The sound of sleat

Jon Schueler, an American Abstract Expressionist painter, came to painting late in life, taking his first classes in Los Angeles after he'd already married and begun a family. But under teachers Clyfford Still and Richard Diebenkorn at the California School of Fine Arts, he quickly discovered a talent and a love for painting that compelled him to move to New York, where he began to define and perfect his artistic vision. But when in the late 1950s nature became a stronger poetic force in his work, Schueler set off for Scotland. He discovered Mallaig, a town in the Western Highlands on the Sound of Sleat, where the dramatic landscape inspired his art and continued to influence him throughout his career. Over nearly thirty years, as he painted, Schueler worked on this book. In it, he struggled to uncover what it was that drove him to paint and wrestled with a conflict that confronts all artists - how to strike a balance between the need to create in solitude and the desire for human intimacy. The Sound of Sleat tells the story of a passionate life and offers a fascinating look at the New York art world of the fifties and sixties.