WHO IS PAUL CROUCH?
I never met Paul Crouch.
He was in full-time care, his life altered by Parkinson’s disease and dementia when his wife Karen and I became friends.
In her years of grief after his death, Karen did not talk a lot about Paul, so I know few details of the man himself. I am told he was a rather quiet and gentle soul. Loved cats and kayaking and old cars. He had a long career as an award winning commercial photographer in Toronto and he and Karen spent summers driving around the Maritimes buying Folk Art. He restored vintage Jaguars and he collected all manner of interesting objects and antiques.
Oh, and he drew.
And painted.
And carved and fabricated and doodled and sketched and never stopped creating until the day he died.
Our society wants us to sum up a life with a list of places lived, jobs and titles earned. But I got to know Paul through his art, so that is how I invite you to know him too. Might I suggest it may be a richer and more intimate view into his person…
When Karen died rather suddenly earlier this year, I learned she had left me all of Paul’s work. To honour my dear friend and to celebrate Paul’s exceptional creative mind I approached the Salt Spring Gallery about holding a show.
There are large paintings from an Abstract Expressionist phase painted between 1959 and 1962.
A collection of colourful wood sculptures made on Salt Spring and shown in Toronto at Prime Gallery in the mid-80’s.
A series of Lithographs of curious figures and an uncountable number of fantastical drawings… Rendered in pen and ink, oil pastel, pencil, anything he could make a mark with. Paul’s imagination and creative output was remarkable and he did it not for fame or fortune but it seems because it was who he was.
I invite you to come see Paul Crouch with me.
You will be amazed.
Nadine Buckinger
Paul Russell Crouch
April 6, 1932 - December 31, 2016
Karen Anne Gray
July 15,1951 - March 16, 2022
