Her Lucca Studio One of my aunt Mary’s so-called failings was in her lack of dates and titles or locations On her paintings this canvas an exception 1962 it reads a view from her Lucca studio Across the flood plane of the Serchio bathed in crisp Tuscan morning sunlight 1962 seemed light filled until it wasn’t she crated her paintings sailed home After that November funeral exporting her own paintings back to the states a legal snarl This oil on canvas image bright and airy catches handfuls of promise and light It hangs in my daughter’s living room close to Lake Harriet far from Italy and 1962 Mary O'Hare oil on canvas 1962

Ugly Art He Said Brian wondered how I could spend so much time making ugly art when there is so much beauty in the world to paint Why not paint the lake in the morning? Roses and marigolds in a vase? Or the way sunlight makes a halo out of hair if you stand in just the right spot in the late afternoon? Brian was an old man I was a kid fresh out of art school Years passed And then Brian became an older man and didn't sleep anymore After his wife Lilian passed away she the one whose hair looked like a halo in the late afternoon Brian set up a studio in his basement A horizontal sheet of plywood covered his pool table A slab of Sumi ink, brushes, paper He promised to show me what he'd been doing down there alone and I promised to go look He said I'm sorry for what I said about you wasting time making ugly art It isn't ugly at all once you look at it instead of hair glowing in the late afternoon light "It is it...