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December 4, 2024

Talbot Spy

Nonpartisan Education-based News for Talbot County Community

Arts Looking at the Masters Spy Journal

Looking At The Masters: American Autumn

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Autumn began on Sunday, September 22 this year. In Greek mythology, Persephone, the daughter of the goddess of the harvest Demeter, had returned to live in the Underworld. She had been abducted in the Spring by Hades, God of the Underworld. In response, Demeter stopped everything from growing on Earth until she found out where her daughter had been taken. She appealed to Zeus and Aphrodite on Mt Olympus and a bargain was reached. Persephone would live in the Underworld for half the year and with her mother on earth for the other half. This myth explained why they Earth was bountiful in Spring and Summer, and barren in Autumn and Winter.

 

“View of Mt Washington from North Conway, New Hampshire” (1860-65)

“View of Mt Washington from North Conway, New Hampshire” (1860-65) (14”x19’’) was painted by Albert Bierstadt (1830-1902). He was born in Germany but immigrated with his parents to New York when he was two. As an artist, he was a member of the Hudson River School. He went on several expeditions to explore the western territories to California. Bierstadt always was interested in representing the seasons and the time of day in his work.  An avid outdoorsman, he also found opportunities to include animals in his painting. Fall foliage dominates this painting, with three cows quietly drinking from the lake, and Mt Washington’s peaks clearly visible in the distance. The setting is a calm Autumn day with no rain, no rainclouds, and no wind. All of Bierstadt’s paintings were landscapes, and all evidence his strong feelings for the America’s landscape.

 

“Autumn Oaks” (1873)

“Autumn Oaks” (1873) (21”x30’’) by George Innes (1825-1894) represents work during the middle of his career. Born in Newburgh, New York, he became interested in art at an early age. He studied at the National Academy of Design in the mid-1840s, and traveled to Europe and was inspired by French art from the 17th Century through the Barbizon school of landscape painting. He was member of the Hudson River School. “Autumn Oaks” is typical of his middle style with dramatic clouds and strong coloring. Innes’s autumn trees range in type and color from fiery orange, bright yellow, and green turning to brown. Cattle graze, with a bull in the foreground watching over them. A farmer is harvesting hay in the field at mid-ground. Sunlight streaks across the scene in several places and draws the viewer’s attention into the distance. Threatening dark clouds roll in, while five white birds fly through the clouds. Innes has caught the intensity of colors that precede an Autumn storm. 

 

“Lake George, Autumn” (1927)

“Lake George, Autumn” (1927) (17”x32”) is by Georgia O’Keeffe. She and Alfred Stieglitz spent the Summer and Fall seasons at the family estate in Lake George, New York, from 1918 until 1934. The 36-acre estate was located by a 30-mile glacial lake. She had her own studio where she could paint in peace and quiet. Georgia painted several scenes of Lake George. “Lake George Autumn” was a departure from her usual approach, because she eliminated the lake shore and included only the essentials. A practice she continued for the rest of her career. Her painting approaches the abstract with the use of bold color shapes for the autumn trees, the deep blue for the glacial lake, and the bold orange for the distant mountains. 

In a letter in 1923 to the writer Sherwood Anderson, O’Keeffe described her emotions concerning her work: “I wish you could see the place here–there is something so perfect about the mountains and the lake and the trees. Sometimes I want to tear it all to pieces–it seems so perfect–but it is really lovely–and when the household is in good running order–and I feel free to work it is very nice.”

 

“Fall Plowing” (1931)

“Fall Plowing” (1931) (24’’x39’’) is by Iowa born painter Grant Wood (1891-1942). He was one of three American Regionalists, including John Steward Curry and Thomas Har Benton, whose style was popular from the 1930s until the1940s. The panoramic scene begins with a walking plough and a steel ploughshare, used by Midwestern farmers at that time. Plowed fields are ready for new planting. Already harvested fields and wheat stacks cast shadows across already harvester fields. Simply designed yellow and orange Autumn trees are dotted over the landscape of rolling green fields that lead to a small red barn and white farmhouse. The composition is formed by diagonals that are painted with simple hard edges. The day is sunny. Regionalism became popular in the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl in the 1920s through the mid1920s. The three midwestern artists wanted to illustrate life on their beloved prairie, with its good and bad aspects. 

“Fall Plowing” hangs in the John Deere headquarters in Moline, Illinois. John Deere, a blacksmith from Grand Detour, Illinois, invented in 1938 the walking plough made of molded steel. At that time, the farmers rejected the metal plough because they thought the metal would reduce the fertility of the soil, encoumraging growth of weeds.  Wood’s painting illustrates that farmers came to use and appreciate the metal plough. 

 

“Corn Shocks in October Sunshine” (1954-59)

“Corn Shocks in October Sunshine” (1954-59) (30”x40”) is a watercolor by Charles Burchfield (1893-1967). Born in Ashtabula, Ohio, Burchfield was an American modernist whose paintings reflected his sensitivity to nature: its sights, sounds, colors, times of day, and seasons of the year. 

