Dedicated to the Memory
of Joseph Donaldson, Jr. (Jan. 30, 1914 - Jan. 1, 1997)
2014
- the Centennial of Joe's birth and the
tenth anniversary of the Joseph Donaldson, Jr. Memorial
Online Museum
Joe Donaldson relaxing at the Tulane School of Architecture in
1952
(image courtesy of Francine Stock)
(http://www.regional-modernism.com/2010/12/character-study-in-kodachrome.html)
Please browse
freely, but kindly refrain from borrowing images or information without consulting
the management in advance (at wood@med.akita-u.ac.jp). Thank you.
I can't remember when I first
met Joe - he was just this old man who was always there - he
even signed letters and cards as "Old Man Joe." He was a
very skilled, extremely talented, artist with an extraordinary
ability to teach, and a penchant for Shakespeare. Joe
could execute a painting or drawing with the swift
determination of a bird-of-prey, or the delicate precision of
a ballerina. He was very tall - over six feet in his
prime - and always dressed well for going out. Most of
all, for me, Joe was just fun to hang around with.
I got to know him through my parents, because my mother was
very interested in art, having been an art major for a time in
college (as I later was). He was somewhat of a curious,
distant character for me until I got my first job bagging
groceries at the local supermarket at the age of 16. He
would come in from time to time and ask me to fetch him a
carton of Parliaments, and one day he finally recognized me,
and I guess that was about the time I started to visit him at
his house by myself.
Joe was born in
New Orleans on January 30, 1914 - only seven years after the
collapse of native Jazz legend Charles "Buddy" Bolden, and a
mere five months prior to the assasination of Archduke
Ferdinand and the outbreak of war in Europe. Woodrow
Wilson had been in the White House scarcely a year. When
Joe was a baby, Louis Armstrong was out on the streets of the
city selling newspapers, or perhaps unloading cargo down at
the docks - he did not yet own his own instrument. I
know little about the first twenty-five years of Joe's life,
but according to certain records he studied art at Tulane
University, and with Enrique Alfarez. What is clear is
that at some point in the mid-1930s Joe went to Chicago to
attend the Art Institute, and that while there he traveled
many times between the Windy City and the Big Easy by the luck
of this thumb.
House Behind the Church, 1939
(black and white photo of original watercolor, dimensions
unknown)
Exhibited at the New Orleans Art Project Gallery(?), 718
Toulouse St., former
headquarters of the Federal Art Project - see below (image courtesy of James
Baker)
untitled, 1940
dimensions unknown, watercolor and ink (Photo by Tim
Manning, image
courtesy of James Baker)
untitled, 1941
dimensions unknown, watercolor and ink (Photo by Tim
Manning, image courtesy of James Baker)
The Works Progress
Administration (WPA), established by President Franklin D.
Roosevelt in 1935, provided artists around the country with
employment and commissions. In the late 1930s and early
1940s Joe was involved with the Federal Art Project in New
Orleans, under the WPA.
October 26, 1939 - The headquarters for the Federal
Art Project at
718 Toulouse Street, New Orleans, originally built in
1889
Joe seems to have spent a fair amount of time here.
Only a few doors down the street was the residence of
Tennessee Williams. (From
New Orleans Public Library, WPA Photograph
Collection) (http://nutrias.org/photos/wpa/images/07/07171.jpg)
Today the site is a museum, open to the public.
The 1939 (original) painting above
is apparently exhibited here. (From French Quarter
Walking Tour)
(http://www.neworleansonline.com/neworleans/fqtour/fq09hnok.html)
untitled, 1940
19.75 inches by 15.5 inches, watercolor (Image courtesy of Buzz
Jackson, who received the original from his father, who
apparently received it from Joe himself in New Orleans)
Joe at the age of 27 viewing a
painting in a gallery, November 17, 1941 (From New Orleans
Public Library, WPA Photograph Collection)
(http://nutrias.org/photos/wpa/images/07/07682.jpg)
Joe viewing paintings with Helen Turner,
November 17, 1941
(From New
Orleans Public Library, WPA Photograph
Collection) (http://nutrias.org/photos/wpa/images/07/07681.jpg)
November 17(?), 1941
"Joe Donaldson, Jr., and his water
color drawing,
'Sky Line,' which will be on display at the
central exhibit
for Art Week on the twelfth floor of the
Roosevelt Hotel."
(From New
Orleans Public Library,
WPA Photograph Collection) (http://nutrias.org/photos/wpa/images/07/07671.jpg)
November 24(?), 1941
"Exhibition at the Delgado Museum in City Park
During National Art Week"
(This may be the 1940 watercolor that is currently
in the possession of Buzz Jackson - above.) (From New
Orleans Public Library, WPA Photograph
Collection) (http://nutrias.org/photos/wpa/images/07/07614.jpg)
November 17, 1941
"For two daya an art jury selected by the
Louisiana committee on
Art Week, weighed the works of Louisiana artists
to be placed on
sale at the central exhibit in New Orleans." (From New
Orleans Public Library, WPA Photograph
Collection) (http://nutrias.org/photos/wpa/images/07/07652.jpg)
November 17, 1941 "The announcement by National Art Week
chairman Thomas B. Watson that his IBM would buy one
painting
and one piece of sculpture from each state injected a
competitive spirit into the observance.
Louisiana's winner was a WPA artist, Joe Donaldson, who
was paide [sic] $50 for his water color, 'Gretna
Gothic.'
The painting was placed in the New Orleans IBM office
building window where Donaldson was 'caught' by a
photographer." (From New Orleans Public
Library, WPA Photograph Collection) (http://nutrias.org/photos/wpa/images/07/07511.jpg)
Joe designed this poster for
the WPA. It is dated Oct. 22, 1941.
(from Works Projects Poster Collection, Library
of Congress, http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/ammemhome.html.) Copies of this poster, in various sizes, can be
purchased at: www.rainfall.com/posters/WPA/1690.htm
November 17, 1941
"Students from the Metairie Park Country Day
School
are being instructed by Hans Wang, WPA artist,
in the use of a screen for poster making." (From
New Orleans Public Library,
WPA Photograph Collection) (http://nutrias.org/photos/wpa/images/07/07821.jpg)
Joe's poster can be seen here - behind the
students
The Library of Congress
is selling T-shirts and sweatshirts
with this design on the front.
