The Artists' Cottage in Gloucester (Flashback Friday #4)

This is the kind of pastel portrait I learned to do during my studies in 1979 and 1980 from a model sitting. This is on Canson Paper and of my eldest son Adam who was a very good model as was my youngest and late son, Jason. However, the middle son couldn't sit still for anyone. Both Adam and Jason modeled for Daniel Greene's summer portrait classes while middle son Aaron mowed Dan's lawn!

The top photo is of a typical group of artists (art students studying with Dan) outside of the little cottage I so abused while living there that summer. I am on far right with my late son Jason right next to me and in front row was one of my art students, Jen Gillen from Cheshire,CT. In the lower photo were two of my adult students who joined us in Gloucester, MA, Louise Meisel and a lovely woman whose name escapes me!

The cottage was so completely booked I had to schedule 10 min. times staggered for each boarder to use the one bathroom in the house. I had the septic system cleaned each month! To make it easier on our guests, we hooked up an outside shower with a double curtain around it just outside the actual indoor shower to make things go faster.

A wonderful young woman artist named Frances Hairfield from the south, was a trooper and loved showering out of doors with or without the curtains!LOL  Frances was a talented painter and did a mean "Clog" I think they call it.

Frances Hairfield in top photo on far left and on left below as well. She had reddish blonde hair, the most delightful accent and posed for me too.

This is a pastel sketch I did of Frances on dark green paper. I always loved this gentle sketch of her and that beautiful profile and long neck. This is one of those works I just lost track of and can't find anymore? Frances now lives in Morganton, NC and paints and teaches there.

In top photo is Erika Greene, Dan's daughter who was there drawing  and modeling all summer and Pamela who was one of our great models there. All three of my sons took a shine to Erika and fought over who was going to spend time with her. One day my son Aaron asked me if he could take her out to Blackburns Tavern for a clam chowder lunch and I said OK while I stayed in the studio. When they returned, I asked him how the lunch went ? He said fine, she couldn't eat hers so he ate both lunches!! Aaron was only about 12 or 13 I think. His older brother Adam would have asked to be seated, pulled out his guests chair and used his napkin politely. He was the smooth one.

Erika was lovely to all my boys and with Dan's permission, even came to our house in CT,  for a weekend with us.

Top: Portrait demo of Erika and bottom is of Pamela by Dan

Pam always modeled on the models stand with her dog. It was a small white and black spaniel and was so cute. I remember one day when I had the last choice in class for my spot at an easel, I was very upset for some reason. I wanted to paint her from one position and that was taken. She was nude.  So I decided to sit on my feet on the floor using a propped up, upside down chair for my easel. It was ok for several days. Dan said nothing to me just observed quietly.  He would critique my portrait very calmly while bending down on his knees! 

However one day when the bell rang for lunch break, I started to get up from sitting on my feet and my feet would not work, they were completely numb. As I stood up on these numb feet , I began to fall forward and down . Pam the model in the nude caught me and her dog, barking and running around the studio made quite a scene. I broke my foot in Dan's class!!! 

I had to go to the hospital and was put in a cast up to my knee and had to walk with a crutch for a month or so. The next week when I came to class (three flights of stairs up to the studio) and there was a new model for the following two weeks and it was time to pick names for positions at easels. Dan walked over to me in a cast and on crutches and said "Some artists will do anything to get a good spot at their easels!" LOL

I got first choice and learned that the best spot doesn't necessarily guarantee the best painting! So many lessons to learn!

Couldn't resist putting one more photo of art students renting in the cottage, at Wheeler's Point in Gloucester, MA, because it includes my late son Jason one more time on far right and in front a promising young art student of mine back then, Jen Gillen. She came to see me recently at a demo I did and what a nice surprise to see the lovely woman she grew up to be!

Pastel of Eleanor the model I did in class there in Gloucester. She insisted on holding her head way up high to not make her double chin obvious. We couldn't convince her otherwise. I did a Dan Greene finish with my strong drawing lines on the left and letting the pastels go out into the paper on her garments. I thought I was slick.

Painting Daniel Greene & Life in the Rockport Art Colony '79/'80 (Flashback Fridays #3 )

Watching Dan Greene teach, demonstrate, lecture and share day after day and week after week back in 1979 and 1980 was a rich education.  I observed his demos, listened to his lectures as well as each item he would share with us as his students. I also observed him as a subject for painting.  I looked at his gestures, poses and expressions and could not help but want to paint this man I learned so much from and respected as a gentleman. 

