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Category: Robert McCloskey

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Mammas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Craftsmen

Craftsmanship, passed down from artist to artist, keeps modern painting alive. That’s because painting is a craft, not an intellectual pursuit.

Rowboats on Dock, oil on board, by Robert McCloskey 
The other day I overheard an Old Salt telling a Young Salt that connecting links in marine chains are as strong as coil chain once the rivets are peened in. That kind of knowledge is passed from person to person in a trade. It can hardly be measured or tested.
My husband recently remarked that tradespeople get more respect in Maine than they did back in New York. I think he’s right. New York is heavy on colleges and universities. That’s a good thing, but it does result in some disregard for the highly-skilled people who hold our physical world together.
Any flat-pack project can be rendered infinitely more complicated with the addition of glue and clamps.
That’s ironic, since we live in a society where few people can do much of anything. A 2012 survey found that 44% of British adults were unable to assemble flat-pack furniture. Another quarter of them needed a whole day. Only 42% of Americans are confident they can change a flat tire, and 26% believe they can change the oil in their car. We need the trades.
There was a time when artists considered themselves craftsmen rather than intellectuals. That shifted with the Age of Enlightenmentand the Cult of Genius. We’re in the final stages of this thinking, where implied talent and intent trump discipline and skill.
One artist who thought of himself primarily as a craftsman was the brilliant and revered Maine illustrator, Robert McCloskey.  A show of his work runs at Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts until June 18. I’d hoped to go down to see it with Bobbi Heath, but—I’m embarrassed to admit—I was home with my ailing dog. I had to be content with the photo she sent me of his Rowboats on Dock, above.
McCloskey has been in the news recently because his family recently donated Outer Scott Island, the setting for One Morning in Maine, to the Nature Conservancy.
From Robert McCloskey: A Private Life in Words and Pictures by Jane McCloskey.

 McCloskey thought of himself as an illustrator, not an artist. “He never sold anything [of his paintings], and never really tried,” his daughter Jane said. “It was all about the books.”

“His puppets and paintings,” she wrote, “which never won any awards, were worth as much to him as the books which won the praise of the world.” 
“Don’t talk about it; do it,” was McCloskey’s credo.
Dynamic symmetry is a system of rectangular design invented by Jay Hambidge.  It’s easier to visualizethan explain, since it is based on square roots. McCloskey was a fan of dynamic symmetry. 
I also learned this system and sometimes still use and teach it. I got it from an ‘Old Salt’ of an artist, the figure painter Steven Assael. It’s that kind of knowledge, passed along from artist to artist, which keeps modern painting alive. In this way, we have more in common with tradespeople than we do with intellectuals. There’s nothing to be ashamed of in that.
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World’s Okayest Mom

Lonely rubber ducky in Camden harbor.

Lonely rubber ducky in Camden harbor.
You might know my young friend Sandy Quang. She was my painting student for a long time, then my studio assistant, and sometimes my workshop monitor. Most recently, she worked at Camden Falls Gallery.
Sandy’s parents run a restaurant called Dac Hoa. It’s a small eatery on the edge of downtown Rochester, known for its fresh Vietnamese, Thai and Chinese food. Ha, Kahn and Nu know this range of cuisine because their families left China during the Chinese Civil War and settled in Vietnam. After the fall of Saigon they moved along again, eventually ending up in Rochester. I respect them for their courage, hard work, and integrity. Through Sandy, we’ve become friends.
"My parents’ restaurant," graphite on paper, approx. 16X18, 2008, by Sandy Quang.
“My parents’ restaurant,” graphite on paper, approx. 16X18, 2008, by Sandy Quang.
When I was a kid, I had a crush on an imaginary boy called Homer Price. I loved him because he was nice and could fix anything. Years later, I met him in the form of a gangling high school student. We’ve had four kids and grown grey together.
At the time, I didn’t know anything about Homer Price’s creator, Deer Isle’s own Robert McCloskey. I’d never seen his other children’s book classics. But I raised my own kids on a steady diet of his books. My youngest took Make Way for Ducklings very much to heart. The lad loved everything about ducks. “Well, that’s cute,” I thought. His obsession about ducks was just one of those things that were in the background of our collective family consciousness.
And then he was slightly older and we were at Dac Hoa during a Christmas season very much like this. He was restive and annoying, as little boys are wont to be. Looking to amuse him, I showed him the roasted ducks in the window. To this day, I have no idea why I thought this would be a good idea.

"Sandy’s parents’ restaurant interior," graphite, approx. 18X24, 2008, by Zeyuan Chen.

“Sandy’s parents’ restaurant interior,” graphite, approx. 18X24, 2008, by Zeyuan Chen.
He dissolved into howling, violent grief. Our dinner, obviously, was ruined. The lad cried for days.
“That boy is going to be in therapy for years,” I thought ruefully.
Last week we were in Dac Hoa celebrating the same kid’s 20th birthday. I asked him if he remembered the incident with the ducks. My husband pulled an exasperated face. Nu laughed. And my son also laughed. I’m so relieved.
I simultaneously believe that parenting is our most important job and that kids make their way somehow despite it. I guess for this youngest one, “World’s Okayist Mom” was good enough.
Christmas is the season of grace-made-manifest through the incarnation of Jesus Christ. It’s nice to know I’m forgiven.