Contact the management
(wood@med.akita-u.ac.jp)
for directions to the government site.
Another piece that Joe did for the WPA Art Program of
Louisiana in 1941
Joe's New York
Years
Following the Pearl Harbor attack, Joe
decided that he wanted to serve his country in some
way. His stutter (caused according to him by a
childhood bout with diphtheria) prevented him from joining
the regular armed forces, so he studied cartography at
Tulane University. As soon as he was ready he and
his new bride, Edwina, headed for Washington, D.C., where
Joe was put in charge of compiling maps for the
Coast and Geodetic Survey. Edwina seems to
have had a position at the Pentagon. Joe had a dream
of operating a radio on a Coast Guard ship, for he had
learned how to operate a radio years earlier in New
Orleans, but that dream was never fulfilled.
Joe and Edwina both wanted to live in New York, so he
applied for a transfer, partly for the purpose of
attending a speech clinic there. His transfer was
granted, and the couple relocated to the Big Apple.
They rented an apartment in Greenwich Village and lived
there for some time - perhaps until the end of the war.
This 19 x 27 inch watercolor, painted by Joe during his New
York years,
was formerly in the possession of Joy Gaudet Lanneau, who
studied art at Tulane U. in the 1940s, and
who later passed the painting along to her nephew, Martin
Lanneau.
Photo provided by Martin and Joany Lanneau.
And Always Will the Lovers Meet, February 11, 1945,
New York
sketch for painting, dimensions unknown, watercolor
and ink (Photo by Tim
Manning, image courtesy of James Baker)
Composition, N.Y., 1945
dimensions unknown, watercolor and ink (Photo by Tim
Manning, image courtesy of James Baker)
These are the only two works executed by Joe in New York that
I know of, although there were certainly more
Late
in his life, Joe told me that of all the places he had
ever lived, New York was probably his favorite. I
know little about his creative activities in the
city, but he had a wonderful story about how he bravely
thwarted a would-be burglar in the middle of the night -
probably in 1942 (or perhaps 1943). Having been told
many times over, it was well known by his friends.
As an assignment for a linguistics course I took at Texas
A&M University, I visited Joe at home with a tape
recorder on Easter Sunday (April 3rd) 1994 and recorded
his telling of the tale. He was eighty, and it may
have been the last time he ever recounted it.
____________________________________________________________________________________________ Joe's Famous Attempted
Burglary Story: (J = story teller - Joseph Donaldson, Jr., D =
listener - Donald C. Wood)
J: So then I went to my...I was a
civilian attached to the military doing these maps... D: Right. Yeah. J: But I had an
"essential job" - that's in quotes. By that time
there were so many "essential" people we were falling
all over (each other)!
And they thought
I was an idiot for leaving this job to
go...that's...when they were...German subs were blowing
the ships out of the water.
So,
I...uh...decided I'd do that. But before all of
this....and I'm getting my stories...oh, boy. D: Go ahead. Go
ahead. J: Uh...we
were new - Edwina and I - in New York, you
see. We loved it, but we were new, and
we lived in the Village, and we lived on the
third floor of
a...place on Perry Street, I think it was. And it
was a small apartment - a sort of a "shotgun"
apartment. You could look straight back.
And it was called
a "studio apartment" - simply because it had a roll-away
bed that you pull out! (laughter) D:
(laughter) J: When
you wanted to sleep you pulled out the bed! D: Uh,
huh. J: Well, it also had
a humongous lamp - an iron lamp - with about a two
hundred and fifty watt bulb in it. D: Uh,
huh. J:
And, it was...I had never seen anything like this
lamp. So, when we pulled out the bed, we had the
lamp by the bed, to read.
Well, I was on the
outside, and Edwina was on the inside, and the wall to
the bathroom blocked her view of the...of the rear
window.
But I could see
the rear window. And there was an industrial
building which had the lights on all night - its lights
on all night - every night,
so illumination
was there, I mean, to a degree, I could see. I had
twenty-twenty vision then anyway. So, all of a
sudden I saw this guy
trying to get in
the window! D: Ah,
hah! J: He had come up the
fire escape, to the third floor. This is
true. And I never had a gun, and I knew I had to
do something, and I had to do it in a hurry.
So I woke Edwina
up, and I gently put my hand over her...uh...I did this
and smiled. And I was scared to death, but I
didn't let her...you know...I didn't
want to frighten
her - not that I was ashamed of being scared -
anyone who isn't frightened in certain situation is a
damned fool! But I didn't want to
frighten
her. so, then
I, I was only sleeping in a pair of shorts, and I
slipped off the shorts. (laughter) And I
looked...to see how far the string to this
humongous lamp
was - it wasn't far. Then, I ran my hands
through my hair, and I had...fairly good length hair,
so it stood right up on end. And I
waited until
this joker got in the window, with his (laughter)
his hands holding the window up - both of his feet
inside. D: Uh, huh. J: He
couldn't reach for a gun, you see? D: Uh, huh. J: And I
leaped out of...jumped out of bed, pulled on the lamp at
the same time, I (was) stark naked, and jumped and
yelled at the top of my voice,
and he fell out
the window! (laughter) D:
(laughter) J:
He did! (laughter) And Edwina didn't know
what...and she had a sheet over her head, and she was
jumping and kicking (laughter).
She thought I'd
gone nuts, I guess! (laughter) D:
(laughter) J:
Anyway, then...by that time it was almost daybreak - he
(had) chosen an odd hour for this attempt at entering,
illegal entry. So I said,
"My God, I've
killed a man." So I went into the bathroom and
combed my hair, and put on my pajamas and my
bathrobe. I said, "Hun, will
you put some
coffee on?" And she says, "You're going to ask him
up for coffee?" (laughter) And I said, "No,
no, no. I meant some for us - for me.
I'll do it if
you..." and she says, "No, I'll do it."
(laughter) So, I went downstairs...service
entrance...and sitting there was this little,
middle-aged man -
pretty bummed
up. And I opened the door and I said, "How badly
are you hurt?" And he did a double take and looked
at me, and I'm...tall...tall.
I was six four
then, and I was about twenty-eight years old. And
I said, "I'm the man who's apartment you tried to get
into."