The first time I painted him was on a handmade board made by someone in NYC that has since passed away. He  made handmade boards from Museum board and he made them for Dan as well as the Wyeth's and other famous artists. The boards were beautiful and held a great deal of pastel and were made in very large sizes. I remember using a 40 x 60 in. custom board for a pastel portrait commissioned by the late Nancy Smedberg from Cheshire, CT of her and her two children. The pastel board man died with his secrets for making his special boards.

Anyway I had a small  10 x 12 in. piece of this fabulous board and created a pastel painting of Dan Greene in front of his easel in his typical theatrical stance and the entire Gloucester, MA studio in the background! I framed it and brought it to show Dan one day and he took it away and came back and said he wanted to swap paintings and would like I like the demo pastel he did of my son Adam for the painting I did of him. Yes!  I certainly would swap with Daniel Greene. So my little pastel painting of Dan is in his private collection and has been for many years now. Here is a small photo of it midway in it's creation.

I then proceeded to create another pastel of him, larger and more dramatic, on a handmade paper I purchased at New York Central Art Supply in NYC. I used an image of him after visiting his NYC apartment when picking up pastel surfaces. Here it is below....

This pastel is about 24 x 30 inches. It is very open and not tightly rendered but the color in the background is a favorite of Dan's. It is monastral green and it is a pigment we used when Dan taught us how to make our own pastels from scratch. I worked diligently on making purples, golds, darks and of course this incredible monastral green! Back then all of these colors were non existent in most pastel brands and there was a great need for these. So I had these little treasure boxes full of these rare colors I made. After a weekend of seriously making pastels at my own studio, my lungs were caving in and I realized how dangerous all of this could be. Thankfully today, we can  select and purchase large assortments of darks, golds, purples, and intense pigments. 

I remember one time Dan actually used chimney soot to create a good dark black pastel! Honestly I don't know why we call these wonderful pigments "pastels"  That implies they are light in color and value. Instead, I think they should be called "Pigments" and we should be "Pigment painting"

The young girl  in the photos below is Lisa Sue Smedberg.  I had painted her in a family's commissioned portrait and also a couple of other times as she gladly modeled for me, spent time with me and even visited me for a few days in Gloucester when I was studying. I was and am very fond of Lisa Sue. She visited me recently just before her beloved mother Nancy died. She grew into a gorgeous woman who works in the art field by the way.

Here is the pastel portrait commissioned back in 1979 of the Smedberg family, all from sittings! 40 X 60 in. and on that special custom made pastel board .

Lisa Sue resting and modeling for me 1980

Oil Painting of young Lisa Sue. How I loved to paint this young girl. She was delightful. After all I had three rugged boys, this was a change of pace. I always seemed to have an extra young girl with me, either art student, model or surrogate daughter!

Below is Lisa Sue posing with Daniel Greene 

I posed a second time for one of Daniel Greene's Oil Demonstrations and it was a profile of me. I never found my profile very interesting but he did. It is located on the right side of the photo above (next to Lisa Sue) and was very colorful I remember. 

Now I must tell you the story of the fisherman model on the left side of the above photo with the hood on. He had bright red hair with a large red beard and Dan of course found his looks intriguing and used him for a demo. It was spectacular and the fisherman wanted to buy the portrait. He couldn't afford the full price so Dan arranged to have a huge load of fresh fish delivered to my place! He asked if I would be willing to have a fish fry because he knew I not only liked to cook but knew I could pull this thing off! So I got busy inviting some other artists I knew in the area as well as whoever was renting out space in the cottage I had for the summer classes. What a group!

Top photo (below) shows a young hungry Charles Movalli in the center, Dan carefully choosing his cuisine, behind him a doctor who took classes, on the far left my son Aaron who will eat any fish anytime and out of the photo was artist David Hatfield, and the late artist and my dear friend Michael Stoffa! 

I think this happened to be a time when Greene, Movalli and Stoffa were all single and never refused a good meal!

Bottom photo is the well known Cape Ann painter and writer Charles Movalli thoroughly enjoying the local catch of the day and at far left is Joel Englehardt who was a local stained glass artist and close friend of the late artist Zygmond Jankowski who later became a very close friend of Charles Movalli.

Portrait of Joel Englehardt 1980

I remember one time someone caught some large squid and Joel and I decided we should cook them up, you know, calamari! We did not however know how to cut it up for use so we asked our "resident art student doctor" to help us out with it. It was like real surgery to get this squid dissected for the kitchen. It did end up a very good meal but we all laughed so much in the progress.

