Entry - 1.13.24

I first painted the author Jeffrey Ford back in 2004. The portrait was “constructed” from many sources, including some poorly lit snapshots which I took in a pizzeria of the unsuspecting but amiably accommodating writer. In the painting I was hoping to capture the strange realism embraced by many Northern Renaissance artists, particularly Hans Holbein. Once completed, I built a heavy frame for the painting and painted on it in spiraling, gold lettering a quote from Hermann Hesse. Two things troubled me about the finished work. The lighting in which I had photographed Jeff was extremely inadequate, leaving form poorly expressed and providing little contrast and nuance. So I embellished as best I could. I was also dissatisfied with a crow included in the work. I knew that its dark plumage had the potential to dominate my composition and tried to tamp down the blacks in my palette, but somehow I lost control during execution. The crow was too weighty and didn't integrate successfully with the subtly rendered details of other components of the work. I wouldn't call the finished painting a failure, but I definitely hoped to get another crack at Jeff sometime in the future.

Gerard Wickham - Jeffrey Ford, detail - 2004

Gerard Wickham - Jeffrey Ford - 2004

My opportunity came eighteen years later in September of 2022. Jeff and his wife Lynn were passing though our area during one of their many peregrinations and stopped by our home to visit for a few days. During their stay, I asked Jeff if he would pose for some photographs and, as is his wont, he obliged readily. This time I was going to get it right. I set up complex studio lighting in a stuffy alcove and had Jeff pose in front of a multi-paneled, wood grained door. It was a hot day, there was no ventilation and the lights were raining heat upon us, but I kept taking photos, at least fifty of them. Throughout this ordeal, Jeff never grumbled or whined. Afterwards I was so confident that I had got exactly what I needed that I didn't even look at the photos until well after Jeff and Lynn had left. Imagine my shock when I transferred the photographs to my computer and found that every image was totally out-of-focus. I tried editing the photos to salvage an image or two, but eventually I had to recognize that they were completely unusable. What the hell had happened? I was pretty sure my Nikon DSLR had died. It actually took me weeks to figure out that the lens was the problem and not the camera. Turns out my lens had an autofocus motor in it that must have conked out. What? Lenses have motors?

I was at an impasse, and rather than address the problem I chose to ignore it. At that time, I was painting an extremely large figurative work which would take me many months to complete, so I felt no urgency to make preparations for Jeff's portrait. Jeff lives several hundred miles away, so I couldn't ask him to drop in for another try. It was slowly dawning on me that I was going to have to ask Lynn, who is a very talented photographer, to take a series of photos of Jeff. She would have done a great job, but I look for very specific things in my source photographs and rued surrendering control to someone else (even with my providing obsessively detailed direction). So again I did nothing. By the summer of 2023, work was winding down on my current project, and I knew my explanatory phone call to Jeff and Lynn would have to be made soon if I wanted to avoid a long period of inactivity between paintings. That's when I found out that Jeff and Lynn would be traversing the Hudson Valley once again, an event as infrequent as a total solar eclipse or the Mets winning the World Series. Eureka! Deus ex machina! etc. etc.

So, in a nutshell, Jeff and Lynn stayed with us a second time and Jeff agreed to pose once again, never offering even a word of censure regarding my highly probable incompetence. This time I positioned Jeff beside a sliding glass door to his right and an incandescent light source to his left. I draped a bright blue blanket behind him, hoping that its intense coloration would infuse his features with form-defining reflections. I used two cameras, a point and shoot model and my DSLR, now equipped with a 35mm fixed lens. I wasn't taking any chances this time. I'd take two series of photographs.

I instructed Jeff to adopt a very specific facial expression, one I thought exemplified his personality faithfully, and he complied effortlessly. I, of course, took a million shots. To rule out any possibility of camera shake, I used a tripod and took my photos with a ten second delay. Every so often I noticed Jeff pulling strange faces in the interlude between my pressing the shutter release and the camera taking the timed photos. I asked him what he was doing. He shrugged his shoulders and said, “I'm mixing it up.” It's your funeral, I thought, and continued with my work.

Afterwards, I examined the results of our efforts, and on this occasion nearly every photograph I took was successful. I examined the shots, including those in which Jeff deliberately distorted his features, and came to realize that my portrait had become a triptych. So weeks later, I brought a flash drive holding three photos to Staples and instructed the confused technician to print each image several times, sometimes deliberately over or under exposing them. She did as I requested, but she didn't like it one bit.

When I painted this first image, the one where Jeff actually adopted the expression I wanted, I pinned multiple versions of the photograph around the gessoed panel on which I painted and referred to each of them as I worked. My goal was to finish this first panel before Christmas, and I achieved this objective with a week or so to spare. Setting arbitrary goals is a tool I employ to coerce myself into being more productive, maybe squeezing in extra sessions and extending my time in the studio. I believe I got from this painting what I wanted: a concise portrayal of a specific personality executed using fairly loose brushwork and a heightened palette. My intention, should my focus and stamina endure, is to paint two additional versions of Jeff and construct some sort of framing mechanism to display all three panels. As I complete them, I'll post the results of my future efforts.

Gerard Wickham - Jeffrey Ford - 2023

As always, I encourage readers to comment here. If you would prefer to comment privately, you can email me at gerardwickham@gmail.com.

March 30, 2024 Update:

Weeks ago I completed the second panel of my multi-paneled portrait of Jeffrey Ford. It took me about two months to paint this image. The beginning was rough. I repainted the same small sections over and over again, never quite able to achieve what I wanted, never satisfied that my tonalities and brushwork would mesh with those of the previous panel. After several sessions of painting, I finally felt that my approach was coming together. Once over that hump, the rest of the endeavor proceeded efficiently. By the way, I left the first panel stacked aside while I painted the second; I relied mostly on my memory to determine my course. Since I completed this painting, I left it on my easel to dry while I waited for the weather to improve enough for an outdoor photoshoot. My intention now is to wait a few more weeks before tackling the final panel, maybe catch up on some long neglected writing projects.

Gerard Wickham - Jeffrey Ford - 2024

December 7, 2024 Update:

Long story short, I took some time off between Panels 2 & 3. But I did go back to this project. Some months ago, I completed the third panel (see below), and now it was time to construct a framing device for the three panels. It didn't go well. Let's just say the duration of this effort was extended over and over because of many minor mishaps, remedial action often being required. But finally I was coming into the homestretch, the kitchen floor littered with newspapers, paint brushes, sand paper, a drill, a miter saw, screw drivers, glues, rags and cans of stain and polyurethane, when my wife informed me that I had to clean up this mess. She'd been pretty tolerant, but Thanksgiving was coming and we were having guests in. So my project was on pause again. After the holiday, I went back to work, this time not creating quite the same mess. With a few picayune details addressed, I can now declare this project complete. Whew! I look forward to indulging in a few smaller, less taxing projects.

Gerard Wickham - Jeffrey Ford - 2024

Gerard Wickham - The Jeffrey Ford Tripdych - 2023/24

Entry - 9.16.23

Before leaving his job, my father had become a bit dour and subdued, more inwardly focused and less willing to engage actively with others. His pre-retirement personality didn't emerge overnight but instead evolved over years. The stress of work, financial worries and health issues certainly contributed to his less than rosy weltanschauung. My father belonged to the “Greatest Generation”, the soldiers who had fought in WWII, and these veterans did not vent about their emotions and anxieties, instead choosing to stay silent and shoulder their troubles as best they could. And my father was definitely even less talkative than most of his male peers. I can recall a number of occasions when I had messed up terribly and got caught red-handed violating my parents' rules. Days would pass while I awaited their response, tension building with each passing day, until finally my father would address my offense. First he would recount what he had been informed of my activities in one or two short sentences and then ask if that synopsis was accurate. When I'd admit that it was true, he would look sad, never making eye contact with me, and quietly ask, “Well, that isn't going to happen again, is it?”, to which I'd sheepishly reply, “No, it won't.” End of discussion. It was far worse than if he had harangued me for hours... and far more effective too.

