Tarmo Pasto

Modernist Portrait of St. Francis

1970

Dr. Tarmo Pasto was a psychiatrist and artist. He taught psychology and art through the 1970s at California State College at Sacramento since the school’s inception. He also authored a book on art, "The Space-Frame Experience in Art,” published in 1964. However, Dr. Pasto was mainly known to the world for introducing the works of one of his patients, Martin Ramirez (1885–1963). Dr. Pasto was a psychiatrist for Ramirez in the late 1950s and provided him with quality art materials and also encouraged his artistic endeavors. The art of the insane was of particular interest to Dr. Pasto, and he would often use examples of it in his classroom. Dr. Pasto was also very instrumental in initiating several Bay Area exhibitions of what today is considered outsider art. In the 1970s, with the help of artist James Nutt, he provided the first public showing of Martin Rameriz's artwork. Thus, Tarmo Pasto gets much of the credit for introducing one of the well-known outsider artists to the world. He also discovered the outsider artist P.M. Wentworth and promoted his work. Dr. Pasto was a long-time contributor to the California art scene, as well as an art teacher and psychologist to many successful artists.

(Biography provided by Robert Azensky Fine Art)