The doctor rented a room in my cottage for two weeks to study with Dan. He wanted to stay another week but I told him I had no more room. My cottage was bustling with artists, great art talk, good food and it was the happening place that summer. So I told Doc that I could offer him a cot in the hallway, and by God he took it! I rented a hallway!

When Daniel Greene Painted my Portrait (Flashback Fridays #2)

 

During my first summer of study with Dan, he asked me to model for one of his weekly pastel portrait demonstrations. I watched so many of his demos that I could practically recite them word for word and even mimmick his motions with one hand on hip and the other holding a cigarette. When I told my parents that I was going to model for Dan, they both drove 3 hours up to Gloucester to see this for themselves. My mother being a porcelain artist and an artist through and through, looked forward to seeing first hand what I was learning all summer and the quality of the mentor I had chosen for myself. I was very happy they were there to witness Dan in action. I wore a body suit under a loosely worn light denim shirt which was my artist's uniform that summer. It was easy and casual. My hair back then was permed. I had a head-full of curls and I let them go wild (the style of the sixties and seventies) I soon realized what the job of the model meant to the portrait artist and also how difficult the job actually was. The spot light was on , so was Dan, and I was dying to itch my nose.  With each sitting the artist proportioned my features, aligned all drawing with plum lines and studied my face and shoulders so that with every step the true likeness of me emerged. The studio was filled with students and guests watching the master of pastel execute a well composed pastel portrait using me as his subject.

My late mother Alice is watching my Mentor work with close eye and melancholy spirit because I was the model.

She had a profound interest and understanding of the process demonstrated and confirmed my time studying there was well spent. My mom was my best friend and supporter and played a significant role in my pursuit of a career in art and living my life as an artist. She told me that "my art was never going to forsake me or leave me, it was going to be the one thing in life that I will always have and can depend on" She was so right.

My father Alfred was an electrician but also very creative. He was always creating and working in his workshop in the basement. He was one of the original "Mr. Moms".  He did all the grocery shopping and made all the weekday dinners for my sister and I because my mother worked each night. He instilled in me the desire for cooking and baking, taught me the basics and gave me confidence in the kitchen. However, he did not support making a living as an artist and did not want me to go away to Art College. He even tried to bribe me with a hot red convertible if I would stay at home! My parents stayed together all of their lives and gave me security, love and laughter. My father's sense of humor was a treasure for us. Watching Dan demonstrating here proved to him I was working hard at just what I was best at.

Dan chose a dramatic lighting for my portrait and had me look directly at him during the sittings. He looked slightly up at me (above eye level) which projected a bit of power, strength and seriousness.  He knew my character and my story, so as the portrait painter he could bring certain elements into the painting to reach the viewer.

Not just skill here, but all of the important elements to project emotion, sensitivity and intensity of the subject. He revealed me, my seriousness, my sensitivity, my intensity, my vulnerability, my strength, and my honesty.

This is in black and white, just values.  However, as Dan built up his patterns of dark, middle tones and lights the colors emerged in intense warm and cools as only our eyes can see in life (not photography). He pushed colors to their limits in their intensities and studied with his eyes every nuance of warmth and coolness. That made me crazy with excitement! Pushing Color! He would carefully draw each form on the head and neck but make sure that all of the larger forms composing the entire painting were relating correctly to one another. Drawing excites and stimulates me and at the same time it puts me in another state of mind, much like meditation or prayer. I have drawn all of my life and have never have gotten to the point of making it less important than painting.

Drawing is the base of all of my art. In The Art Spirit by Robert Henri, a compiling by Margery Ryerson of his many teachings, Henri said something like this, " The skillfully executed lined drawing appeals to the viewers intellect and the large masses of values and colors appeal to the viewers emotions" I love that book . It is a bible for artists and inspiration from cover to cover. My first book was given to me as a gift back in 1979 by the late Charles "Chuck" Sovek, noted plein air painter. I believe Dan used and uses both intellect and emotion in his work.

In color , my portrait sang.  Dan worked three more, 3 hour sittings to his finish. He developed my hair, face, garments and even my precious cameo I wore each day.  I own this pastel portrait by Daniel Greene and have the pleasure of looking at it each day in my home and remember that wonderful time of my life and the young woman and artist that I was. Portraiture is just wonderful.

In my next Flashback Friday I will show you pastels that I painted using Dan as my model .

