Phyllis Strickland

1915-1993

Theme/Style – Modernism, figurative, townscape

Media – Oils, Oils, etchings

Artistic Focus – Phyllis Strickland was not as well-known as many of her contemporaries, perhaps because her career as an artist seems to have ended early in her life. Her rare etchings and paintings are quite engaging, and reveal a skilled painter and printmaker who was able to instill charm and character into city scenes, and strength and feeling into her figurative portraits.

Career Highlights –

• Phyllis Strickland was born and raised in Portland, Oregon. She most likely received her earliest art instruction from her father, respected artist and teacher Fred Strickland, and later studied in Portland with artist Sidney Bell.
• In the 1930s, Strickland moved to California and studied in Los Angeles at the Chouinard Art Institute and the Art Center School under Richard Munsell.
• Strickland was a member of the Laguna Beach Art Association; and in 1939 she exhibited with the Painters and Sculptors Annual at the Portland Museum of Art in Oregon.
• By 1940 Strickland was residing in San Francisco, and exhibited there that year with the Society for Sanity in Art at the California Palace of the Legion of Honor, and at the Residence Club.
• In 1941 Strickland married artist Harley Henry Melzian, after which the couple relocated to Michigan, where Melzian worked as a designer for automobile companies in Detroit and other corporate clients.
• Phyllis Strickland passed away in Northport, Michigan in 1993.

 

Selection of Works by this Artist

Bibliographic references are available upon request.