 he began teaching in the Art Department at

San Jose State University San José State University (San Jose State or SJSU) is a Public university, public research university in San Jose, California. Established in 1857, SJSU is the List of oldest schools in California, oldest public university on the West Coast of ...

, where he taught the American figurative artist, Robert Graham (1938–2008) in 1961. In 1962 he took a sabbatical in England for one year, where he lived and painted representationally in St. Ives Cornwall, United Kingdom. During this period he created several figurative and

landscape paintings A landscape is the visible features of an area of Terrestrial ecoregion, land, its landforms, and how they integrate with Nature, natural or human-made features, often considered in terms of their aesthetic appeal.''New Oxford American Diction ...

. He returned to San Jose, California, in 1963 and continued to teach at San Jose State University where he served as the Chairman of the Art Department and as the interim Dean of Humanities and Arts.

Color theory painting

In 1970, he moved to Los Angeles and began to experiment with color theory, but continued teaching classes part-time at

. Spratt was informed by the

formalist Formalism may refer to: * Legal formalism, legal positivist view that the substantive justice of a law is a question for the legislature rather than the judiciary * Formalism (linguistics) * Scientific formalism * A rough synonym to the Formal sys ...

art of

Josef Albers Josef Albers ( , , ; March 19, 1888March 25, 1976) was a German-born American artist and Visual arts education, educator who is considered one of the most influential 20th-century art teachers in the United States. Born in 1888 in Bottrop, Westp ...

minimalist In visual arts, music, and other media, minimalism is an art movement that began in the post-war era in western art. The movement is often interpreted as a reaction to abstract expressionism and modernism; it anticipated contemporary post-mi ...

painting by

Ellsworth Kelly Ellsworth Kelly (May 31, 1923 – December 27, 2015) was an American painter, sculptor, and printmaker associated with hard-edge painting, Color field painting and minimalism. His works demonstrate unassuming techniques emphasizing line, col ...

and

Ad Reinhardt Adolph Friedrich Reinhardt (December 24, 1913 – August 30, 1967) was an American abstract painter and art theorist active in New York City for more than three decades. As a theorist he wrote and lectured extensively on art and was a ...

, and

abstract expressionist Abstract expressionism in the United States emerged as a distinct art movement in the aftermath of World War II and gained mainstream acceptance in the 1950s, a shift from the American social realism of the 1930s influenced by the Great Depressi ...

painting by

Barnett Newman Barnett Newman (January 29, 1905 – July 4, 1970) was an American painter. He has been critically regarded as one of the major figures of abstract expressionism, and one of the foremost color field painters. His paintings explore the sense ...

; his work was also deeply influenced by his early days as a sign painter. Spratt's

work is regarded for its mutability—changing with the available light, time of day and season of year, with each viewer and with each viewing. During the 1960s in Los Angeles, many California artists were creating work that focused on the surface qualities of a work of art—a tendency that generated the descriptive phrase " finish fetish"—an immaculate, glistening, often

translucent In the field of optics, transparency (also called pellucidity or diaphaneity) is the physical property of allowing light to pass through the material without appreciable light scattering by particles, scattering of light. On a macroscopic scale ...

surface which conveys the look of a refined industrial process. For thirty years he experimented with color theory in three main series: ''Semaphores'', ''Scrolls'' and ''Diptychs'', all of which are characterized by their flat application of acrylic lacquer onto aluminum. In 2004 Spratt described his artistic endeavor in the following way: “It seemed I was seeking a way to put paint in the service of art while freeing it from the harness of depiction or narration. To let color be its own narrative through its combination and by the palpability of painted fields.” Several of his paintings from the 1970s were exhibited nationally at O.K. Harris Gallery, New York City,

San Francisco Museum of Modern Art The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) is a modern art, modern and contemporary art museum and nonprofit organization located in San Francisco, California. SFMOMA was the first museum on the West Coast devoted solely to 20th-century art ...

, and at Janus Gallery, Los Angeles in 1976 and 1978, respectively. This same year he returned to San Jose and, after five short years, opened his own gallery—Frederick Spratt Gallery—in 1993 which operated until his death in 2008. Many of his remaining works belong to the permanent collection of the

San Jose Museum of Art The San José Museum of Art (SJMA) is a modern and contemporary art museum in downtown San Jose, California, United States. Founded in 1969, the museum holds a permanent collection with an emphasis on West Coast artists of the 20th and 21st cent ...

Exhibitions

* 1985 - Ten California Colorists, a group exhibition in 1985 that traveled to Redding Art Museum, San Jose Institute of Contemporary Art,

Palm Springs Desert Museum The Palm Springs Art Museum (formerly the Palm Springs Desert Museum) is a visual and performing arts institution with several locations in the Coachella Valley, in Riverside County, California, United States, founded in 1938. PSAM has been focu ...

, Montgomery Gallery at

Pomona College Pomona College ( ) is a private university, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Claremont, California. It was established in 1887 by a group of Congregationalism in the United States, Congregationalists ...

and University Art Museum at the

University of New Mexico The University of New Mexico (UNM; ) is a public research university in Albuquerque, New Mexico, United States. Founded in 1889 by the New Mexico Territorial Legislature, it is the state's second oldest university, a flagship university in th ...

. * 2004 - The

Triton Museum of Art The Triton Museum of Art is a contemporary art museum located at 1505 Warburton Avenue in Santa Clara, California. History The museum was founded in 1965 in San Jose, California, by rancher, lawyer and art patron W. Robert Morgan and his wife ...

in Santa Clara, California, mounted a solo exhibition of his color theory works entitled Trooping the Colors. * 2008 - A retrospective—Fred Spratt: Color and Space— was held at the

in San Jose, California. * 2016 - "Artists in Residence: San Jose's 20th Century Vanguard" at the

featured several of Spratt's large lacquer-on-aluminum paintings that make direct reference to the color work of

Mark Rothko Mark Rothko ( ; Markus Yakovlevich Rothkowitz until 1940; September 25, 1903February 25, 1970) was an American abstract art, abstract painter. He is best known for his color field paintings that depicted irregular and painterly rectangular reg ...

Personal life

Frederick Spratt is survived by his daughter Kris and sons Mike and Shahn Spratt.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Spratt, Frederick 20th-century American painters American male painters 21st-century American painters 21st-century American male artists 2008 deaths Painters from California 1927 births 20th-century American sculptors 20th-century American male artists American male sculptors Sculptors from California

Early life

Color theory painting

Exhibitions

Personal life

See also

References