FLASHBACK FRIDAYS #1 January 6, 2012

FLASHBACK FRIDAYS #1 (January 6, 2012)

The Best Art Career Decision I Ever Made
http://claudiapostartist.blogspot.com/
www.claudiapost1@hotmail.com

 

1979,  Here we are from left to right Jason Mathew Freitas, my youngest son who died in 1988 at the age of 20 years, my middle son Aaron Christopher Freitas, me and Mrs. Reilly and my eldest son Adam Garret Freitas.

I have been remembering and telling stories about my life as an artist and the experiences I have had both in the art field and as a woman artist for some time now. When others hear my stories and hear about the artists and people I have known, they become seriously interested, some learn what to do or what not to do and find humor in them. My experiences can inspire, teach, give hope and direction, stir emotions of anger, joy, love, and share wisdom.

Working in my studio 2011

I will be celebrating my 67^th birthday next week on January 11, 2012 and with all of those years behind me, it is a difficult decision  to know just where to start. I have decided to start almost smack dab in the middle of my life when I was 34 years old, back in 1979. I have been an “artist” all of my life. It has not been just a vocation, job or profession. It has been a lifestyle chosen either consciously or unconsciously as I found myself with both the gift I was given (by God I believe) and the consistent desire to draw, paint, observe and feel emotionally about things I saw and experienced as I grew from childhood to adult. I will go back to those times in my weekly Flashback Fridays but for now I will begin at a place where I was divorced and single mother of three sons and supported us all solely on my art. Yes, that's right on my art. I taught, painted, executed portrait commissions, demonstrated my abilities, conducted workshops (which were not popular back then!) and created my living as I went along. I did not even have a brother , so raising three sons alone was the challenge of my lifetime, believe me. There was no child support back then that was being enforced and the state did not chase down the support in our fair state of Connecticut or out of the state as they now enforce it  today. So I was left to my own resourcefulness. I remember the divorce judge having no problem in pronouncing me as sole parent and provider but then he had to nerve to say “now go out and get a real job, not as an artist!” Well that was not the thing to tell me, I had to prove him wrong. I was spunky, strong minded and determined to do things my way.

I proceed to build up an art school which I called “Post Academy of Fine Art” located in Cheshire, CT where I raised my boys. It took time and many trials and errors and lots of hard work to get to the point of owning a huge old house in the town that could be a place for us to live as well as an entire floor for an art school with studios, office, supply room etc etc. I worked daily to make this happen. The town knew me and supported me in many ways  enabling me to be self sufficient and independent with my children. Back then I had to go to a woman's adviser at the local bank to apply for a mortgage. Can you imagine the looks on their faces when I said “ I am self employed, an artist and a woman alone applying for this mortgage.” The bank even had me submit a large portfolio of my work and a resume to secure this for me. Impossible today!

This school of mine had classes going 7 days a week and I hired 5 artists other than myself to teach classes. I had two lovely women who were my students who worked the office and the supply room for me. My sons were raised with artists and art students coming and going and saw the world slightly different than their classmates and their families. I remember when my son Adam was just about in third grade and I heard him talking to his buddy outside my window. His friend asked” What does your mother do, does she work?” He replied, “ No she doesn't work, she does draws and paints all day!”

After operating this art school for a few years, it grew so much that an accountant/adviser told me that I had to make a decision either to incorporate or dissolve ( I had grown too fast and too big ). I sat and cried. I did not want to run a large art school and I wanted to paint! I was teaching others to draw and paint but there was little time for me to work, grow and increase my own skills.

 My mother who was a great porcelain artist in her own right sat with me and comforted me and asked me what it was I really wanted to do? She always taught me that if there was a will, there would be a way! I just needed to figure things out for myself and for our little family.

I told my mother there was one artist I thought I needed to study with and that his work moved me and inspired me.

This artist was Daniel Greene. He was one of the original serious pastelists of our time. He had a book that I looked at over and over again and his process of drawing from the inside out to achieve a likeness was just like what I naturally did all of my life. I wanted and needed to find a way to make this happen. I needed to keep increasing my skills and better myself to continue earning the finances I needed to take care of us. My mom listened to me through all of my tears and broken emotional words. She said “ OK, how can you do this?”

Yes it is black and white photography and the kind that needs developing! This is Dan when the cigarette was almost as important as his pastel.