His innate reticence had been clearly compounded by his recent experiences at work. His last boss was a high-strung and ambitious megalomaniac who crafted his management style on the conduct of Mussolini. He would sarcastically pester my father about retirement, making it obvious that he wanted him out of the office. Even when my father was sixty-five years old, he still needed to work an additional year before the mortgage on the family home was paid off; leaving employment before satisfying that loan was an impossibility. Also, after over three decades with his company, my father had been granted a private office in which to work, but this boss took that away and converted the space into a conference room – a humiliating blow for my dad. Surely his boss's most egregious crime occurred the first time my father was in the hospital undergoing stomach ulcer treatment. During his stay at the hospital, my father received a visit from his boss and another coworker, and, even though my father had been absent from work for only a short period of time, his boss felt compelled to inform him that an extended leave would mean that the bureau would have to take possession of his company car. Though I believe that current medical thinking may contradict this, back in the eighties, it was the consensus that stress, if not the direct cause of ulcers, greatly exacerbated their symptoms. To threaten a patient undergoing treatment for ulcers with extreme consequences seemed particularly unconscionable.

When we were kids, my father would have gotten up, eaten his breakfast, bathed and exited the bathroom before we had stumbled out of our bedrooms at about 6:30 am. He warmed up his car quite a while as I would groggily ladle down a bowl of cereal at our kitchen table, then he was off to work. He invariably returned home promptly at 6:00 pm and joined his family for dinner. In my parents' bedroom he had installed a small, blonde wood desk at which he would plug away at outstanding work files on his evenings and weekends. Looking on as an inexperienced child, his schedule seemed unacceptably oppressive, and, even toward the end of his career when his children had graduated from college and were working, that schedule hadn't changed.

Another challenge my father faced at the end of his career was an appreciable worsening of his eyesight, eventually necessitating cataract surgery on one of his eyes. After the operation, his pupil, no longer round, was now shaped like a keyhole, he was required to wear a contact lens in the impaired eye and, honestly, his eyesight didn't improve noticeably. His night vision was particularly bad. When picking up my sister and me at the train station in the evenings, he would drive quite slowly, hugging the right side of the road to allow other cars to pass him. We worried that he might inadvertently hit a bicyclist or pedestrian obscured in the dark shadows at the road's edge. But driving was a critical component of his job. Hanging up his keys, at that time, was not a possibility.

So clearly my father's last years of employment weren't easy for him. Instead of coasting into his golden years, he was struggling against adversity and bearing up as best he could against the assaults of an amoral and ambitious supervisor. When during my undergraduate years I painted my only oil portrait of him, I pictured him with eyes concealed by reflections and I inserted behind him an invented background of crisscrossing horizontal and vertical studs (meant to convey a feeling of complex and exacting structure).

Gerard Wickham - Portrait of My Father - 1981

I'm certain that I've unintentionally presented thus far in this entry a distorted, uni-dimensional portrait of my father and a far too harrowing account of his last years of employment. He truly was not “besieged” during those days. I would say that the hardships I've described above certainly colored his outlook, making him more introspective and aloof, but his daily routine remained unchanged and he plodded through his days impassively. He continued to enjoy the support of his wife and children, often participating in family events and visits on his weekends. Regardless of whatever changes I observed in my father, he remained a faithful, kind, quiet-spoken and helpful parent.

So I guess this is where my story begins...

It was January of 1987, and I had made the train ride from Brooklyn to Suffolk County, Long Island to flee the noise and bustle of the city, visit with family and, most importantly, welcome a new addition to the family: my sister's newborn son. It was cold, at least for temperate Long Island, and a few inches of crusty snow carpeted the ground. The family home was situated on a quarter acre parcel in a very suburban development, and returning there always awakened a host of memories for me. The place was now both comfortably familiar and foreign at the same time. I had been living in a Brooklyn apartment with my girlfriend and working in Manhattan for a while now, and I always felt just a little out of place when returning home.

Studying the contents of the refrigerator, I asked my mother what the heavy cream was for. She replied, “Oh, your dad's doctor has him drinking that whenever his ulcers act up. It's supposed to coat his stomach.” “Does it work?” I asked. She just shrugged her shoulders. It was disheartening to learn that my father was still experiencing discomfit from his ulcers. I had hoped that his symptoms would abate once he escaped the anxieties of employment.

My father had been retired for about a year then, and already I could see positive changes in his personality. He was alert and talkative and definitely more relaxed. He frequently laughed, and I was seeing within him the father of my childhood who would greet me with an upbeat “Hiya!” when he came up the walkway after returning from the office. I was shocked to learn that he had begun to patronize the town's senior center. My father was NOT a participator! I remember my mother telling me a few years earlier that my father had belonged to a local volleyball league when they first moved out on the Island about three decades ago, and I almost fell over. My father was not athletic, and he certainly did not belong to things. This new sociability was a very promising development. Considering these changes, I had reason to conclude that retirement was working out for him and could only anticipate further gains to come.

Well after dinner that night, I decided that I wanted to go out and experiment with my new camera, a Nikon FG-20 recently purchased in order to make high quality slides of my artwork. So I headed out the door into the darkness with a camera bag slung over my shoulder and a tripod in hand intending to take long exposure, naturally lit photos at various locations in my hometown. I remember that the ice-encrusted snow made a fantastic reflective surface that picked up distant, dim houselights and the ghostly glimmer of the moon and I would lie on my belly behind my tripod hoping to catch the effect.

After a few hours at my endeavors, I arrived home sometime after 1:00 AM to find the house brightly lit and still filled with activity. This was unexpected, and I passed warily through our kitchen's backdoor. My mother rushed to me and explained that my father's ulcers were bleeding badly but he refused to go to the hospital. I found my father in his pajamas and bathrobe standing in our home's sole bathroom. He was pale and looking weak. I stated that I was going to drive him to the hospital immediately, but he wouldn't budge. “I'm fine. I don't need the hospital,” he insisted. I tried ineffectually to persuade him, but he clearly felt that he could weather this storm without intervention. My mother pulled me aside and instructed me to “make him go”. This contradicted my firm belief at that time in the fundamental right of the individual to determine his or her own fate - a belief I still hold today. “He'll let me know when it's time,” I assured her. We lowered the lights and went reluctantly to bed. I kept my clothes on, stretched out on the living room sofa and covered myself with a quilt, ready to transport my father to the hospital in a flash. I hadn't slept a wink when an hour or two later my father crept into the room and quietly notified me that he was ready to go.

While waiting in the emergency room to see a doctor, my father suggested to me that I should go home and get some sleep. Although he was lucid and clearheaded, I thought it best that he have someone with him (even if just for company) and indicated that I would stick around. After another few minutes, he turned to me and said, “Look, it's going to be a while before I see a doctor, and, after that, they're going to admit me. There's really no point in your waiting. In the meantime, I'll just try to get some rest here.” At that moment, I was conflicted but eventually succumbed to the logic of what he was saying and the exhaustion I was feeling. I agreed to go home. Not that it really mattered much one way or the other, but I've always regretted that decision.

My father's prediction was accurate. He was admitted to the hospital, and, unlike on his previous stay there when they had treated him non-surgically, the doctors this time determined that part of his stomach should be removed. Within a day or two, the operation was performed... successfully, and the next day my father was recuperating in a room waiting until he was well enough to be discharged. I visited him then.

He was in a regular room, shared with one other patient. I recall vividly the pastel-colored walls, the artificial wood-grained veneers on the furniture, the plastic accouterments, the high-tech beds. I was happy to find my father looking well and was relieved to think that, his problems being behind him, he could return home and live unencumbered by persistent illness. Though a little weak, he was alert and cheerful. After a few minutes of the usual hospital visit palaver, he stroked his chin and winced. “Hey, could you shave me? This stubble is itching me terribly.” I readily consented, and he directed me to a cabinet beside his bed in which I found all the necessary gear to perform this small chore.