He looked at me
(laughter) and said, "Mister, for God's sake,
either call the cops or go away!" (laughter)
So, I didn't call the cops.
I gently
shut the door, and went away, and had a cup of coffee
with Edwina. And that's the...end of that
story. Turn that thing off. D: (laughter) J:
Kaput! D: That's
the end? J:
...end of that, yes. Also the end of my voice! D: Yeah, your
voice is sounding... J: Turn
your...thingamajig...off. ______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Remembered City, 1950 - 1960
dimensions unknown, watercolor (Photo by
Tim Manning, image courtesy of James Baker)
Revisitation
by Joseph Donaldson, Jr.,
printed in
Quartet Magazine, 1971, pp. 26 -27
City
Returned to After many years
Known and unknown - Sharp knife of Strangeness In the Gut
And then The bandage-like
remembrances And Love
City of stench and balm Of Hurt and Humor City of Shrieks and din Of Calmness And Of Truth and Lies
This Sea touched Rock based Steel boned Ball hung city-world Rejects My Metaphoric mouthings Simulative words -
Accepts confusion Nowness Presence here
Action accepts - And Awe
N.Y., 1966
dimensions unknown, watercolor and ink (photographed by Dr. Tim
Manning, Texas A&M University, image courtesy of
James Baker)
Certainly Joe was reflecting on the Big Apple when he
painted this one as well.
New Orleans, St. Thomas, and
Texas
Joe and Edwina returned to
New Orleans, and in 1945 he took a teaching position at
Tulane University, where also seems to have taught briefly
before moving to New York. At Tulane he worked with
John Clemmer (see http://www.johnclemmer.com).
During this period, back in his home town, Joe exhibited
his work with the New Orleans Arts and Crafts Club.
At some point - either then or in his earlier time at
Tulane in the 1930s - he seems to have been involved with
the John McGrady School of Art and the New Orleans Academy
of Art, but I do not know anything specific about his
associations with either institution. (McGrady was
also a WPA artist in the early 1940s).
title unknown, February
1948
dimensions unknown, watercolor and ink (Photo by Tim Manning,
image courtesy of James Baker)
This painting, probably
done in New Orleans, reminds me of the work of Taro
Okamoto,
the famous Japanese avant-garde artist, of the same
period.
Mid-stream (?), 1949
dimensions unknown, watercolor and ink (Image courtesy of Todd
Maxwell, who was kind enough to photograph this and the
painting below and
contribute them. The originals were given by Joe
to his father, Gene Maxwell, who was a student in the
architecture department of Tulane University in 1949 and
1950.)
Mountain Side,
Port-au-Prince, Haiti, 1950
dimensions unknown, watercolor and ink (Image courtesy of Todd
Maxwell)
Joe must have executed this playful 2 x 3 foot painting
while in the Virgin Islands.
Photo kindly provided by Dennis Headington, whose father
appears to have taken a liking to it
after spotting it on the wall of a hotel in the Virgin
Islands, and who subsequently acquired it
and took it back to the US mainland aboard the USS
Nautilus (c. 1953).
Birds in the Bush, January
1958
29.5 inches by 19.75 inches, watercolor and ink (Image courtesy of
William Boggess of Oxnard, CA, who rescued the original
from someone's garage)
Joe and Edwina eventually
divorced after their return to New Orleans. A story
recounted by John Clemmer suggests that Joe tried to keep
the news of the impending separation from his friends and
colleagues as long as he could, and also that he must have
been rather anxious about it.
"I
recall an incident with Joe in the late 40's. A group of
friends and fellow artists were drinking in the Bourbon
House. I decided to leave and was asked on
what grounds did I have to leave. Apropos of nothing
I said on grounds of divorce although I was not married at
the time. I was going up the stairs at David
Arnold's house on Dauphine St. where I was camped out in
the attic when the door bell rang. There was
Joe obviously extremely agitated. He
vehemently wanted to know what I knew about his impending
divorce and whether I had mentioned it to
anyone. I had considerable difficulty convincing Joe
that I knew nothing about his divorce until he mentioned
it and that my parting remark was in response to a
question!"
- John Clemmer
Probably around 1950
Joe married Grace Underwood, who had a daughter (Gayle)
and a son (Tony) from her first marriage. During his
off-time, Joe worked in Grace's attic in order to avoid
interruptions. Apparently, Joe's relationship with
the dean of the Tulane University School of Architecture
was not especially cordial (described by one as "stormy")
and this may have been why he resigned in 1951, holding
the title of associate professor. Joe and Grace then
left the mainland and headed for the U.S. Virgin Islands,
where they stayed for five years. There, he taught
landscape drawing and painting at the Saint Thomas Art
Center. In 1956 Joe was lured away by a friend who
was teaching at the school of architecture, Texas A&M
University, and he brought Grace with him to College
Station to take up a teaching position at TAMU. He
later told me that he had made the move because the
weather in the Virgin Islands had been "too damn nice all
the time." They lived in a small house near the
present-day site of St. Thomas Episcopal Church, across a
large avenue from the university campus.
Ink Wash Landscape, circa
1963
14 inches by 18 inches (Image courtesy of
Sheldon Minkon)
Pancil Landscape, circa
1963
11 inches by 14 inches (Image courtesy of
Sheldon Minkon)
Sepia Landscape, circa 1963
10 inches by 13 inches (Image courtesy of
Sheldon Minkon)
Shrimp Boats, circa 1963
watercolor (Image courtesy of
Sheldon Minkon)
"For Shelly", circa 1963
watercolor and ink (Image courtesy of
Sheldon Minkon)
Being
somewhat "different" from most other teaching faculty of
the university, and from the general residents of the area
as well, Joe stood out in College Station; he had just
moved from offshore, and was not especially religious (if
at all), and was therefore seen as the quintessential
Bohemian - a real beatnik. Joe and Grace were known
to be fairly heavy drinkers, and night owls as well.