The first thing I did was write a letter to Daniel Greene. I heard that he was going to begin teaching serious students in Gloucester, MA for an entire summer. He had always taught at the Art Students League in NYC and I knew that would be an impossibility for me. However, I did have friends on Cape Ann Island where Rockport, Gloucester, and Annisquam are located and I could find a way to arrange something there. I remember writing this awkward letter to Daniel Green explaining that I only had enough money for 2 weeks of his classes but wanted to stay for the entire summer to benefit from his teaching. I told him I was a single parent of three boys 10, 11 and 12 and I was the sole supporter of my family. I don't know why I told him that other than I wanted to let him know just how serious I was as a woman artist and that I would have to sacrifice in order to make this happen.  I got a letter back from him that said to come and take classes and all will work out. I was so excited and hopeful and hearing from Dan in person was a sign for me. Now I had to figure out just what to do to close down my school for the summer, find a way to have each son taken care of for a month. I arranged a  revolving schedule of caretakers for them. My mom took one son, my sister and brother in law took one son and I took one son with me to Gloucester. I rented a little apartment for us in an area with a cute seaside neighborhood above a young family with a little boy and a huge dog.  The tricky part of this venture was that I had to rent out a floor of my house to pay my mortgage in CT and figure out what to do with our family pets.

We had three cats and a big Irish Setter (with my color hair) named “Mrs. Reilly”  Two cats summered at my mother's house and a cat and Mrs. Reilly came up to Gloucester with me. This was no easy feat as I packed my old station wagon with art supplies for the summer, my son and my clothing and personal things and two adequately sedated animals that were like dead weight  with their eye lids swollen shut on the 3 ½ hour drive to our summer destination and my 12 weeks of art study. The wagon was so over packed that I could only see the lower half of my tires. Off we went and life for me was never the same again. One of the best decisions I made!

Meeting Dan Greene for the first time was awesome for me. His seriousness, his discipline and his patience and skill was just what I needed. I know that he respected me for what I was doing and sacrificing to study there. I respected him for that.

I loved Dan's posture and his method of measuring and making evaluations with arm outstretched.

Here is the historical old brownstone on Pleasant St. and off Main St. in Gloucester that Dan Greene first held his summer classes in.  We loved to go on the roof for the views of the ocean, the fishing boats and the fragrances of the sea and Gorton's fishery! Sadly the church in the background burned down one day while we were in class and it was devastating to watch.

On the rooftop it is Tom Dillon and I (at top ) and Jakki Kouffman and I (below).

Dan's monitors from NYC,  Jakki Kouffman and Tom Dillon became my friends and it put a smile on my face to show them Cape Anne and the casual seaport lifestyle there. Unlike monitoring at the league in NYC, the skies, seas, ships and landscapes did not stay still as the subjects did in the portrait and figure studio. It was funny the first time I brought Tom and Jakki outdoors to Lanesville (a favorite location for my old friend, the late Michael Stoffa)  to paint boats floating at the dock and the owners moved their vessels and the subjects of our paintings were gone from view! The looks on their faces were priceless. How dare they move the models! Jakki and Tom were outstanding painters. Tom was a skillful oil painter and Jakki a one of a kind pastelist. She was and still is inventive and original. She is located now in the South West and her website is http://www.jakkikouffman.com/  I did some nice portraits of each of them when they each modeled for Dan's classes.

I loved to get up early in the morning go down Main St. and get a big loaf of homemade Italian bread fresh from the oven (at Virgilios) with some butter and coffee and show up for class at 8:30 to be ready to work at the easel by 9 am all day until 4pm. What a treat to spend that kind of time with a model, looking, seeing, feeling and making decisions and finding solutions for proportions, compositions, drawing lines, values and of course the one thing I needed most was to finally see Color as only I could!

I had arrived finally at the place I should be to learn what I knew I needed to know !

1979, Here we are Daniel Greene and me Claudia Post, now master pastelist and portrait painter. I knew after 12 weeks, painting in pastels, that I had to return the next year to paint in oils and study more.

Dan's classes were exciting. Sometimes as many at 45 students in his class. The anticipation of getting a good spot at an easel for a two week posing period was stressful. Sometimes if you name began at the beginning of the alphabet you chose your view of the model first. Sometimes the end of the alphabet. The students came from all over the United States and I met some good friends there. I knew if I returned the following year I would rent a house and rent out rooms to students coming in. Dan supported me and directed all inquiries to me first, especially if they needed reasonable accommodations. Oh Lord, my place was booked solid and sometimes I accidentally overbooked and Mrs. Reilly and I slept on the sofa!


more stories to come next Flashback Friday #2