While he held a basin on his chest, I lathered him up, being careful not to get shaving cream on the hospital linens. Once I applied the razor to his cheek, I was immediately aware that this shaving job was going to be a challenge. My father's beard was thick and coarse, the feel of his skin akin to that of sandpaper. Though in my late twenties, my facial hair was still thin and downy, easily dispatched during a quick shave. But I was undeterred. I scraped away at his face, determined not to inadvertently nick him. I painstakingly applied myself to this task, regularly changing my position to achieve the optimal angle to apply the razor. I lifted his nose to get at his mustache. I asked him to raise his chin, so I could focus on his neck. I switched from one side of his bed to the other. I loomed over him. I scrunched down below him. Throughout this long ordeal, my father cooperated patiently, never losing his cool, recognizing that I was honestly trying my best. Finally I announced that my mission had been completed. I grabbed a small towel, wiped the residual lather from his face and examined the results of my efforts. I was aghast. He looked exactly the same as before I had started. I couldn't believe it. I must have held the razor at the wrong angle, or maybe I didn't press hard enough on it. Whatever the reason, I had clearly failed to accomplish anything. A tiny giggle bubbled up from inside me, but I struggled to suppress it. The more I tried to contain it, the more the giggle insisted it had to be free. I squeezed my lips together tightly, my face flushing bright red with my efforts. At first, a few hiccupy gasps escaped from me, but they soon escalated into something very loud between a keen and a groan, what I imagine the call of a lovesick moose might sound like. Tears streamed down my cheeks. I glanced over at my father's roommate to see him investigating our activities with a terrified expression on his face, which, of course, only heightened the hilarity. Eventually, I could contain myself no longer and erupted into a fit of laughter which literally lasted several minutes. When I had calmed down and wiped the tears from my eyes, I explained to my perplexed father what had happened and offered gamely to give it another try. “No,” he replied, “I think it's just fine. Really.”

From there, it all went downhill in a long series of internal bleeding episodes necessitating multiple, ineffective operations and inevitably concluding with some lethal hospital infection... all within a three month period. Every time I came to visit, my father was hooked up to an additional piece of equipment. Eventually his room in the Intensive Care Unit, where he now resided, resounded with the wheezing, beeping, clicking, buzzing and screeching of machinery, monitors and alarms. Unable to communicate due to a tracheotomy, my father expressed with his eyes what he couldn't with words, and his eyes seemed to be saying, “Get me the hell out of here!” One afternoon, I entered the hospital along with my brothers to visit our father, and we were ambushed by a doctor we'd never seen before. He was handsome and slick, wore a dashing bow tie and spoke in a soft, conspiratorial voice. The gist of his little speech was to inform us that our father had received excellent care and the hospital, doctors and nurses had done everything possible to treat him and make him comfortable. He really couldn't say enough positive things about the magnificent performance of the staff there. We just stared back totally perplexed. At the end, he asked if we had any questions, and, when we had none, he trotted off never to be seen again. We looked at each other, knowing that now all hope was lost, and one of us said (I really can't remember who), “I guess they're worried about getting sued.”

At the end, the doctors informed us that they could not operate again. As a last-ditch effort, they would try a robust infusion of Vitamin K which might help to stem the internal bleeding which had plagued him since his initial operation. Strangely enough, it worked. But at that point his health was completely compromised and his body beset with infection. My father died near the end of March.

I believe people process loss in different ways. Some people simply collapse, disassociating from reality, surrendering completely to their grief. Some people may find the whole death ritual to be cathartic – you know, the demands of making arrangements, meeting with funeral directors, getting dressed up, attending religious services, organizing meals, and gathering with friends and family. At a bare minimum, addressing all those responsibilities provides a distraction. My family tends to be a bit pragmatic, objective and dispassionate. I recall that during the weeks before and after my father's death, my siblings and I gained some comfit from engaging in a lot of finger-pointing. Of course, we couldn't help but wonder what would have resulted if my father had received that Vitamin K infusion even before the first determination to operate was made. We analyzed every decision the doctors made, finding fault with most of them. If only they hadn't... Why didn't they try that earlier... Shouldn't they have... Don't get me wrong, a lot of pretty big blunders seemed to have been made in my father's treatment, but I also believe that we lacked the expertise to productively evaluate the judgment of the medical professionals. We even questioned the choices my father had made: why hadn't he switched doctors... why hadn't he been more aggressive in addressing his ulcers... why did he hold off seeking treatment during this last episode? It took me years to recognize that our bodies have a shelf-life, and often, despite our tweaking and fiddling, nothing we do is going to extend or shorten that shelf-life by much. It's reality. I know death is a hard thing to face. We really want to believe that by being proactive, by staying on top of all the latest medical guidance, by making wise choices and by heeding our bodies' warning signals we can put off our ultimate departures – well, let's face it, perpetually. Such thinking is absurd but very reassuring. I guess we all like to indulge in the fantasy that we're in control of our destinies.

Once all the post-death ceremonies were performed and my family had convened multiple times, informally and in various assortments, to lament, to agonize, to analyze, to criticize and to, basically, vent, it was time for me and my girlfriend to head back to our apartment in Brooklyn and for us both to return to our jobs. In my experience the real mourning begins once you reestablish your everyday life... when dark thoughts creep in during your daily subway ride or in the midst of watching a TV show or while lying awake in bed at night. Strangely, the “what ifs” that had so dominated my family's thinking earlier began to diminish and were replaced by a vague realization that had been troubling me throughout my father's decline. I felt that at some point during his weeks-long hospital stay my father had been stripped of his “humanness”... that he had been transformed into an object (like, let's say, an automobile undergoing extensive repairs, disassembled to the point of unrecognizability, its parts strewn across the garage floor)... that his emotions, his feelings, his discomfit, his pain were insignificant and only the successful outcome of his treatment mattered... that we, his family, as healthy, functioning individuals still merited an attention, a consideration and the right to make choices that he had somehow relinquished – and that was the case even though he remained conscious and aware throughout most of his ordeal. And though fully cognizant of what was transpiring, we, his family, were completely helpless and incapable of intervening. This disturbed and terrified me.

As is still the case today, back then, whenever I needed to address or resolve some distressing occurrence in my life I turned to art. Several weeks after my father's death, I decided to make a linoleum block print documenting his last days at the hospital. Though for compositional purposes I resorted to some distortion and rearranging, the print accurately depicts each of the many mechanical devices that sustained my father's life at that time – so accurately that when I study the print today it brings back vivid memories of those painful days. My goal was to so prioritize the gadgets and mechanisms enveloping my father that his own presence would be diminished, nearly erased. After cutting the block, I tried printing it in several colors. On one occasion, having just pulled an image in black, I got lazy. I examined the block and determined that there was very little residual ink remaining on the surface, that all the grooves I had cut were pretty much free of ink. Just to be cautious I wiped off the block with a paper towel. In truth, I should have cleaned the block with turpentine, washed it with soap and water and then waited for it to be thoroughly dry before making a print in a different color. But, like I said, I got lazy. My next printing was to be in bright red, hopefully to elicit a feeling of alarm, peril, blood. I inked the block, applied it to a sheet of good quality rag paper and, not having access to a press, simply rubbed the back of the print with a spoon until I was certain that the paper had made absolute contact with the entirety of the block's surface, the whole process taking quite a while. When I peeled the paper from the block, I was immediately dismayed. The black ink, the remaining amount of which I thought negligible, actually asserted itself forcefully, dulling the bright red ink and creating an inconsistent mottled effect. I groaned, ruing the time I had wasted trying to cut corners. I put the print aside to dry, cleaned the block and quit for the day, expecting to properly execute the print the next day.

