Page 27 - Studio International - September 1966

with deeper hues—or pulsates lightly. Stroud has spoken seems to be the determining thing more than anything
of gates, portholes, charts, plaques, but I would think else.' Once the size feels right, he establishes either a
these images are more abstract, satisfying the mysterious vertical or a horizontal dynamic by the modulation of
instinct that takes pleasure in symmetrical rhythms and colour and the span of line.
exceedingly close harmonies. At times his paintings are In a larger painting, there is even an effect of warping
far closer to the lyrical geometric abstractions of Paul and a curious illusion of the third dimension because of
Klee than they are to either the early constructivist or the way one strip is sent, uninterrupted, full across the
de Stijl conceptions. (Charles Biederman, an American central plane. Line functions much as it does in Runic or
theorist whom Stroud admired, characterizes the art as Celtic script, or, as Stroud says, in stonemasons' signs.
`a new music to the eyes'.) He also thinks of the Byzantine mosaics 'with their
His use of velvety, somewhat misty colours, which is surround of colour that doesn't really read as a line'.
entirely intuitive, invokes what he calls 'colour resonance'. Almost all of Stroud's allusions to the past of painting
No explanations have ever satisfied those who wonder at are to the way colour and line are best wed, and to the
the emotional power of colour and Stroud does not pre- maintenance of surface continuity. His preference for
tend to a theory. He is content to seek 'resonance' in Roman wall paintings can be felt not only in the dry
close, almost monochromatic terms. opacity of his red-oranges and earth colours, but also in
Many of his paintings are nearly the same in format, his insistence on the 'wall-bound' character of his image.
about five feet square, yet they appear larger or smaller He presses his boundaries close to the edge, but he never
because of the colouristic lines traversing them. Stroud forfeits the sense of final two-dimensional closure. This
says he chooses a certain area to work in: 'The field size is important for the tempo of apprehension. The viewer

Three there 1966
Compound emulsion on
masonite
60 x 60 in.