Thomas George

Thomas purchased a small home in the town of Drobak on the Oslo fjord. He spent the next 30 summers there drawing and painting the Norwegian landscape, focusing on the northern regions, mainly the Lofoten islands, where he created hundreds of ink on paper drawings that stand alone as works of art, but also fueled his nature-based extractions.

 

George was to make two trips to the People's Republic of China, the first in 1976 as the guest of the Norwegian ambassador to China. He focused mainly on bold brush and ink drawings of the mountains of Kwelin. The results of this effort were a show of this work at the Smithsonian Institute.  “I rely on nature for knowledge and inspiration, looking at nature is where it all starts for me”. 

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For 22 years, Mr. George was represented by the Betty Parsons gallery at 15 E. 57th St. in New York City, the stuff of legend from the heyday of abstract expressionism, the late 1940s to the 1980s.   

 

Mr. George's abstract works are in world collections, leading cultural institutions, including the MOMA, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Guggenheim Museum, and the National Museum of American Art.  His work is in the corporate collections of Chase Manhattan Bank, AT&T, Ford Motor Company, and the Squibb Foundation.  In his later years, Mr. George produced hundreds of smaller gouaches and many pastels of his favorite pond at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, N.J.  His age began to limit his travels and the mediums in which he worked, but not his passion for nature.

 

Thomas George passed away peacefully on October 22nd, 2014, at the age of 96.  He was preceded in death by his wife, Laverne, who joined him on all his adventures.  He has two sons, John and Geoffrey George.