Douglas Philip Bratten is an award-winning artist who lived and worked in North Carolina and New Hampshire, where he now resides. Born on May 18, 1931, Bratten spent his childhood in Ohio before moving to Winston-Salem, North Carolina, at the age of fourteen when his father returned from serving as an Army doctor in the North African and European theaters of operations during World War Two. After graduating from Gray High School in Winston-Salem, Bratten served in the United States Army Signal Corps deciphering secret military communications.

From 1952 through 1954, Bratten was stationed in Kyushu, Japan, where he met his wife, Toshie Sato, who was originally from the area around Nagoya. Bratten recalls his time in Japan fondly as o...