I paint subjects that I really have a keen interest in, and they are rural, rural America,
and family farming, and also military.
We were about five miles north of Patterson, New Jersey, and the parades would begin at
the armory, go down to Main Street to City Hall.
And I recall the World War I veterans, there were even some Spanish-American war veterans,
and that was just told as overwhelmed by the pageantry, the veterans themselves, and the
colorings.
So that has stayed with me to this very day, I'm afraid.
You know, there's so many paintings and artwork on the notary, veterans like the Washington's
and the Pattons and the Eisenhower's, and I really chose more the family, the small
family, the veteran perhaps that was not as noted, not as popular, but still the families.
The families were really key to my thinking.
Particularly interested in veterans who were killed in action, and then the families left
behind, especially rural America, where the men on small farms were so critical.
To me it was just very, very, very important, very critical.
I think that's very key in my mind that whatever I do, if it's a simple drawing, it should
relay a message, it should be part of a story, or tell a story in itself.
You know, while doing the military paintings, I would work in the morning, and then go in
for lunch, and then bedding my wife and say, you know, you're very quiet, what is, are
you okay?
I said, well, really, I've been attending a burial morning, I've been at a funeral
morning, or, you know, I'm painting some very serious subjects.