The following morning, I examined the red print again. The infusion of a small amount of black ink permitted the structure of the print to pronounce itself more clearly than if I had used only red, which would have pulsated on the page. I also liked the surprising grainy effect the black residue contributed to the print and how the darker hues emerged irregularly, providing a more nuanced, complex component to a composition which basically consisted of a series of strong horizontals and verticals. My incompetent accident actually satisfied me, and I decided that the print was worth keeping. Ultimately, my thinking went beyond that. Instead of tolerating my clumsy mistake in one image, I deliberately recreated the effect in all future printings.

Gerard Wickham - My Father's Deathbed - 1987

I didn't quite know what to do with this print once it was completed. It seemed too personal to share with others. And it seemed to be too universal to be of interest to others. (Hasn't everyone experienced a similar loss of a loved one in a hospital setting?) Though this print has hung on the wall of my home for about thirty years, I believe it to be too grim for most people to tolerate on a daily basis. So you might think my whole endeavor to be fruitless. But I would disagree. During my schooling, I was trained to be a “fine artist”. As such I was encouraged by my instructors to put aside issues of affirmation and marketability and instead follow my own unique inclinations. That is the only true pathway to bringing about meaningful communication. To this day, I am so thankful to have had this central concept drilled into me throughout my years of higher education. So although My Father's Deathbed remains a challenging, troublesome companion, I have no regrets regarding its creation. In fact, after thirty six years, it asserts its presence far more tolerably (almost consolingly) than it did at the time of its execution. And as I grow older and must envision my own inevitable demise, I can appreciate that even as a young man I chose to attempt to represent the perspective of a fellow human succumbing to death while enmeshed in the apparatus of a well meaning yet incognizant medical establishment. At a minimum I'm satisfied that I cared enough to give it a try.

As always, I encourage readers to comment here. If you would prefer to comment privately, you can email me at gerardwickham@gmail.com.

Entry - 12.3.22

Our personal histories are often composed of a long string of seemingly unexceptional events, but perhaps it is those barely memorable events that define our lives, confer significance to our days and ultimately determine who we are. Please bear with me as I indulge in a little nostalgia and once again expound upon some of my personal history.

Long, long ago in the 1980's, I hadn't been working for the state long when our agency was instructed to beef up our staffing during a routine HUD* audit. Joel, an experienced and knowledgeable professional, was one of the new hires who were eventually brought on as a result of that directive. At the time, I worked in a unit that shared the same stretch of offices and cubicles occupied by the newbies. Since we reported to different managers and had completely different functions, I wasn't very interested in the new employees. Joel told me later that I was a bit cold and standoffish. That didn't surprise me. I'm sure I was polite and businesslike, but, unless an individual gave me cause for interest, I wasn't looking to make new friends. That may sound pompous, but, while working full-time and pursuing my artistic endeavors, I had to be somewhat selective as to where I committed my energies. And, probably even more material, I was wary of making a connection with any individual who would later prove to bore the hell out of me. Once such connections are made it's usually extremely difficult to extract oneself from them.

In spite of my inclinations, I couldn't help but learn more about the new hires. Joel was a true product of the Sixties, having participated in many demonstrations during his college years and holding an encyclopedic knowledge of the various philosophies being advanced during those tumultuous days. He showed me a picture of himself from that era, and he looked the quintessential hippie: long hair, enormous beard, dirty, worn and disheveled clothing. He was my senior by a decade, married and with kids when we first met. He already had years of experience in several avenues of employment, including a few stints working as lighting designer for theater productions (his true vocation but one that sadly did not provide reliable, profitable employment). I was in my late twenties, just out of grad school, single with no desire for a “real” job.

Joel was well-read, informed about art, music, politics and culture, freethinking, self-effacing and ever willing to play the fool. As is still the case today, I took myself too seriously and found Joel's company to be refreshing and liberating. We inevitably became good friends, and, though I'm not sure exactly when this occurred, we at some point established a weekly ritual that we followed for more than a decade.

Anyone who has ever worked a full-time, mind-numbing job knows that Friday is a cause for celebration, a release from the seemingly endless succession of workdays that swallows up most of the hours of our conscious lives. On Friday, there is a brief illusion, embraced quixotically over and over again, that we have escaped our bonds and can foresee an infinite expanse of time to pursue our own inclinations and address our own needs. We deny the recognition that our weekends fly by in a flash and are ever surprised to find ourselves transported magically to Monday morning heading back to the office to start another week of work. These mental games are really critical to our survival.

So when Friday arrived, Joel and I were always primed to relish the moment. At the end of our workday, we took the 6 Train from our Midtown Manhattan office down to the East Village. Back then, there was a massive Tower Records Store in the Silk Building (est'd 1909) at the intersection of Broadway and East 4^th, but what interested me most was that around the corner of the same building at Lafayette and East 4^th was a Tower Records Annex which offered at steep discounts CDs that hadn't moved at other outlets. The CDs were so cheap that Tower would cut a groove into each jewel case, making resale at another music store impossible. A selection of many genres of music was available there, but, weirdly, the classical music section was by far the largest of all. Fantastic! I loved classical music and, after savoring a half hour or so of pawing through the inventory, I always purchased a couple of CDs. Those journeys downtown really helped me flesh out my classical music library, and to this day I still pull many a “notched” CD from my stacks to enjoy an interlude of listening pleasure as I complete a crossword puzzle, read a book or do some creative writing. (Sadly, nearly two decades ago Tower Records filed for bankruptcy and within two short years the company's assets were completely liquidated.)

After that detour, we would walk further east on 4^th Street until we reached our ultimate destination at the corner with Bowery: Phebe's Tavern & Grill. Phebe's had been a neighborhood bar since 1968, and, though it certainly wasn't a dive, it was a place with an earthy vibe and affordable food and drink. Usually when we showed up, an assortment of sedate locals (middle aged workers and elderly retirees) occupied the establishment. They usually sat at the bar, in pairs or alone, and they all seemed to know each other, conversing comfortably among themselves or with the bartender. The music wasn't very loud, mostly Sinatra and his contemporaries. As the evening progressed, the locals would cede the bar to a younger crowd of NYU students, who arrived in large groups and commonly populated the many tables scattered about the place. The selections on the jukebox pivoted to contemporary Rock, and the volume was turned up high. Then Phebe's really started to hum. The floor space was filled with patrons, standing drinks in hand, waiting perhaps for a table to become available or maybe for their shot at the pool table. To approach the bar you had to squeeze through a mob. Waitresses scurried from table to table, filling orders and presenting checks. The continuous ring of the cash register was smothered in the cacophony of bellowing voices, blasting music and the crack of pool balls. To my untrained eye, the establishment appeared to be doing rip-roaring business.

Joel and I would arrive well before the bar got crowded and always had our choice of where to sit. We would pick the same table on the building's shallow wraparound veranda enclosed in glass. This specific table wasn't tucked away behind the brick exterior walls but was exposed through a large entranceway to the hub of activity at the bar. This meant we would still get prompt service while enjoying an expansive view of street traffic. Immediately, we would get a pitcher of beer to start our long evening. Phebe's was one of a small number of bars in NYC that still served beer in pitchers at extremely affordable prices. Soon after, we'd order our dinners: Blackjack Burgers and spiced curly fries. If I recall correctly, the Blackjack Burger was a hamburger rolled in cracked black peppercorns and sauteed in Jack Daniels, a truly heavenly treat. Once we had eaten, we could get down to some serious conversation.

