"Creative" DePrie has aptly named himself, his creations and subject matter ranging from the delicate to the bizarre. They all maintain his distinct and instantly recognizable style, from a soft floral to an untraditional nude. Gerald works fast and furious, detailing his vision in pencil, pastels, and crayon against paper. This West Virginia outsider lives with his pet dog in a small apartment, greeting visitors, brilliantly playing his piano, and working his unsettled style on an ever-present stack of art paper. A Navy veteran who is plagued by heart problems and a self-described "nervous" condition, Gerald says he creates from "eternal space and psychic sources emanating from God."
His most frequent subjects in his art are human figures and architecture. When he drew the human figure, he drew it nude and then added the clothes. He was fascinated with nursery rhymes, with a strange and sometimes unsettling twist on the traditional Alice in Wonderland and ancient places. Egypt in particular. He used to say he knew about Egypt but he didn't know why. Gerald's work was included in the exhibition "Love: Error and Eros" at the American Visionary Art Museum and his work is in the permanent collection of the Huntington Museum of Art. Gerald died suddenly of a heart attack in May 1999.
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