Presented by C. Parker Gallery

Deborah T. Colter grew up in upstate New York. Her father was a cartoonist at heart and an architect by profession. His discipline and ceaseless work ethic strongly influence her approach to her work. He found time for his passion as well as his career in supporting a family. Painting is Colter’s passion, though there are often days it is comparable to the balancing of a nest on a tree limb. Colter studied Fine Art at the Rhode Island School of Design. She graduated in 1981 with a BFA in Printmaking. After graduation, Colter moved to the island of Martha’s Vineyard and chose to focus her energies on raising a family. Returning to her passion for painting in the early 90s, she has been actively painting and showing her work extensively since then. Colter believes that ultimately a painting is about creating a world unto its own. The visual inhabitants of this created world become one with their environment. The artist works with an abstract collection of marks, textures and color, repeating shapes and forms, seeking to find a balance of chaos and harmony within each piece she creates. Often these marks will reflect architectural landscapes, roads, maps, repeated patterns, or colors as if seen from above or as seen from within, a sort of visual record book of the mind. The artist’s challenge is to find an exciting balance between the pandemonium of her thoughts and the multitude of images and events that bombard our daily lives. She trusts in the inner thoughts of the mind as they reveal themselves purely through the act of creating. In the past twenty years, Deborah T. Colter has participated in national juried exhibitions, has had numerous gallery exhibitions, and had her work purchased for both corporate and private collections.