In fact, the first half of the 1960s seem to have been an
especially rough time for Joe. Sheldon Minkon knew
both Joe and Grace at the time, and his recollection helps
shed some light on that part of Joe's life:
"I met Joe and Grace in my sophomore year, while a
student at Texas A&M school of Architecture. I
was very involved and actually living in the Hillel
Foundation on Jersey Street (now George Bush Blvd.). The
building happened to be close to the Donaldson residence,
and I saw Joe frequently. I have to say that by this
point in time, Grace was drinking very heavily, and was
passed out on most occasions that I was with Joe. By
evening time, Joe was not far behind her. They drank
brandy, I do not remember the brand, which I would buy,
almost daily. I had to drive into Bryan, as College
Station was “dry”. [The following] took
place, over and over with little deviation. Joe
would call me, or walk over to the Hillel Building, drunk
and hungry, and ask me to take him to get some
dinner. I would take him to some chili joint in
“town”, Joe would eat and sometimes, literally pass out,
face down, in his plate. Then I would take him home,
clean him up and put him to bed. On the occasions
that he was lucid, he would insist that I take his art
work. We would load my car with drawings and
paintings, and the next day Joe would come by and ask for
them back. This went on over and over again. I never
took the art work out of my car, knowing that he would be
back for them. It was like a traveling art exhibit,
only in my car. At the end of my junior year I left
Texas A&M to pursue a fine art course at Pratt
Institute in NY. Joe encouraged me to do this as
A&M did not offer an art degree, and I was clearly
leaning in that direction. While drunk or sober, Joe
was a great teacher, and philosopher. He had a way
of getting to the “essence” and was able to translate it
to art. I learned much from him, and admired his
enormous ability, and intellect. To this day I refer
to a book, “the natural way to draw”, that he gave me to
help sharpen eye hand coordination. In
retrospect, I think that Grace was an alcoholic, and Joe
drank to keep her company. I could be wrong, it was so
long ago, but based on conversations with friends that new
them, I was told that he stopped drinking after she passed
away".
- Sheldon Minkon (Sept., 2008)
At one point, Joe later said, Grace was warned by a doctor
to lay off the alcohol. He made up his mind to do
exactly that, but apparently Grace was not able to - she
developed cirrhosis of the liver. The specific
reasons are unknown to me, but the couple eventually
divorced (whether this happened before or after Grace's
diagnosis I also do not know). It seems that Joe
spent some time with his parents and his sister's family
in New Orleans during this period, and this very well may
have been while he and Grace were separated. Back in
College Station, Joe remarried Grace, and he took care of
her as her condition worsened. He was
becoming well-established as a Texas (and generally
Southern) artist, and as an educator in the University, by
the time Grace passed away on April 2, 1965.
Although Joe has apparently not been buried in his family
grave, he did have Grace interred there. The
tombstone still overlooks the burial plot in Lafayette
Cemetery in New Orleans.
IN MEMORY OF
ELLEN
DONALDSON
BORN
SEPT. 8, 1848
DIED
JUNE 20, 1907
JOSEPH
DONALDSON
BORN
JAN. 18, 1831
DIED
JULY 30, 1911
WILLIAM
DONALDSON
NOV.
19, 1880
MARCH
25, 1964
JOSEPH
DONALDSON
JULY
10, 1875
MAY
29, 1964
GRACE
GRAHAM DONALDSON
WIFE
OF JOSEPH DONALDSON, JR.
AUG.
22, 1912
APR.
2, 1965
ELIZABETH
SAWYER DONALDSON
WIFE
OF JOSEPH DONALDSON
JUNE
1, 1883
JUNE
9, 1966
The Donaldson family grave in
Lafayette Cemetery No. 1, New Orleans (photo and
transcription courtesy of Fred Hatfield -
www.fredhatfield.com,
lafayettecemetery1.com, under "Donaldson")
Ellen (Philipps) and Joseph
were Joseph, Jr.'s grandparents.
William, his uncle, married Flourisca Webber
in New Orleans on March 17, 1906.
The second Joseph was Joe's father. He
married Elizabeth Thomas Sawyer,
who would later give birth to Joseph, Jr., in
New Orleans on April 22, 1908.
Joe Jr.'s sister, Elizabeth Ellen Donaldson,
was named after the siblings' mother
and grandmother. She married Richard
Leonce Buck, a surgeon, in the 1930s and died
in 1980.
Her son, Joseph Donaldson Buck, Sr., still
lives in Louisiana and contributed material
for the museum.
Joe once told me that he wanted to be
cremated and to have his ashes scattered over the
Mississippi River, but
he seems to have made no arrangements in his
will. Apparently
he was cremated, but what happened to his ashes I do
not know. I
would like to see them either placed in the family
grave one day or scattered over the great river as
he wanted.
1965 Portrait of Joe Donaldson by Dan Malcolm,
TAMU class of 1963
(courtesy of Dan
Malcolm)
"I am so pleased to [share] send this photo
of Joe. I took this sometime in the fall of
1965 for a specific reason. As part of my
course work, I took a photography course (all 5 of us
in the graduate center did) and we were to have a
photo contest on campus with five or six other
schools to attend. I asked Joe if I could take a
portrait photo of him and he agreed. We agreed
on a time, and I believe I took this in his
office. I had a double lens Yashika camera, a
tripod and a small aluminum hooded hand held flood
light with about a 40 watt bulb in it. That's
all I could afford. If you knew Joe, you know he
could never be still. I knew it was going to
be a challenge to get him to sit still for a
portrait. I knew I was going to have to work fast, and I
did. The entire session probably took less
than five minutes and I don't think I got more than
3 or 4 shots. The image in the background is an ink drawing
that Joe did of Alan Stacell. I got
lucky. What a shot. I took first place
in portrait in the photo contest! I felt then
and feel now that this photo really captured the true
character of Joe Donaldson."
- Dan Malcolm (2007)
Gulf Shrimp Boats, 1968
19 inches by 27.5 inches, watercolor (Image courtesy of
James Baker, original in a private collection)
Abstract, 1967
18.5 inches by 28.5 inches, watercolor
(Image courtesy of
James Baker, original in a private collection)
Joe was very active
in College Station, teaching many people at his
house, contributing to various publications, and
holding exhibits of his work. Joe loved
drawing with conte crayons. In fact, he was
affectionately called "Conte Joe" by many of his
students. Many years after his retirement
(in his upper seventies) he attended a reunion of
sorts at Texas A&M University and was thrilled
to meet a number of former students who once again
called him by that nickname. Although Joe
was often alone following Grace's passing in 1965,
this was not always so - he was married to a
hairdresser for a short time, and then he married
a much younger woman, a student in a different
department at the university, only to have the
union anulled due to the extreme difference in
age. This last wife of Joe's remained in
touch with him for the rest of his life; I can
recall his happiness over receiving phone calls
from her even when he was eighty.
