1909-1939
Theme/Style – Modernism, figurative art
Media – Oils, murals
Artistic Focus – Comfort was a Modernist who defied categorization. His works reflect an independent mind, and the subject matter of each has little or no relation to the subject matter of any of his other works. His art was bold and could only have evolved even further but for a life cut short at the early age of 30.
Career Highlights –
- Born in Port Huron, Michigan in 1909, by 1920 Tom Tyrone Comfort had settled in Los Angeles, where he was a pupil of Walter Barron Currier and Leo Katz.
- During the Depression, Comfort was active in the Federal Art Project in Los Angeles, where he created murals for John Marshall High School and the Los Angeles Public Library; and elsewhere for the State Board of Business Education in San Diego and the library of San Pedro High School.
- Comfort’s 1934 painting, Gold Is Where You Find It, a powerful statement about the working conditions of California’s miners, was selected to hang in the White House by President and Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt, who wished to demonstrate the importance of art in a democratic society.
- Because of Comfort’s short career, his works are exceedingly rare.
- Tom Tyrone Comfort passed away in Los Angeles in 1939.
Bibliographic references are available upon request.