Of course, Joel and I addressed our current circumstances and past histories. That goes without saying. We bitched about work and crowed about our achievements. We often discussed literature. Joel had a particular affection for the works of Charles Dickens, and I also remember his informing me that traditionally tragedy could only impact the highborn since the protagonist had to fall from great heights for his or her undoing to be meaningful. Both Joel and I were amateur wannabe authors, and, if a recently completed story had been presented for consideration, we'd devote an hour or so to it's evaluation. We discussed art, often my own, and I couldn't get over the fact that Joel believed the title applied to a work of art to be of great significance, nearly as important as the work itself. I think he would be dismayed to learn that I thought of the titles of my paintings as simply convenient identifiers, sometimes forgotten over the years and invented anew for a show or catalog. We critiqued the artwork on Phebe's walls, a revolving gallery of the output of NYU students (or so we believed) that was usually pretty accomplished. As the evening progressed and more beer was consumed, we would get caught up in circular arguments, repeatedly going over the same ground and offering no possible resolution.

Usually at some point during our stay, we'd head into an interior alcove to compete on Phebe's well-worn, bar-size pool table. Joel and I weren't great pool players. Sometimes we were pretty good, but a lot of the time we were just plain terrible. I guess you'd say that our performance was “uneven”. We really didn't care about the outcome of our efforts; we just enjoyed the game, facing challengers, interacting with other players and spectators and entertaining the crowd. Joel and I always played as a team, alternating our turns on the table. Some nights, we could own the table for game after game; other nights, we'd be booted off after our first effort.

I recall one quiet afternoon too early for a crowd to have developed, Joel and I had to play against each other – which did happen from time to time. We were watched by one lone, young dude seated on the cushioned bench that lined the alcove. Perhaps because we felt no pressure, it was one of those rare days when we were playing particularly well. At one point, Joel observed that he didn't have a shot. I studied the table and after some consideration informed him that there surely was a doable shot. I laid out for him a ridiculously complex shot that required banking the cue ball off the far rail and initiating a chain reaction involving several balls. Joel guffawed at my suggestion, but I persisted, insisting falsely that it was an easy shot. Joel thrust the cue stick into my hand, daring me to make the shot if it was so easy. I really had no choice, so I examined the table once more and began lining up my shot. I was crouched over concentrating on my aim when Joel slammed a five dollar bill on the side rail exclaiming that it was mine if I made the shot. I let the cue ball fly, and miraculously my plan was effected precisely as I had suggested – more a matter of dumb luck than skill. Joel was thrilled. He happily pressed the bill into my palm, absolutely delighted that I had made that crazy shot. And that was what was wonderful about Joel. The competition didn't matter. The loss of a few bucks meant even less. He was there for the camaraderie, for the pleasure of a shared experience. While we finished that game, two challengers appeared, placing their stack of six quarters on the rail to secure their turn against us. During the ensuing game, Joel and I were just awful, missing absurdly easy shots and sinking the cue ball repeatedly. From one game to the next, our abilities had completely evaporated. As I said earlier, our performance was “uneven”. At the table's periphery, awaiting my next turn, I noticed that that first, lone spectator was leaning into one of our competitors and overheard him warning him not to accept any bets from us... because we were pool sharks. Obviously, this poor guy couldn't reconcile how our skill level had changed so precipitously between two games. Of course, we quickly lost and upon returning to our table had a good laugh thinking that someone had mistaken our incompetence for guile.

Many times as our outing drew to a close, we made the mistake of ordering one pitcher too many. We'd be utterly sated, filled to the gills with suds, but for some unknown reason felt compelled to top off our tanks. Our conversational skills deteriorated, and our observations became very basic and primitive. It was usually at about this hour that Joel would rise from his seat, stumble over to the jukebox and put Lynyrd Skynyrd's “Freebird” into the lineup; and when that song came on, Joel became electrified, singing along passionately with the band. There were a few occasions when Joel nodded off while we consumed that last pitcher. This didn't disturb me; I just sipped my beer, listened to the music and studied his features. At that time, I, still in the flower of my youth, was bewildered that he could pull off this stunt in a noisy bar. But now my perspective has changed. Today, I can sit down, completely sober, to watch some TV show to which I've looked forward for some time and drift off unawares in a matter of minutes. I awake with the credits playing, wondering what the hell happened. Regardless of our condition and the lateness of the hour, Joel and I would siphon off every last drop of beer in that superfluous pitcher, pay our tab and exit to the street to part company as we headed off to different subway stations.

Of course, my narrative imposes some distortion on this history. Joel and I didn't visit Phebe's every week without exception. There were times when we simply didn't go out at the conclusion of the workweek, and we often frequented other establishments located around Manhattan. Also, we were sometimes joined by a variety of coworkers on our outings. But, truly, our unaccompanied journeys down to Phebe's represented, by far, the norm.

I hold many fond memories of our sojourns down to Phebe's, but one stands out in particular. During one of our Friday workdays, it had begun snowing heavily; in fact, the weathermen were forecasting the onset of a blizzard, an unusual occurrence in NYC. By lunchtime, the snow was really piling up. Eventually, our Agency's management team, in sympathy with those workers who faced long and unpredictable commutes, closed up shop early, and Joel and I decided to ignore the storm and instead pursue our customary Friday routine – merely a few hours earlier than usual. When we arrived at Phebe's, we chose to sit at the veranda's corner table which provided views of both East 4^th and Bowery. It was a pleasure to occupy a warm, windowed interior space and watch the storm develop. At first, the city was still bustling, taxis careening on the snow-covered streets, plows struggling to keep the roads passable and pedestrians rushing home from work (gingerly scaling the curbside drifts in their fancy duds and totally inappropriate footwear). It seemed to us that we were witnessing a captivating performance presented solely for our entertainment. As the evening progressed, the snow accumulated faster and faster, traffic dwindled to almost nothing and fewer passersby braved the elements. If you happen to capture Manhattan before the almost immediate rush to dig out, the city blanketed in snow is absolutely beautiful and I can't recall ever seeing it look more magical. And then something happened which never happens in the city, day or night. It was perfectly quiet. No traffic noise. No honking horns. No sirens blaring. No construction din. If it weren't for the falling snow, I could have believed I was looking at a still photo of the Big Apple. Joel and I remained at the bar as long as was arguably prudent but finally had to succumb to reason and head home.

Naturally, with time all things must change. I got married and started a family. Ultimately, my wife and I decided to leave the city, moving up to the northern burbs. The Village, which had formerly been located along both Joel's and my commutes home, was no longer the convenient destination it once was for me. My focus was shifting to my family and my expanding professional responsibilities, and even those few hours of escapist release we had indulged in no longer held the same appeal for me as they once had. Still, Joel and I persisted in our routine – just not as consistently as before. Many times change occurs almost imperceptibly, but by the late 90's I had come to understand vaguely that the Phebe's era was drawing to a close. It was definitely an odd feeling, recognizing the waning of a pursuit that had been so vital to my mental welfare for so long, and I determined then that I wanted to memorialize in some way that period of my life and, of course, chose to do so through art.

So one evening I brought my camera along with me to Phebe's and took a series of photographs of Joel - naturally seated at our usual table on the veranda. I hadn't forewarned Joel of my intentions, so I was pleasantly surprised to see that he had worn his very “mod” black leather vest, an article of clothing that truly harkened back to his 60's past. Joel is flanked on one side by a glass and on the other by a pitcher of beer. A couple occupies the table behind him, and in the windows can be seen a display piece (an electric guitar meant to inform potential customers that this joint was rockin') and a Sam Adams advertisement that I believe had been taped to the glass unchanged for years. From my photos, I constructed a drawing and then adapted the image to a linoleum cut. Because I wanted my print to be larger than any standard linoleum block available, I used two 8” by 10” blocks for my cut. I'm pretty happy with this print; for me, it effectively resurrects that time, now a quarter century in the past.

Gerard Wickham - Joel at Phebe's - 1997

As I had foreseen, our visits to Phebe's eventually petered out. With time, Joel and I no longer worked in the same unit (or even on the same floor) at the office and our paths rarely crossed. Additionally my primary interest at the end of the day became catching the first of two express trains up north that would shorten the duration of my long trip home and permit me a span of uninterrupted sleep on MetroNorth's “Quiet Car”. I guess the trajectories of our lives were moving in different directions.

