Thomas Robert Crotty
Thomas Robert Crotty
Prominent Maine artist and gallery owner Thomas R. Crotty died on August 22, 2015 in Portland at the age of 80, surrounded by his children. Tom was born in Boston and spent many of his early years in New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island. He attended Boston English and Technical High Schools and Massachusetts College of Art and served in the National Guard.
In 1966, Tom and his wife Carolyn “Bunty” opened the Frost Gully Gallery in a barn at their home in Freeport, Maine. Tom moved the gallery to various locations around the city of Portland and returned to Freeport in 2000, where he built a new studio and space to accommodate the gallery’s expanding collection. Frost Gully Gallery is now the longest running gallery in the state of Maine. Tom helped promote the careers and gave exposure to many of the state’s upcoming artists. He was proud to exhibit the works of Jamie Wyeth, Dahlov Ipcar, Bernard Langlais, John Muench, Laurence Sisson, Janet C. Manyan, John Laurent, David Driskell, Stephen Etnier, William Thon and many other well-known Maine artists.
Tom will be remembered foremost as one of Maine’s most ambitious realist landscape painters, whose work was inspired by his deep connection and love of the coast of Maine and respect for nature. As former Portland Museum of Art director Dan O’Leary wrote, he was an artist who “entrusted his career to the fundamental principle of the miracle of Maine light.” In 2003, the Portland Museum of Art featured a one-man show of Tom’s paintings entitled “A Solitude of Space.” A book with the same name was published in conjunction with the museum show. This was a great honor for Tom to have a retrospective exhibit in a major museum during his lifetime. His paintings are also included in prominent collections including the Portland Museum of Art, The Farnsworth Museum, University of Maine, and the University of New England, as well as many
private and corporate collections.
Since early childhood, Tom’s first love was sailing and racing. His competitive passion for racing began while winning the annual Boston Park Yacht Club in 1952, and continued up until recently winning the Mohegan race on his J120 in 2010. Tom was one of the organizers of the first Etchell’s fleet in Maine. In 1978, he designed his own racing/cruising sloop, Cailin a Mara (Gaelic for “Sea Nymph”), with the help of a dear friend and crewmember Bob Watterson. He won many races on Cailin a Mara out of the Portland Yacht Club through the Eighties and became the founding President of the Gulf of Maine Ocean Racing Association.
To know Tom is to love him and his deep rooted passions for sailing, art, his country and his beloved state of Maine. His favorite pastime was cruising and exploring the coast of Maine. Although he enjoyed skippering his own boat, he met Robert and Jean Aranson docking next to him. He loved their Freedom 50, N’Shamah, and accepted an invite to come aboard in 2014, not only fulfilling his sailing needs but meeting lifelong friends. In Tom’s battle with cancer, Dr. Aranson was a blessing and trusted advisor to Tom on medical and health issues. The family is so grateful Robert and Jean were there with Tom until the very end, and with Tom and his family at his bedside as he passed peacefully.
Thomas R. Crotty, the son of Donald E. Crotty and Wanda Scovil Crotty, was predeceased by a younger brother, Donald, Jr., and two sisters, Ingrid Peterson and Wanda Touchie, both of New Brunswick, Canada.
He is survived by a sister, Margaret “Marnie” Taragowski, of Arlington, TX. He is also survived by his children, Donald E. Crotty and his partner Theresa Tecson, of San Francisco;~David Wallace Crotty of Palm Springs, CA; Johanna Crotty Maaghul and her husband Richard of San Francisco and their children, David, Olivia and Phillip; Melissa Crotty Chaput and her husband Joe, and their son, Jack; and their mother Carolyn Wallace of Portland. And he is survived by his daughter, Erin A. Crotty of Freeport, and her mother, Pauline Halle Crotty of Daytona, FL.
A celebration of Tom’s life will be held on Saturday, September 12, 2015, at 11:00 AM at the First Parish Unitarian Church, 425 Congress St, Portland, ME 04101. In lieu of flowers or other donations, please contribute to the SailMaine Scholarship Fund in Tom Crotty’s name.~ Donations can be sent to SailMaine, 58 Fore St. Portland, ME 04101 or online at~https://sailmaine.wufoo.com/forms/zmr0shy1uqp2ie/~
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