Theodore Stamos was born in New York City in 1922 to parents of Greek ancestry. His first solo exhibition - at age 21 - took place at the Wakefield Bookstore, under the aegis of Betty Parsons.

He was the youngest member of the avant-garde group called the "Irascibles", the founding core of The New York School, which included Mark Rothko, Barnett Newman, Clyfford Still, Willem de Kooning and Jackson Pollock, among others. These artists were the first American artists to consciously make a break with the School of Paris in pursuing their own aims for a serious new approach to painting.

Stamos' work has shifted and evolved more dramatically than any of the other Abstract Expressionsts. He is in fact one of the first to create both "colorfield" and "gestural" works and he painted across these lines to the end of his career. He nurtured his deep identification with ancient myths and with the classical philosophy of ancient Greece particularly, and this spirit sustained his work. His exploration of the relationship of nature - in form, scale, coloration, light, and mood - to art was never far from the forefront of his concerns.

Kouros Gallery has published a number of four color catalogues on Stamos' work.