Joel and I hadn't been to Phebe's in years when one evening we decided to stop in at the bar for old times' sake. Immediately upon entering the place, it was clear to us that things had changed. It could have been the result of new ownership or management, but, whatever the explanation, Phebe's had been upgraded. The aura was now upscale and trendy, the interior space completely remodeled. The hard linoleum tiled floors, occasionally chipped or cracked, were gone. The rickety tables that wobbled frightfully whenever you shifted in your seat had been replaced. The crowd was different... affluent and polite. A glance at the menu revealed that their prices had experienced an upgrade too, and, perhaps most egregious of all, pitchers of beer were no longer offered. Sadly, the beaten-up pool table had been removed. We really shouldn't have been too surprised; the entire East Village had been undergoing a slow transformation for years.

Time passes surprisingly quickly. Joel and I are both retired now. We live about two hours apart, and the COVID pandemic hit shortly after my leaving work; so we haven't gotten together in over five years. I have to admit that the trip down to NYC, a trip I made every workday for decades, now seems complex and daunting. I suppose my perspective has undergone an overhaul. We do occasionally communicate by email and have both recognized that even that unnatural, high-tech medium allows us to quickly fall into the same old, candid patois that defined our discussions during the Phebe's era. I really can't say what the future holds.

I guess you may expect me to draw some conclusion from these recollections, or perhaps that's a responsibility I simply impose on myself. I might say “carpe diem” (sieze the day), thinking that Joel and I had stumbled through sheer luck upon a little Eden, a situation, a place, a time which optimized our gratification, offering us solace, entertainment, respite, stimulation, companionship and escape – like somehow the stars had inexplicably aligned to create a unique, transitory world in the East Village a few decades ago. But that doesn't ring true for me. I found on the internet an old photo of an earlier iteration of Phebe's, perhaps taken in the late 60's. The bar, then called “Phebe's Place”, is simply a nondescript, white cube with a pair of corner doors, one small window, no veranda and two wall-mounted air conditioners. The place definitely looks a little seedy. But I bet a generation of hippies, freaks and aging locals loved it. The jukebox played the new rock music (still in its infancy), the conversations were about Vietnam, Richard Nixon, civil rights and demonstrations, and the drinks were crazy cheap. I can imagine that those early frequenters of Phebe's Place would remember fondly the original, primitive version of the bar and despise the enhancements that characterized the location during Joel's and my tenure there.

And I also believe that today NYU students, at least those with well-heeled parents, are regulars at the new and improved Phebe's. They stop by after an early morning class for brunch, a mimosa and a bit of civilized conversation before heading back to the dorms. They've never heard of Tower Records and can't even conceive of entering into a brick and mortar store to purchase tangible music media. Years from now they may have their own sentimental memories of Phebe's and the brief span of time they experienced the East Village.

So I suppose what I'm saying is that there is no such thing as the ideal niche perfectly suited to meet one's individual desires. If Joel and I hadn't stumbled across Phebe's back in the 80's, we simply would have found another location equally satisfactory to our needs. I mean there really are an infinite number of bars, taverns and pubs in Manhattan. Our experiences wouldn't have been the same but surely very similar. On the other hand I am thankful that Joel and I did choose to spend those evenings down in the Village, pursuing a routine that included shopping at Tower, carousing at Phebe's and, most importantly, sharing a shred of camaraderie and good cheer.

As always, I encourage readers to comment here. If you would prefer to comment privately, you can email me at gerardwickham@gmail.com.

*US Department of Housing and Urban Development

Entry - 4.30.22

 

“The painter should paint not only what he has in front of him, but also what he sees inside himself. If he sees nothing within, then he should stop painting what is in front of him.”                                                                                                                                - Caspar David Friedrich

Off and on over the last couple of months, I've been working my way through The Complete Short Stories of Ernest Hemingway, a tome of 650 pages which includes writings roughly spanning the nineteen twenties through the fifties. I've been very impressed with the stories, in some ways finding them more satisfactory than the novels. The short stories embody an easy naturalism that at times eludes Hemingway in the longer works. I don't intend to provide a full review of Hemingway's fiction here but instead wish to focus on one aspect of his history which these stories exemplify: Hemingway totally embraced life, enthusiastically setting forth for wherever “the action” was happening, however distant or dangerous. He served in the Italian ambulance corps during World War I, rubbed elbows with Pablo Picasso, Gertrude Stein, James Joyce and Joan Miró in Paris during the twenties, covered the Greco-Turkish War of 1922 as a journalist, documented bullfighting in Spain, big-game fished in the Caribbean, reported on the Spanish Civil War in the late thirties, actually led a small band of village militia in France during World War II and went on safaris in Africa. No matter where he went, he somehow seemed to obtain an almost miraculous understanding of local etiquette, practices and rituals. Apparently, he absorbed languages through sheer osmosis and could talk like a pro about corridas, weaponry, seamanship, food and drink and big game. I am literally in awe of the breadth of his knowledge and the vastness of his experience.

Ernest Hemingway

Perhaps my reaction to his exploits is a bit heightened since I am Hemingway's opposite. I am not well-traveled, having restricted all of my American expeditions solely to our nation's northeast and only venturing to Europe a handful of times. I don't rush toward “the action”; I try to avoid it. In fact, I was much chagrined to find myself in Berlin a month before the fall of the Iron Curtain in 1989, when refugees were already streaming from Eastern Europe into Germany. The situation didn't excite me but instead made me feel rather imperiled. I prefer serene predictability to volatile stimulation and believe, for me at least, that quiet contemplation without intruding distractions is essential to artistic creation. So, as you can imagine, I've led a pretty narrow existence.

I've only set up permanent residence in a couple of locations, all within the borders of New York State. Moving definitely has many benefits. You get to explore new locations and discover new restaurants, stores, art centers, music venues and parks. It can be pretty exciting. On the other hand, the experience of moving can be extremely trying, making mundane tasks challenging and routine activities demanding. I would say that moving means exchanging the familiar for the unfamiliar.

My wife and I, along with our two young children, moved to our current location in the Hudson Valley nearly 30 years ago, and I can still remember the experience as though it were yesterday. We were thrilled and relieved to be exchanging our confined and impractical quarters in Brooklyn for a large house situated on about two acres of land in a semi-bucolic setting. In fact, our furniture and possessions which had crammed our railroad flat in the city barely filled our new space, leaving our new accommodations feeling sparsely furnished and almost unpopulated. During the first months in our new digs, I recall retreating in the evenings with my three-year-old son to an upstairs bedroom to watch the sole TV station we could access with our telescoping antenna, a local station that usually hosted college basketball games. Seated on a span of pristine carpeting in front of a portable TV set (the only object occupying the room), we gratefully watched grainy images of young sportsmen fading in and out of focus as they vied for athletic supremacy. We ate our meals at a folding table set up in our dining room. We had only one car, which meant that my wife was completely stranded at the house while I was at work; for entertainment, she would bundle up the kids, load them into a double stroller and head down the hill to visit a fenced-in cow sedately munching on greenery at the curbside. We were so navigationally challenged that every journey we made for any purpose whatsoever always had the same destination: the one major thoroughfare in the area with which we were familiar. Years later, we laughed at our foolishness, how we often traveled miles out of our way to visit a store or restaurant that had an equally appealing alternative just minutes from our home. Honestly, I could go on forever.

Even after our exodus from Brooklyn, my life continued to be anchored in New York City. I still worked full-time in Manhattan, and my daily commute stole four full hours from my day. Sometimes I felt how ridiculous it was for me even to return to the Hudson Valley each evening. Once home, I would grab a quick bite to eat, watch a bit of TV with my wife and head off to bed early, hoping to get something close to the minimal number of hours of sleep needed to preserve life. I didn't learn much about our home's surrounding area. Our new property was a place to escape to and decompress after a stressful week of work. I didn't make connections with our neighbors; I interacted with quite enough people at my office and didn't need to add superfluous folk to the mix.

