My second art dad

What I loved about the time I was privileged enough to attend university to study art, was that I could know my professors beyond the classroom. We could hang out and the lessons we learned extended far beyond the textbook, the lecture and the handouts describing the tasks of an assignment.

We acted more as colleagues than teacher and student.

One of those wonderful teachers, a colleague, a friend passed away last week, halfway to St. Patrick's Day. A day I learned he oft would celebrate.

Chuck McLeary was one of those people that come into your life and help you to make your life better. He was my sculpture professor that I talked about drawing with, that I learned the artistry of making a meal and the importance a fresh sack of rolls has on the ultimate quality of a sandwich, who showed me how to look a dog in the eyes as a savior, how to take time from work to experience a unique color in the sky, and how accept a good ribbing when called out on going too far on some tirade or overindulgence knowing that I would then still be invited to try and try again.

Chuck wasn't just someone that gave his knowledge of his craft, he gave us his devotion and always gave us a call reminding us that we were his tribe.

What a gift. 

I was blessed a few years back to stop by to visit Chuck and Chris at there home in Vermont. I had enough time to see his studio and his current work. He handed me a medallion he made of a Van Gogh portrait. As I rubbed it with my thumb and fingers he explained what he was reading and how he was drawing influence from it in his current work.

Chuck was the one who equated the experience of good drawing to poetry for me, explaining that the achievement of a piece can only happen when it reaches the level of a great poem.

I rubbed that medallion with my fingers for several minutes tonight as I cried for myself, for my pain knowing I won't stand with him in conversation again. But that medallion did something unexpected, it made me look up and see Chuck's face clear as day and he stared at me for a second and burst out in one of his shoulder shaking laughs and suddenly I was laughing too.

​Thank you Chuck.

​I know you know how much I love you and I truly know how much you love me. That's why you gave me that laugh. The same laugh we shared dozens of times.

When I saw I missed a call from Chris this afternoon and her voicemail message asking me to call, I just didn't want to. I feared the news that I didn't want to hear, but I am glad I called because Chris is family and I needed to tell I love her too, knowing she has lost so much more than any of us.

​She also told me that Jim McMurray had died earlier in the year.

I was lucky to meet up with the two of them in 2011 for a brief moment. Jim was also an important professor of mine and Im proud to have one of my paintings hanging next to his at Edinboro University. And it was a painting I made under his tutelage.

Thank you gentlemen. I will miss you both.

​I would like to raise a glass and offer perhaps the greatest thing I could tell a couple of old irishmen... 

"May ye be in heaven a half hour before the devil knows you're dead."

Visit Chuck's website at http://www.chuckmccleary.com/?fbclid=IwVERDUANBvcxleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHuce1rmTksKU1oYFrsAj9uYQFh3gU1pwW7ZZcUJ4arbGvCTMtOw_lVuGZIMB_aem_LmeQCxWHnPo2aD-ofC6VTQ
to see some of his works.