"The last time I saw Joe was in 1993 when I
went to school for our 30th reunion. I had
not seen him since 1966 or '67. That is the
time he talked about when he saw so many of his
students who had called him "Conte Joe". I
think my class gave him that name. Joe was
standing on the sidewalk near the architecture
building. I walked up to him and said 'Joe, how are
you?' He said 'Dan
Malcolm!'. After 25 or 26 years, he still knew
me. Then and there, I knew I was more than
just one of his former students, I was his friend."
- Dan
Malcolm, '63
Joe also had
pets: an Afghan hound named "Tasha" that lived to
the age of seventeen, and later a fluffy cat whom
he affectionately named "Mr. Wussy." Sadly,
however, Mr. Wussy vanished one day, never to
return. I was still in my mid-teens at the
time, and so was not particularly interested in
the old man yet, but I remember that the feline's
disappearance upset Joe very much. My mother
made some signs that read "Help Find Mr. Wussy,"
and posted them around the neighborhood. She
also searched far and wide for that cat, and for
my part I recall at least keeping my eyes
open. Joe never got another pet after
that. In the end, although Joe married a
total of five times in his life (twice to the same
person) he never became a father. I guess
his drawings, paintings, and poems were his
children.
Abstract Composition, date unknown
4 in. by 5 in., mixed media (Image courtesy of
James Baker, original in the collection
of Graham Horsley)
Reclining Nude, 1963
dimensions unknown, watercolor and ink (Image courtesy of
James Baker)
I grew up in College Station and knew 'Conte Joe'
as a neighbor as well as a professor. I grew up on
Lee Street about 2 blocks from his house on what then was
Jersey Street. It is now George Bush Avenue.
Joe lived in a small green house next to the Episcopal
Church and was (...) a bit unorthodox in his ways. I
came to know this thru Alan Stacell, a coworker in the
Architecture Department and also a member of the church as
well. I ended up in the LA program at TAMU as my dad
wanted me to work in a field that was more stable than
pursuing art, which was my first love.
In public school I had studied under a local
painter, Ruth Mogford and as luck would have it, some
other local artists. But I recall that in high
school I really wanted to take from Joe and learned that
on some occasions he give private lessons. He and I
talked and he agreed to consider it if I would help him
clean up his studio in the house. I remember
spending hours in his small studio going thru stacks and
stacks of sketches and paintings trying to decide what he
might want to part with (discard) and what he would
keep. He was too busy to sit by my side and go thru
them so it became my task to try and organize them.
It was a hopeless effort. Everything I saw looked
wonderful and the ones I thought he might part with he
wanted to keep.
I do remember a mountain of the napkin
sketches and numerous bird sketches he described as
portraits of persons that appeared "pompous and
overbearing", alluding to how rich in art opportunities,
drinking coffee and people watching were. He would
do these with a wooden match stick and a bottle of india
ink. What amazed me about his work is that it was quick
and decisive with never an errant stroke. This
is the time when he was publishing some things in Ford
Times and I was very impressed. Anyway my employment was
brief as he realized he would have to do the work
himself. So my hopes of private lessons never
evolved.
I truly began to understand his talent and teaching
ability, spending time in his sophomore level graphics
class. One nice thing about him was he did not mind
if students from other sections and classes wandered thru
his labs. We focused primarily on the use of conte’
crayons and some ink washes. I remember a series of
quick figure studies whereby we had to work very quickly
and sometimes without lifting the crayon from the
paper. It took some of the anxiety out of the
process of creating.
I also had the opportunity to study under Alan
Stacell, Roy Pledger, John Fairey and others in the
department. It was the only art in the
community and it was a great opportunity for
me. I also got to spend some time with E. M.
"Buck" Schewitz a successful artist in his own
right. He did workshops at A&M on occasion.
- Bruce Riggs, a
former student of Joe's at TAMU
"Joe
would draw on anything available, anywhere we were,
napkins, placemats, paper scraps he found. He usually
dismissed them as junk and tossed them. I wasn't
smart enough to keep them. With me, he was always
demonstrating, and teaching me something through
those sketches." - Sheldon Minkon
(Sept. 2008)
Worried Bird, January 1971
30 in. by 40 in., conte crayon, charcoal, and ink (Photo by Megan Taylor,
image courtesy of Ken Zindler, via James Baker)
Joe teaching students in his studio, 1973
My mother, Katherine Wood, sits in the foreground of the
photo on the bottom left. Nelson,
one-time lodger of Joe's and the model for a portrait (and
possibly two) in the portrait gallery, is visible in three
of the photos. (Images courtesy
of Katherine Wood)
Joe's house on North
Ridgefield Circle, College Station
The room in front was Joe's studio. (photographed in 2005 by
Katherine Wood)
As can be seen from the above photo,
from the outside Joe's house looked just like any other,
but on the inside it was totally different. It was
like a small art gallery - the walls were covered both
with his own works and with those that his students had
given him over the years. It was wonderful to just
sit and chat with him, surrounded by all the paintings,
drawings, and sculptures. In the center of the
living/dining room was a huge, thick wooden table with
all kinds of interesting objects - driftwood, stones,
glass beads and marbles - on it, and on the north side
of the house was his studio, complete with a stage for
models to perch themselves upon, easels, tables, and a
fantastic collection of tools for his trade.
Joseph Donaldson -
artist, professor, and writer - has sought through
many avenues of expression and communication to
share his love and understanding for the arts with
generations of students, as well as colleagues,
friends and his several "publics", from Houston to
New York and Cardiff to St. Thomas.
He brings to
his art, teaching and writing the knowledge and
expertise of one widely traveled and diversely
schooled - from his early student years in his
native New Orleans, at the School of the Art
Institute in Chicago, through a stimulating period
as a painter in St. Thomas, the Virgin Islands, to
his more recent and varied experiences in western
Europe while on faculty development leave from
Texas A&M University.
Relating his
experience as a practicing artist to teaching art
has been a major preoccupation, and yet he also
exhibited his work widely in many major national
shows in New York, Chicago, and New Orleans, as
well as regional and state exhibitions in Houston,
Dallas, San Antonio and Austin.
