Good bye Mr. Paskewitz

For a while I have been thinking about my art teacher who passed away in November. Bill Paskewitz was his name, and as my friend used to call him 'Mr. Paskewitzy or something, what's his name' because it was a little difficult to pronounce his name. His intimidating name equaled his domineering presence but once you got to know him, he wasn't so bad. He was actually quite friendly and funny. He had a big stomach and always wore jeans, carried a cane with him when he walked, and coughed more often than sneezed. He was originally from New York, this fact fits like a glove as to why he was intimidating and outspoken most of the time. One of his favorite lines was KISS, which stood for keep it simple stupid. He had worked at my junior college for 25 years and my last year there I took two of his classes. I was shocked when the same friend who took the class with me texted me in late November saying that our art teacher had passed away....

I have a lot of memories of him and over the course of these months since his passing I have recalled a good number of them. The first class that I took of his was an art class along with my friend who couldn't say his name correctly. It was Fall Semester which starts out as intensifying heat, then later transitions to damp and cool air with red, crispy leaves that fall and seem to stick to your shoes. Truth be told, I thought I knew a thing or two about drawing before I entered into that classroom. Of course, I was proven wrong when came our first in class assignment. How simple and kid like it was, drawing lines. But not just drawing any lines, lines that are bumpy and fluid and thick and thin, all different sizes and lengths. Harder than you think. This for sure was something that I never had thought about. The point of this, was to get us used to drawing a variation of lines so that our artwork would look more interesting.

Our later projects, and the first real one was drawing shoes. I ended up borrowing my Dad's work shoes, and my sister's blue high heels and used a collection of my own. We later drew hands, jars, and made a grid over a black and white magazine picture and replicated it on another grid to shade in the lights and dark to create the picture, if that makes any sense. This in my opinion was one of the most annoying project. In all of our projects, we had to tack up our full finished work on the wall and he would go around and look at all of them individually and then talk about each one and also ask whose it was, the most embarrassing and dreaded part. Here is a link to a past blog post on my old blog. http://wherethemoodismellow.blogspot.com/2013/10/my-date-with-drawing.html

So here went this beginning art class, that was twice a week for 3 hours each day. By the time we learned how to do charcoal, our art bags, table, hands and possibly even clothes began contagious to the dark mess. We did all kinds of things with charcoal and it grew harder and harder. We did teddy bears, paper bags, and drapery which was murder. Mr. Paskewitz would go around and observe how we were looking at things by the proportions and accuracy of our drawing, with all those light and dark shades as well as the ones in between. Uggh, so much to think about. I thought I saw things pretty well until this class. But the important thing was that I learned, a lot.

Our final was to draw a self portrait, with charcoal of course on black paper. We had to have a light shining on us for us to see the light and dark areas. I also learned that there are no lines to make a face, it's only shades that give us this illusion. Bye- bye 1st grade drawings. Before this final project, we each had '15 minutes if fame' because everyone was drawn by the class with a light shining in them, only literally of course.

I passed with an average grade in the end, but was still intrigued with learning about art, rather than performing it. The following Semester, I decided to take his Art History class. I must add whenever there is a question on Jeopardy about some work of art or artist during the time in which I learned, I almost always get it right thanks to this class, and of course Mr. Paskewitz.

Taking Art History was a good idea. The Spring season is so lovely and fresh and I was always excited to learn about famous artists and their work. Of course, Mr. Paskewitz knew all the back stories to how Michelangelo felt about Rapheal and why Van Gough cut off his right ear, and the difference between Manet and Monet. It was as if he was right there when it all happened, sitting in a velvet cushioned chair listening to each one of them tell their stories. I have done my best to capture all the memories I have of him...words can't always do justice I guess.

I will always remember him, his words, his presence, his humor and his wisdom. May he rest in peace.

chalk for who

Well you might be wondering who or what is pyat'. Pyat' isn't a person or an animal, it isn't even an English word to say it blankly. Pyat' is the number 5 in Russian. What does Russian, chalk and the number 5 have all in commom then? Well, I guess me. I like chalk, I like the number 5 and I like Russian and plan to learn the tongue twistery type sounds of the pretty yet forgotten language that is commonly known as very strange and way beyond hard, with weird like backward English writing that happens to be in cursive. On a side note, I enjoy learning hard languages. It keeps things exciting.

The better reason why chalk for pyat' makes sense is for more than one real reason. In English, chalk for 5 isn't very self explanatory, I'm sorry. But that's where the fun and your imagination like skill can come in. Do you mean chalk for 5 kids, chalk for 5 sidewalks, chalk for 5 hands...what are you talking about?

In my case, I haven't used chalk on the sidewalk in years, but I have used it in my hair and there's still a tint of it left. Of course, I didn't use the real kid chalk for my hopeful golden locks, better yet hair chalk! Chalk for your hair that can wash off in only a few days, maybe 5 days. However, mine has been about 5 weeks, leaving a sliver of red strands that once used to be a magenta pink. I can't seem to think how long it will actually and officially take to clear away these red headed moments. I'm grateful I 'm not a true red head though, for it doesn't go very well with the color green which happens to be one of my favorite colors.

I didn't create this blog to fix or get rid of the so called problem of having extra chalk in my hair because perhaps I might have put too much in the first place. I wanted to use and share more of that wonderful thing called inspiration and creativity which makes me feel more awake and alive, especially at work. If anything, that's what I plan to do for chalk for pyat' (chap for abbreviated form).

Mostly, I want to get back into writing, especially now that I'm not an English major anymore, which is another story for another post. I don't think creativity or inspiration should have a limit. As Maya Angelou once said, "You can't use up creativity, the more you use the more you have".

So, chalk for pyat' may be thought of as a number or duration of something in my case but maybe it will be seen as a good friend. Chalk for Pyat', with a capital P could be my new best friend in different ways.  It's related to Russian, soon to be a new favorite language of mine, as well as a reminder to use hair chalk again because now I know that it will stay in for a couple months, as well as a blog, something personal, inspiring, adventurous and rule bending all the way!

Stay inspired and stay chalky.