My wife is a very different kind of person, extremely social and approachable. And let's not forget that she was marooned along with two toddlers at our home unless I and the critically important car were there – certainly a powerful incentive to get the hell out of the house and press the flesh. So she quickly made connections with our neighbors and a handful of local groups and organizations. At that time, most of what I learned about our new environs was gleaned from her casual interactions with a diverse assortment of helpful and knowledgeable townies.

I honestly can't remember who it was that first apprised my wife of a nearby park that would be just the right place for our little ones, but whoever it was certainly did us a great service. Prior to this, we had a rather limited selection of locations where we could go to visit a playground and perhaps take a walk in the woods. Tymor Park was the perfect setting for our young family. Located close-by in a bordering town, the park consisted of a cluster of structures and amenities: a stately, old house, barns, long outbuildings, equestrian facilities, tennis courts, baseball and soccer fields, stables, silos, a playground and a well-maintained swimming pool. Most importantly for me, there was a reasonably graded, unpaved hiking path, about two miles long and girding a sizable pond, that could be traversed by small children. This hiking path, which included a few inclined sections providing a mild cardiovascular workout, passed by an old boathouse and observation deck, the ruins of an iron furnace and a man-made waterfall. For years, we took advantage of the playground and the path around Furnace Pond, without realizing that the park was actually much larger than we had believed it to be. We later discovered that, on the outskirts of the park, across some active roadways, are acres and acres of woodlands offering secluded and challenging hikes up and along a ridge of hills. In fact, encompassing over 500 acres, Tymor is the largest municipal park in New York State. We became aware of these additional holdings just as our boys were growing older and serious exertion became more inviting than swinging on a swing or shooting down a slide. In the right weather during certain seasons, the woods could assert a spooky aura which I, being an impish parent, would play upon to give the kids a thrill – hopefully not so intense as to keep them up at night or turn them off to hiking altogether. Generally, our travels were uneventful, lyrical and exhilarating. The trails in the deep woods are rarely used, and I've only come across a fellow hiker out there a handful of times in literally decades of visiting the park. These days, with the kids all grown, I hike alone and almost always opt for the secluded, outlying trails through the hilly backwoods. It's truly a joy to escape the frenetic demands of contemporary living and experience an hour or more of peace and isolation in a scenic, natural setting.

Mark Twain

Within just the last year, I learned that the park has an interesting history. This is going to get convoluted, so bear with me. In 1884, Samuel Clemens, known to most by his pen name Mark Twain, frustrated with his publisher, decided he would open his own publishing house and appointed his current agent, Charles Webster, as its director. Twain had reason to have every confidence in Webster. Beside serving as his agent, Webster had married Twain's niece, Annie Moffett, in 1875. Initially, Twain's publishing house was a success, but within less than a decade sales had fallen off precipitously. Webster, stressed-out and overworked, suffered a nervous breakdown, and Twain fired him. Sadly, Webster committed suicide in 1891. But during their marriage, Webster and Annie Moffett (who incidentally lived until 1950) had three children, and their only daughter, Jean, studied at Vassar College, traveled the world extensively, advocated for impoverished children and women's suffrage and became a successful and well-known author. In fact, one of Jean's books, Daddy Long Legs, was adapted into a popular play and later made into a movie which starred Fred Astaire and Leslie Caron. Jean eventually married Glenn Mckinney of Tymor Farms in Union Vale, Dutchess County. (“At last, a connection to Tymor Park!”, you exclaim.) Glenn and author Jean lived in marital bliss on the farm until Jean died after giving birth to a daughter at Manhattan's Sloan Hospital for Women in 1916. The child, also named Jean, survived and years later went on to marry Ralph Connor, the couple choosing to continue living at Tymor Farms. In 1971, Jean and Ralph donated the farm to the Town of Union Vale to be used as a public park. Six years later, the couple turned over to Vassar College 52 boxes of material that had been stored in barns and attics on the farm for decades. This material consisted of manuscripts, letters, notebooks, scrapbooks, journals, clippings and photographs gathered by several generations of family members who had lived at the farm and included among it was a large number of public and personal documents of Mark Twain, many of which scholars had no idea existed. I had been visiting this park for close to thirty years and had no knowledge of its history. I was particularly blown away to learn of its connection to Twain, a preeminent American author whose writings I had studied extensively while in college and continued to research after graduation. By the way, of Twain's four children, three died tragically before his own death, and his sole grandchild passed away without having any children of her own. This may explain how many of his belongings ended up in his niece's possession.

Tymor Plaque in Recognition of the Connors

During our nearly three decades of living in the Hudson Valley, we've learned of many amazing parks located quite close to our home. Each of them offers a few unique features such as challenging climbs, amazing views from great heights, extensive trails, scenic lakes and ponds, rushing waterways, roaring waterfalls, open fields, rock scrambling, historic buildings and ruins, fire towers, ice caves, flower gardens and abandoned orchards. I have visited many of these nearby parks multiple times and must observe that some of these features I've listed are not available at Tymor and those features that are available there are often exceeded by far in quality at other locations. For instance, the scenic views at Minnewaska Park or Schunemunk Mountain cannot be rivaled by those from the wooded hills of Tymor. The climb to the top of Bear Mountain is far more formidable than anything Tymor can offer. The deteriorating wooden structures at Tymor cannot compare with the mansions and gardens of the Roosevelt and Vanderbilt estates. All true. But Tymor offers probably one of the widest variety of these features among all our nearby parks and, for the most part, the quality of these features is of a truly praiseworthy character. I don't want to wax so poetic here as to lose all credibility, but I'm going to try to explain to some degree why I've formed such a strong attachment to this location. The park is pretty isolated, even the drive to it providing gorgeous views of open landscape, an ancient graveyard, rolling hills, horse farms and wooded avenues. It is nestled on all sides by ridges of hills that, depending on the time of day and the season, turn golden red or rust or grayish purple or deep green or cobalt blue. And being isolated, the park is not overrun with hordes of visitors. In fact, on most days my little Mitsubishi Mirage will share the large unpaved, dirt parking lot with only a few other cars. On the modern playground, you might find a couple of parents overseeing their children at play, but the trails are usually unoccupied. You're able to meander through this beautiful place free from distractions or interruption solely immersed in your private thoughts. Often the sound of trickling rivulets or rushing streams or crashing waterfalls accompanies your travels. There is a truly timeless quality to this park. While hiking you come across evidence of the endeavors of previous generations: century-old clapboard houses, farm structures, abandoned recreational facilities and the ruins of industrial works established in the early 1800's. Some of the hiking trails bear Native American names like Teaghpacksinck and Foghpacksinck. Would I be going too far to suggest that the park asserts to each visitor that he or she is part of a continuum, that their momentary experience of this place is not unique or individual but simply a facet of an endless communal connection with this land?

Many times while roving within the confines of this park, I am struck by the beauty of the scenery. Often the view of a wide expanse or even a seemingly insignificant detail will inspire within me a powerful emotional response. I can't explain this, but locations within this park frequently provide the quintessential, picture-postcard representation which defines for me the best of what each season affords. So, naturally, I've taken literally hundreds and hundreds of photographs at Tymor. Many of my photos document the same location, even the exact same perspective, but, for me at least, each is specific, asserting a unique character and mood. I will provide here a small selection of the vast number of photographs I've taken at this park over the years. Some of these pictures are actually scanned images from early film prints, so the quality of this selection may vary some.

We've even twice used the park as a backdrop for our annual Christmas card photo.

