Please note:  Only a partial article

Through the month of February the paintings of Sylvia Doucet Stanton will be showing at the Slidell Museum at 2020 First St. in Olde Towne, and what a treat it is.

The oil paint on her brushes flies across the canvas with energy and emotion. It's easy to see that she is in touch with her varied subjects, from architecture to people to flowers.

She claims to enjoy painting gardens and the flowers within them, but her people are absolutely captivating.

In this show young boys sit on a pier, focused on trying to scoop up perhaps minnows in a net, and a young girl in a white party dress swings with the joy of breezes hitting her face. The viewer can feel the life in the works. Yet, the works are painted with a minimum of brush strokes to acquire that energy.

Showing her diverse talent, "White Bliss Iris" uses a realistic approach that precisely replicates each little vein and speck of pollen. It blooms right out of the frame and enfolds the viewer into its petals. It is large, and more an experience than just a painting.

In a combination of those painting styles, she produces paintings of architecture. Specifically, her "Café du Monde" and "Old Mission" offer a soft invitation to visit a lovely place and time.

While her biography says for all practical intents and purposes she began painting seriously by the age of 12, she reveals after some introspection that it was her kindergarten teacher who made her realize that she had a meaningful gift. Her teacher gave her some brown fingerpaints, and she asked, "What can I do with brown?" Though she didn't think much of the color, the time was during World War II, and the young artist decided to create an image of soldiers in tall grass. The teacher's reaction was so good that she sent the child all around the school, knocking on doors to show her work to everyone inside the rooms. Stanton explained, "I realize now how a teacher can instill pride in small children and cause them to develop a talent into a lifestyle of expressions."...

The Times Picayune, Kathleen DesHotel