Additionally, his work is represented in numerous
prestigious public collections such as Ford Motor
Company, International Business Machines, Inc.,
the Hazel Guggenheim McKinley Collection and
Government House, St. Thomas, Virgin Islands, as
well as many private collections – Burl Ives, New
Orleans, Amy Freeman Lee, San Antonio, and Charles
Colbert, New Orleans.Further,
his commissions include the Sazerac mural,
Roosevelt Hotel, New Orleans, illustrations for
“Ford Times” and “The Continental Magazine”,
illustrations and poems for “Quartet”, a magazine
of the arts, design and illustrations for Frances
Parkinson Keyes’ “Dinner at Antoines”, short story
illustrations for “Southern Magazine”, book jacket
design for Bantam Books, New York and color
consultant for L. Lanzer “Multi Map, Inc.” (world
maps for high school and college textbooks), New
York.
While he is
thoroughly conversant with what is happening in
the world of visual arts today, he feels no
compulsion to be a part of the so-called “leading
edge” of any movement or “ism”.It is indeed reassuring to find a man with
such absolute integrity who knows himself as well
as Joseph Donaldson does.He
makes his art as naturally as he breathes,
nurturing his own skills of mind and hand, while
enriching and stimulating all with whom he comes
in contact.
He is an individual
whose credentials as a human being, artist and
teacher more than qualify him for the recognition
and honor which this select retrospective
exhibition accords him.
From a leaflet for a
retrospective exhibition of Joe's work at Texas A&M,
written by the late W. Graham Horsley, Professor of
Environmental Design and long-time friend of Joe's
(The "Sazerac mural" mentioned here is not, in fact,
displayed in the Sazerac Bar in New Orleans. All
of their
paintings were done by Paul Ninas in the 1940s.
John Clemmer, however, did have a study for a mural that
must have been
intended for the Sazerac Bar but was never
executed. It now belongs to the Historic New
Orleans Collection.)
Faces of the Big Thicket
Village Creek
Farm on Honey Island, Big Thicket
Various illustrations for "Jungle Country - Texas Style"
by Archer Fullington,
Ford Times Magazine, November 1964, pgs. 41, 43 (Images courtesy of
James Baker)
A page from the magazine,
Quartet (1971), with one of Joe's numerous poems, a photo,
and some biographical information (Image courtesy of
Katherine Wood)
Two more
pages from Quartet Magazine (Images courtesy of
Katherine Wood)
Faces, Trees, and Steeples,
1969
Shrimp Boats at Seadrift, Texas (n.d.)
The cover of Center Magazine, January 1979
Joe loved to draw faces
Thin Man, 1971
(Images courtesy of
Katherine Wood)
Thin Man, Jan. 22, 1978
dimensions unknown, watercolor and ink (Photo by Tim Manning, image
courtesy of James Baker)
Three Faces with Venus (The Hollow Men?), January 30, 1979
dimensions unknown, watercolor and ink (Photo by Tim Manning, image
courtesy of James Baker)
Faces, November 10, 1972
dimensions unknown, watercolor and ink (Photo by Tim Manning, image
courtesy of James Baker)
For Dawn (sketch), date unknown
This is one of Joe's many napkin sketches.
He drew it for Grace's great-granddaughter, Dawn, to whom he
signed and presented it. (Image courtesy of Summer
Stone Callaway)
Prisoner, September 21, 1973
dimensions unknown, watercolor and ink (Photo by Tim Manning, image
courtesy of James Baker)
Fantasia - Thin
Man with Branches, December 1973
dimensions unknown, watercolor and ink (Photo by Tim Manning,
image courtesy of James Baker)
Copy from Michelangelo, 1984
18 inces by 12 inches, graphite on paper (Image courtesy of
James Baker, original in the collection of
Graham Horsley)
Dancing Stranger,
1974
dimensions unknown,
watercolor
(Image courtesy of James Baker)
Joe loved to play with words. Not that he was the only
person in the world who could recite Shakespeare's "Seven
Portraits of Man Speech" (As You Like It, Act II, Scene
vii), but Joe had that one memorized. He also told
some funny stories about his earliest days in central Texas
in the mid-1950s - having lived in New Orleans, Chicago, New
York and the Virgin Islands, the local culture and ways of
speech baffled him. As can be seen from the above
scans of "Quartet" Magazine, Joe was also quite a
poet. Below is a sample of his poetry, some written in
his own hand.
"Forest," by Joseph Donaldson,
Jr., 1973 (Image courtesy of Katherine
Wood)
"Forest," by Joseph Donaldson,
Jr., 1973 (courtesy of Dara Childs,
Jr.)
"Presence," by Joseph Donaldson, Jr., 1982 (Image courtesy of Katherine
Wood)
Poem (title unknown), by Joseph
Donaldson, Jr., 1985 (courtesy of Dara Childs,
Jr.)
The Room
He walked into the Silence of the Sighted
dark
Into the hearing Silence
of the darker room
His fingers found the
latch and closed the door
The unknown door within
the unseen place
Some place, somewhere, he
felt he'd never been
Some unfamiliar place he'd
never left.
His hands moved cautiously
along the wall
His footsteps followed,
naked on the floor,
They found the meeting of
a corner's walls
He crouched and closed his
arms around his knees.
The hours, or minutes,
fell like dust on stone,
Like finely sifted sand of
all Eternity.
Slowly his hand moved out
and, opened, cupped
To catch, perhaps, a
little silt of Time
It closed and held,
instead, the Pulse of Now –
The pulse of Now that was
the Now of Then
He held it close
And suddenly he knew –
Its beat had cleared a
passage in his thought.
All was not muted, blinded
stillness there
The Eyes that watched him
in the Dark were his
He heard the Silence and
the Silence spoke:
"You are no stranger here,
You have returned
Stand up and walk along
the wall –
The second wall your
fingers found before
Then follow to the next
And stand and hear
The Sound beyond the
shutters – stand and hear
Stand feet apart and feel
the movement too."
He rose, and following the
walls,
He stopped and heard –
It was the sound of
Sea –
Her sound, Her movement
seeming very near.
The sound grew strong – he
could not understand
Not having heard, or felt,
or understood before.