It occurred to me recently that I've probably painted the scenery at Tymor more often than at any other location. I don't commonly paint landscapes. It's not that I disparage the genre. In truth, I find the landscapes of Caspar David Friedrich, Ferdinand Hodler, Vincent van Gogh, Fairfield Porter, Richard Diebenkorn, Andrew Wyeth and Anselm Kiefer (to name just a few) to be truly stirring and effectively expressive of a distinct emotional state. But I struggle with landscape. For me, it's a matter of focus. In painting a landscape, I have trouble determining where to direct my energies and end up with an overall unsatisfactory execution. I think I get impatient and lazy. The figure remains for me my most natural instrument of expression. But I do paint scenes from nature now and then, especially while on vacation at a particularly impressive locale. And since retiring, I now have more frequent opportunities to explore local parks and trails, which regularly spark an interest in documenting a scenic vista. All the same, I still very rarely tackle a landscape and even more rarely will I approach a landscape as a weighty, laborious effort. I would define most of my landscapes as “studies”. This is why I was surprised to recognize recently that several of my major works have been inspired by the scenery at Tymor.

In 2003, I created View from Tymor, a large oil painting executed on canvas, which documents a view from an elevation overseeing roadways crisscrossing the park, bordering trees, scattered structures and distant fields and hills. I thought of this work as an abstract “symphony” composed of various movements whose details could be reorganized, emphasized and distorted in acquiescence to the whole.

Gerard Wickham, View from Tymor, Oil on Canvas, 2003, 46" X 52"

The following year, I painted on a wood panel Furnace Pond, Tymor Park. There used to be a deck above Furnace Pond at which my wife and I would occasionally set out on a picnic table a huge spread of cheeses, meats and other delicacies for our children to enjoy while we shared a bottle of white wine. I was decidedly interested in how the bright spring sunshine would wash out the tonalities of the distant pond, fields and hills leaving only the deck and the curtain of trees immediately behind it richly colored and in focus. It was an effect that definitely struck an emotional chord within me, and I set out to capture it in paints.

Gerard Wickham, Furnace Pond, Tymor Park, Oil on Wood Panel, 2004, 17.25" X 22.5"

In 2018, the first year of my retirement, I decided that once the weather was reasonably mild I would get outdoors regularly to record some of the local scenery. Most of these works were not very accomplished, but I was happy with a few of them. Tymor in Autumn, a detailed portrayal in gouache of an old clapboard house on the outskirts of the park, was one of the last landscapes that I produced that year and is, in all likelihood, my most successful effort. 

Gerard Wickham, Tymor in Autumn, Gouache on Paper, 2018, 14" X 9"

With the COVID pandemic raging in 2020, I believed it would be irresponsible to organize a multi-figure modeling shoot in preparation for a major work and instead began to entertain thoughts of executing a large landscape painting. In the autumn of that year, many months after the initial outbreak, I was hiking alone in the backwoods of Tymor when inspiration struck. During that first year, I probably did more hiking than I had ever done before in my entire life. On that particular afternoon, I chose a trail that would take me directly to the top of a long ridge of hills. This route ran parallel to a small stream confined within a rocky chasm situated between two wooded slopes. As I achieved the summit, the trail abandoned the stream and headed straight into the woods. A few minutes later, I looked off to my left and saw a scene that probably wouldn't excite the interest of most hikers but really grabbed me. It was late November and the trees were already bare, their discarded leaves several inches deep on the forest floor. Beyond the trees was, inexplicably, an open field, still green with life, and behind that field was a thick screen of violet-gray trees, barely permeated by sunlight. At that time of year, the days are really short, and the sunlight seemed weak and impotent to me. Even though I had gotten out pretty early that afternoon, already the day was waning, the low sun casting lengthy shadows across the fallen leaves. The scene was so melancholy, so emblematic of the end of the bountiful growing season and so filled with foreboding of the bleak winter to come that I stopped in my tracks momentarily steeped in sorrow. Everything about me at that moment seemed absolutely tenuous, vulnerable and transitory. I know this sounds ridiculously melodramatic, but I thought about the changing of the seasons, how the cycle of the seasons related to the cycle of life, which in turn evoked a cognizance of the inevitability of physical decline and ultimately death. The scene before me palpably elicited such thinking. Luckily I had taken my camera with me that afternoon, so I was able to take a series of shots of the scene. It actually took me several days to grasp that this scene would be the subject of my next major work.

After preparing my canvas, I set to work with some loose concepts in mind. Initially, I felt that I might approach this landscape in a Cézannesque fashion, not apishly imitative but vaguely accepting of a fragmentation of form – an effect suggested by the weak autumnal light filtered through a prism of bare tree limbs. I actually devoted several sessions to this approach before recognizing that it wasn't legitimate for me, that I was adopting an artificial vocabulary not true to me. I briefly considered employing a very heightened palette of impasto brushwork, something akin to the technique employed within the compositions of Wolf Kahn, but again this approach was rejected as “dishonest”. At that point, I decided to let my image evolve organically. Though light was very critical to this work, I didn't want the painting to become too atmospheric; my trees had to be solid, weighty forms which spanned the gulf between foreground and sky. I felt strongly that I didn't want this painting to become “fussy”, a direction my natural tendencies veer toward, so I forced myself consistently to use brushes coarser and larger than would seem appropriate to my immediate needs. I wanted my paint handling to be crude and essential. I wanted to minimize technical affect. I was seeking candor.

It took me a full year to complete this landscape. To be honest, I must confess that I wasn't working too diligently and consistently on it. Perhaps experiencing the pandemic stripped me of some focus. For a good chunk of the first phase of the COVID-19 lockdown, our home was filled to the rafters with a crowd of idle workers, a student on hiatus from studying and retired me, and all that inactivity led to some excessive partying. However, if I truly make an unbiased evaluation of my behavior at that time, I would conclude that I was simply not motivated. This landscape provided a distraction for me. When I opted to go up to my studio, I really enjoyed the effort of painting, was satisfied with the approach I had chosen and relished the level of concentration I achieved. But then days would pass without my crossing the threshold of my studio. I have no regrets. It was just what had to be.

When I finished this painting late in 2021, I left it sitting on my easel for weeks and would occasionally visit it to consider the result of my endeavors. Let me make clear that this landscape was not intended to be an austere momento mori. Of course, as stated earlier, I wanted to capture a specific light and a specific mood that late autumn asserts, but, for all its focus on endings, the painting is pretty colorful and vibrant. I particularly enjoy the proximity of zones of orange, green and purple, an aberrant combination for me. Regardless of my response to its coloration, this painting disconcerted me. It is not edgy or outrageous or provocative; it is purposeful and raw and unsophisticated; and I wondered if viewing it offered any recompense... if aesthetically it could please or excite or offend... if it communicated any of the emotional content which I intended. For quite a while I was undecided. It wasn't until I hung the painting on a wall which I pass multiple times on a daily basis that I was able to reconcile myself with this work. I'm satisfied with it.

Gerard Wickham, Deep Woods, Tymor, Oil on Canvas, 2021, 34" X 44"

As I am finishing up this blog entry, it now occurs to me that I may have done a horrible thing. I've let the proverbial cat out of the bag. In singing the praises of this secluded, little-known spot, I could be compromising the very attributes that please me most about Tymor: its serenity, tranquility and lack of crowds. I can envision vying for a parking space in the unpaved lot, waiting in a long line at Furnace Pond's waterfall to catch a glimpse of its sonorous effluence and being accosted by hordes of fellow hikers on remote trails in Tymor's forests. It's a pretty grim prospect. Then I recall that my blog enjoys only a very minuscule following making my fears completely unfounded. I can let out a sigh of relief. And to that small assortment of crackpots and eccentrics who actually read my blog, I hereby announce that I gladly invite you to come and experience this wonderful location. Perhaps I just might run into you on the dirt paths tracing the hilltops above the park. We could share a granola bar, hike a few miles together and enjoy a long talk about art.

As always, I encourage readers to comment here. If you would prefer to comment privately, you can email me at gerardwickham@gmail.com.