Striffolino was born in New York city in 1950 and was raised on Long Island. Although from his childhood he could draw spontaneously with extraordinary skill, he never took a formal art class, feeling that his drawings were so personal he could allow no one -- not even teachers -- to interfere with his art. Instead, he majored in architecture at Ohio University. After his graduation he was hired by the City of Cincinnati as an architect. However, in spite of earning good commissions and professional recognition, he began to feel increasing frustration over a life and career too distant from the art he loves. In 1978 Striffolino left his architect's job to embark upon what he has since called "an odyssey: I decided to travel for as long as I needed to reestablish something in my soul, something I had gotten away from." He backpacked and camped along for seven months starting in the Great Smoky Mountains, then along the Gulf Coast and across Texas to New Mexico, through the Rocky Mountains north into Canada, and finally across to the Pacific and down the California coast. It was while camping in California within sight of the Pacific Ocean that he made the decision to settle down and paint in earnest. This decision he later said "resounded in my soul". Immediately thereafter he moved permanently to northern New Mexico, where he still resides. For Striffolino color is the highest and most subjective element of painting, but the real subject matter of his work is its emotional content. He strives to articulate on canvas an intense feeling about the location, whether it is the physical dynamics of the landscape or the juxtaposition of colors and light. This is when the painting really begins to take on a life of its own.

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