One hand still holding,
close, the Pulse –
The other reached and
found another latch
He pushed the shutters
open and the Sea was there
The solemn Vastness bright
in the moonlight then –
Bright, Timeless Vastness
in his Memory –
With all the ancient
Freshness felt again.
The Movement heightened,
entering the room.
His hand fell open and
released the Pulse
He freed the Pulse of Now,
the Pulse of Then
And knew, at last, a
final, stronger, unrelenting One.
He took the water's life –
as it took his.
Joseph
Donaldson
June 1974-July 1976
(courtesy
of Dara Childs, Jr.)
The Hunter (A Narrative in
Rhyme)
He was, for some unmeasured
sleep of time,
A stranger in an unknown,
friendless place,
A prayer unprayed, a saying
never said.
He suffered guilt for
uncommitted crime
His mirror showed a presence
not a Face.
He was a runner in an
unmarked race
A song unsung, a poem never
read.
His travels took him far, but
never There
A troubled searcher, he, who
searched in vain
He was the missing fragment
of a broken thought
His mission was to reattach,
repair
And so to see his mirrored face again,
To know detachment,
namelessness and pain
If doing so would find the
Self he sought.
And Time, asleep, must of
itself awake
But for this hunter with
an unfound prey,
Time waking quietly was no
sudden thing.
At last he was a knowing
prayer to make,
A poem and a song, to read,
to sing, to say –
A runner eager to explore the
way
A certain Face who knew its
mirroring.
One day he walked in calmness
on the shore.
He walked with strength
of reclaimed Self, alone,
Then rested near the rocks
and touched the Sea.
He knew the sights and sounds
he'd known before –
The cry of the gull, the
dance of surf spray blown,
He knew the Sky and Water's
vastness as his own
And asked a question – old as
Time may be,
"Have I found Self or Selves
in finding me?"
Joseph
Donaldson
October, 1976
(courtesy
of Dara Childs, Jr.)
Whether Joe was the author of the
following limerick or not, I do not know, but
it is one that he enjoyed recounting:
I once knew a woman from
Britain, Who said she would knit me a
mitten. When I asked why not two, She exclaimed "greedy you, Be glad with the mitten you're
gitten!"
(courtesy of Dara Childs,
Jr.)
Although Joe's second wife, Grace,
died in 1965, he remained close to her grandchildren
(especially Gayle's daughters) throughout his life. One
of them was particularly influenced by Joe's interest in
literature.
"I was in fifth grade in New
Orleans and studying poetry. Gayle and I took our first
plane trip to Texas to visit Joe for a week. When
asked, I told him my favorite poet was T.S. Elliot and he
gracefully agreed to recite from memory The Lovesong of J.
Alfred Prufrock, although he did so with his back turned to me
so as not to stutter too badly. That same week he
recited numerous limericks, several of his own and he
encouraged me to write my own poems. Unbeknowing to me
or my mother, he mailed one of my poems to a
children's magazine to be published and sent me a copy
for my birthday. It was one of the proudest moments of
my childhood. I went on to major in literature with a
special love for T.S. Elliot."
- Shannon Stone Rhodes
After retiring from Texas A&M
University, Joe was granted the title of professor emeritus,
and lived in his house on N. Ridgefield Circle. I went
there to visit him fairly often beginning in the late 1980s.
One day (in 1987) Joe
was trying to teach me how
to draw the human face. He grabbed a book from
a shelf, and referring to some examples in it,
he made these quick skull sketches on a sheet of
paper.
He then glued the paper to a piece of cardboard and
gave it to me.
For my eighteenth birthday
Joe gave me this book.
He had very fine script.
(image from First Trade Registry
- http://www.firsttraderegistry.com/forsale/pre80/american/att196.htm)
According to his nephew, Joseph
Donaldson Buck, Sr., Joe once had a 1954 Ford station
wagon that he called "The Blue Goose," but I never saw it
myself. By the time I got to know Joe, he had a 1970
Buick Riviera - all factory original, including the 455
cubic inch engine - identical to the car above. Once
he got into his upper seventies he had to give up
driving it, but he didn't want to part with the car so it
just sat in his garage all the time. I used to take
it out for him about once a week and have it washed
and waxed. At the service station, college students
would say "Cool car, man!" Joe wanted me to drive it
on the highway each time and to let it run at full
throttle at least for a bit...well, maybe "full throttle"
was my idea. I have to admit - it was a
blast. When the engine roared, I could literally see
the gas gauge dropping. And despite the car's weight
and age, it was easy to make the rear tires spin. I
miss that car almost as much as I miss the old man...well,
perhaps not quite that much, but it was a classy item with
an unforgettable personality, and a rare product of a
vanished age - not unlike Joe himself.
Dara Childs, with whom I went to grade school for
many years, had the good fortune of living on North
Ridgefield Circle, across the street and down a ways from
Joe's house. He and his sister, Leslie, spent quite a
bit of time with Joe over the years. Dara also helped
Joe by taking his car out from time to time.
"I remember taking his car
out to put gas in it, and he always wanted a blend of unleaded
and premium unleaded...and then they came out with the
blend of fuel in between, and I put that in the car...and man
did he flip out when I told him what I had done. He was
so picky, and such a creature of habit. The car was fun
though...all kinds of luxury gadgets. What a powerful
engine."
- Dara Childs, Jr.
"For Dara" - the front
cover of a greeting card Joe sent to Dara Childs (courtesy of Dara
Childs, Jr.)
"Little Man" - a sketch
Joe gave to Dara Childs
(courtesy of Dara
Childs, Jr.)
"Old Man" - a sketch given to Dara Childs by Joe (courtesy
of
Dara Childs, Jr.)
The Birthday
Limerick To commemorate his
eightieth birthday, Joe made up the following limerick:
A fact, that to
some may be known, I'm
eighty and living alone. An
eccentric old farter, No
wife, son, or daughter, And
the pain in my ass is my own!
