I was expecting to complete an essay on mixing your own watercolors with dry pigments but got sidetracked with a more personal New Years essay.
Sondra Gail feeding Pigeons in the Park
January 1, 2012 by Roberta Rosenthal © 2012 all rights reserved
In 1974 I was asked by my father to paint a picture for his cousin Ben as a gift,. It was to be a painting of Ben’s grand daughter, Sondra Gail. I’d never met her in person but was given a photograph. I placed Sondra Gail in my favorite part of Bronx Park in New York close to where I grew up. She lived in Joplin, Missouri and had never been to the Bronx. I had traveled to Joplin as a child, later as a bridesmaid for her parent’s wedding and again as the first stop on my honeymoon so my husband could meet that side of my family.
I lived and went to school in New York City for most of my life. Those vacations to Joplin balanced my life in the city where most of my activities revolved around the arts. In Joplin I sat in my cousin’s pawn shop observing their business activities and peering around the store into old glass and oak cabinets which held guns, tools, radios, T.V. sets with rabbit ear antennas, jewelry, watches, coins, stamps, and high up on steel shelves taxidermy specimens of fox and other small animals. I was fond of the big old cash register that really made a ka-ching sound every time a sale was made. At the back of the store was a huge black safe with fancy gold lettering with the name “Ben Milgrim Pawn Shop” on it.
I would get a bottle of “pop” instead of soda and cousin Pauline brought a big picnic basket filled with lunch complete with red and white fabric gingham napkins. Their home had a wrap around porch with rockers and a backyard vegetable garden. They taught me about pickles from seed planting to jarring. Malteds were made in a big avacado green mixer and tasted better than anything I ever got at Jan’s ice cream parlor on Fordham Road. I learned how to shoot a gun at the rifle range, went fishing at Shoal Creek, visited mineral museums, Indian reservations and ate at the Mickey Mantle Motel Restaurant which were quite the “in” places to go to in Joplin. At the house I stayed in the “maid’s” room, a small closed space off the kitchen which was bright, cozy and comfortable where I would listen to my new turquoise Phillips transistor radio given to me from a shelf in the store and country music would lull me to sleep.
In the Bronx I lived in an apartment in a federal government project five stories above a single tree with shrubs and grass below. The Bronx Park was a short walk and became my backyard. This is where I played and would feed the squirrels and pigeons. I gathered acorns in the fall because they seemed so interesting to me. I once brought them home and kept them in a closed bag in my dresser. Months later my mother found them, opened the bag and gasped at the worms inside.
In the painting I depicted Sondra, about 8 years old, with a blond pony tail in a tee shirt and blue jeans holding a bag of acorns and throwing them to the pigeons. In the background was a landscape of grass, trees, and a section of park bench occupied by a womans legs and a handbag. The painting was 18” x 24” sketched in pencil and painted with watercolor on smooth illustration board. At the time I was a budding commercial artist designing textiles and home furnishing accessories working full time for an art studio. In the evening I worked on my fine art work. I was also recuperating from a emotional disturbance in my life. My parents thought doing this quiet, calm, realistic painting would be a step towards recovery. The paintings I had recently completed were based on a wild vacation in Europe and Greek Islands in the early 1970’s vibrating with bright psychedelic colors, abstract forms and shapes with imaginary views.
I don’t recall the painting taking very long but it was detailed and pleasant with a fashion illustration hand, nice grass, trees and a feeling of being cared for and nurtured. When it was completed my father wrapped it up and mailed it to Ben who put it into an inexpensive frame and hung it in his home. It was his first grand child. But Ben always wanted me to design a duck stamp. I sensed that Ben was a little disappointed that it wasn’t a duck stamp illustration. Now that was art!
Decades flew by and Ben passed away at age 100. I didn’t go to the funeral but my brother did. He sent me a picture of me with the painting which my father had taken before mailing it but it instantly vanished into a black hole in my studio.
In March of 2011 I got a call from a stranger, Susie Clark, asking if I had done a painting of a girl feeding pigeons. I said yes and that she must be calling from Joplin, Missouri. She said she and her husband Mitch went to an estate sale at Ben’s home and found the painting in the garage where they fell in love with it. Was I really the artist? They didn’t pay much for it as it had water damage at the edges and the frame wasn’t in great shape. A real bargain. They took photos of the painting on their wall and holding it. They sent me the photos of it in a Walmart envelope. I was somewhat surprised that my cousins didn’t keep the painting of Sondra Gail. I sent Susie and Mitch a certificate of authenticity with its current value, which was far more than they paid, since I was now an established artist with a history of sales, gallery and museum exhibitions. They asked me how to restore the work and the best way to frame it. I sent them detailed instructions and they did it right away.
On May 22nd, a short time after they restored and reframed the painting, a devastating tornado hit Joplin, Missouri totally destroying their home, car and everything that Susie and Mitch owned, including the Sondra Gail painting. Their home was in the direct path of the storm. Fortunately they were at Walmart in a bathroom and their lives were spared. They went about the task of rebuilding their life. I sent them a new certificate of authenticity and the photos they had sent me of them with the painting as proof of ownership for the insurance claim. Claiming the current value of the painting helped them recoup enough money to start over again. I felt so good about getting to know these brave warm people. Then Mitch got inspired to paint. I was honored when he sent me his first small watercolor and kept e-mailing me images of his newest paintngs. The work was a little primitive but looked good.
On January 1, 2012 Susie called me to tell me that Ben’s Pawn Shop store contents was being auctioned. She and Mitch were going and what would I like? I said, “just look for paper items but I really don’t need anything”. They found a framed photograph of Ben, Pauline, Mr. West and two other customers in the store. They bought it for me and sent an instant phone picture of them holding it with cousin Martin. Though the tornado took the material part of the painting into a dark tunnel of the unknown, the spirit of it continued and grew into a new friendship and inspired a new artist. It renewed my ties with my cousins I had not seen in for decades. My “Wizard of Oz” family from Missouri and that painting now have an ongoing history. It may also renew my interest in creating a Federal duck stamp, My art has already been published as botanical postage stamps for Palau and the Marshall Islands. So why not a duck stamp for Missouri?
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