Joe had his own way of
living. He refused to attend funerals - he did not
even go to his parents' funerals or to those of his sister
or her husband. Some may have though badly of him for
his refusal to budge on this matter, but in the end he did
put his money where his mouth was, so to speak; not only did
he once tell me that he wanted no funeral to be held for
him, he made legal arrangements to this effect in his
will. Exactly why I do not know, but Joe was
steadfastly anti-funeral. Joe also tended to reject
what did not sound good to him. For example, he had a
habit of drinking tea in the evenings (he was still a night
owl when I knew him) but drinking tea caused him to get up
many times during the night for trips to the bathroom, which
left him feeling drowsy and unrested much of the
day. Those near to him (including my mother)
suggested that he lay off the tea, but that idea did not
suit him. It was a constant problem in his later
years. There was a time when he asked me to take a
look at a plastic camera he had bought. He wanted to
use it, but the winding mechanism was not working
properly. It was not the kind of camera that one could
have repaired, so I suggested that he buy a stronger,
fully-automatic camera. Since he could not accept my
diagnosis, I took the camera to the university photo lab
where I served as a student worker. There, my
co-worker (a professional photographer) confirmed my
opinion. I returned the faulty camera to Joe and told
him of the final diagnosis. It took a little time but
eventually, amid diminishing protestations, he gave up on
the camera and let go of the matter. I was not
bothered, of course - it was just his way.
Some who knew Joe
wanted to get him out of his house from time to time (other
than just for doctor visits), but he rarely left after about
1990. My mother succeeded in getting him to come over
for dinner on a number of occasions, and he would always
dress well. I remember that he did not get along with
the family dog - a lovable if not slightly nervous terrier
mutt named Jackie. Once or twice, after I had moved
out of the house, Joe wrote to me about how he had enjoyed
supper at my mother's place the previous night, and joke
about how "well" he and Jackie had gotten along.
Probably sometime in 1994 I invited the old man to attend a
performance of Don Quixote on the Texas A&M University
campus - I had an extra ticket for the front row - but he
declined. While he could manage visits to the house, I
guess it had become too difficult for him to go out in
public anymore. It probably made him too tired, seeing
as that he could not sleep well at night.
Untitled sketch, 1995
Joe gave this to my mother. (Image courtesy of Katherine
Wood)
For Katherine (sketch), 1996
another sketch Joe gave to my mother (Image courtesy of Katherine
Wood)
The last time I saw Joe was July twentieth,
1995, shortly before leaving for an extended stay in
Japan. Over the course of the next year and a half we
exchanged letters (sometimes about his encounters with Jackie)
and talked on the telephone from time to time. I do
remember that I called him on November tenth or eleventh,
1996, to inform him of the birth of my daughter, and that he
seemed very pleased to hear the news. Although I was to
return to Texas the following year, Joe did not have enough
time left; his health rapidly deteriorated, and late the next
month he was admitted to St. Joseph's Hospital in the
neighboring city of Bryan. There, in the early morning
hours of January first, he died at the age of
eighty-two. I had so wanted to take my daughter to his
house and talk to him and gaze once more at all of his work,
but by the time I made it back to that town, he was
gone. His objection to the holding of a funeral for him
was honored, so once he was gone he really was gone. But
at least Joe can be remembered, for he had some relatives,
many friends, and had also taught numerous people in his life,
some of whom are now professional artists. Today there is a scholarship
in his name at TAMU, "awarded to encourage a sophomore
environmental design student who shows professional promise
and an interest in the environment, community service and
university extracurricular activities" (http://archweb.tamu.edu/college/admissions/scholarships/arch.html). One of Grace's
granddaughters recalls her last time to converse with Joe:
"The
night before he was to go into the hospital (for knee surgery
I think) he called to let me know that he had written an
account of his life with Grace as I had asked him to do.
He was quite nervous about this hospital trip because I think
he knew that he wasn't coming home. I poo-pooed his
nervousness, as he was quite prone to getting worked up
about sickness. I was never to hear from him
again. Ah, hindsight...and 'if only's'... I wish
now that I had allowed Joe to say good-bye, for that is really
why he called."
- Sarah McDermott Stone Griffiths
There
are more than a few people who miss Joe very much.
Joe at the age of 81, sitting
in his rocking chair at home, July 20, 1995 (Photos by D.C. Wood)
For more on Joe's lifetime, his artwork,
and New Orleans: - "Only Yesterday:
An Informal History of the 1920's," by Frederick Lewis
Allen, 1931 (1957, New York: Harper & Brothers)
(a very readable overview of the decade in
which Joe came of age)
- "A Nation In Torment: The Great American Depression,
1929-1939," by Edward Robb Ellis, 1970, New York:Coward-McCann
(a fascinating, thorough, and human
discussion of the decade during which Joe studied in Chicago,
and worked with the Federal Art Project -
Chapter 27 details the Works Progress Administration)
- "New Orleans Stories: Great Writers on the City," by John
Miller, ed., 1992, San Francisco: Chronicle Books
(a wonderful collection of short pieces by
various authors on New Orleans - "Growing Up in New Orleans"
by Louis Armstrong is a must-read)
- "Panic in the Streets," directed by Elia Kazan, 1950
(This film is recommended by Fred
Hatfield, long-time resident of New Orleans, jazz
affectionado,
and chronicler of historic cemeteries.)
- "Dinner at Antoine's," by Frances Parkinson Keyes, 1949
(orig. 1948), London: Eyre & Spottiswoode.
(This harcover edition
contains 23 of Joe's original illustrations, plus the endpaper
design - a drawing he did on
Rue Saint Louis in the
French Quarter, depicting the facade of the landmark
restaurant.)
- "The Art Spirit," by Robert Henri, 1960, New York:
J.B. Lippincott.
(Joe definitely had the "art
spirit" - he lived it.)
A number of people have
helped build this museum by providing images and/or
information. Much thanks to:
Katherine Wood, James
Baker, Joseph Donaldson Buck, Sr., Shannon Stone Rhodes,
Sarah McDermott Stone Griffiths, Summer Stone Callaway, Dara Childs, Jr.,
Sheldon Minkon, Dan Malcolm,
John Clemmer, Fred Hatfield, Todd Maxwell, Ken Zindler,
Bruce R. Riggs, Roger Jackson, Buzz Jackson, Jacquie
Ferrency, William Boggess,
Francine Stock, Martin and Joany Lanneau and Dennis and Todd
Headington.
I am also grateful to Dr. Tim Manning, Texas A&M
University, for photographing many of Joe's works back
when
the old man was still living - something I regret not
having the foresight to do myself.
Last updated on August 20, 2018
Questions and comments are welcome - wood (at)
med.akita-u.ac.jp