He assimilated all these images into his own vision of nature. This watercolor depicts not only three corn shocks but also the yellow and white energy radiating from the field and the corn shocks. Two ears of corn and three blue flowers are placed in the foreground to create a triangular composition. Green is repeated on the flowers and on the edge of the distant road. Hazy fields lead to distant trees and sky. Burchfield keeps viewers’ attention on the grain stacks. He recorded his thoughts in a daily journal: “An artist must paint not what he sees in nature, but what is there. To do so he must invent symbols, which, if properly used, make his work seem even more real than what is in front of him.” 

 

Beverly Hall Smith was a professor of art history for 40 years. Since retiring to Chestertown with her husband Kurt in 2014, she has taught art history classes at WC-ALL and the Institute of Adult Learning, Centreville. An artist, she sometimes exhibits work at River Arts. She also paints sets for the Garfield Theater in Chestertown.

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

Grace Creek Almanac: Spanish Coast

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Here’s Becky on Camino Santiago’s coastal route. The path follows the rocky shores of the North Atlantic, just about due east of the Delmarva Peninsula by a few thousand miles.

SPANISH COAST – Our early September hiking along Camino Santiago’s coastal route carried us northward from A Guarda, near the border with Portugal. About 120 miles over seven days to Santiago de Compostela. Lots of rocky outcroppings and patches of beach, small vacation estates overlooking the Atlantic and nestled in tall dune grasses, clean and narrow stone-paved streets in small villages strung up against the sea.

Little churches and chapels of stone, houses and businesses of old stone construction–everything is built of stone and concrete including the landscape. It’s almost as if talented builders and the Tao Te Ching’s Master Carpenter planted magical stone seeds in the rocky underpinnings where they took root and grew and transformed in all kinds of minerally ways to become windows, walls, floors and roofs.

That’s right, they just grew up out of the ground that way.  (Strong coffee folks, that’s all I can tell you.) All stone except for the terracotta roof tiles.  I guess they burned up all the wood centuries ago for heat and cooking.

Entropy.  Taking the energy stored in wood and converting it for other uses. Entropy.  Releasing energy stored in walls protecting our egos so it can move to other parts of our brain for creative expression and understanding.

The Camino took us up and down coastal terrain through thick natural shrubbery and–closer to the paralleling coastal highway–across asphalt parking lots for touristy hotels, cafes and restaurants.

With August and vacation season behind us though, this was a quieter time. Also, at this distance from the final destination, not as many pilgrims greeted us with the ubiquitous Buen Camino! salutation.

Of course the closer we came to Santiago, the more populated the path became with the convergence of other Camino routes.

Halfway in the first day’s 18-mile hike, a red lighthouse perched high on a mountainous rocky outcropping in the distance north of us. While cautioning the maritime trade, the lighthouse for us also served notice that our way was about to turn eastward into Spain’s interior.

Clearly, ancient travelers afoot wanted to go eastward around that forbidding mountainous impediment as much as wary mariners wanted to stay westward of its dangers slinking down in hiding beneath the waves.

That interior section of the Camino over the much-less elevated pass imprinted the age of this journey deep and viscerally on my mind. Despite its rockiness, millions of travelers over thousands of years have helped level this often-steep section.

We picked our way over everything from gravel-sized stones to the rounded tops of vehicle-sized boulders. At one point I found myself staring at and mesmerized by wooden cart wheel-width ruts worn inches deep into solid granite. The agreeable scent of bordering tracts of cultivated eucalyptus forest further stayed my step as I considered the ruts.

If you’re thinking the same as I am, yup, you obviously know I was in a rut. But it was a pleasant rut I was in no hurry to shed.

Here was slightest but primary communication with ancients, like discovering an arrowhead in a freshly plowed field, holding it in your hand and thinking about the last hand that held it.  Communication was there in as common a thing as a rut. Ego melted in that consideration, melding my soul with countless others across the almost limitless scope of human experience.

Roman legions and their traveling communities eventually evolved into steadily northward flowing currents of pilgrims seeking a different form of treasure and higher authority.

John Denver sang about it with the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band: “Mountains may disappear, rivers will dry up, and so it goes with everything but love.”

But what about the rain-punctured egos I promised in the previous post? They’re up next but I’ve asked enough of you today.  If you’ve stayed with me this far, thank you for reading.  And don’t forget to spread a little love around.  A little by lots of us goes a long way.

Buen Camino!

Please notice the wooden wagon wheel ruts worn into the granite through ages of travel over this pass along the Camino Santiago. 

 

DENNIS FORNEY PHOTOS

Dennis Forney has been a journalist, editor, publisher and photographer on the Delmarva Peninsula since 1972. He writes from his home on Grace Creek in Maryland’s Talbot County.

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

Remembering Neil King at the Avalon

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As the Spy and thousands of fans of the writer Neil King, Jr. continue to mourn his early death last week, we reached out to our friends at the Avalon to obtain the video of Neil’s appearance with his friend and photographer Jeff McGuines in the Stoltz Listening room in November 2023.  They gathered in a filled room to talk about Neil’s book, American Ramble, for one of our Spy Nights, and it seemed like the perfect long-form interview of two close friends delightfully rambling themselves to share with our readers on a lazy Sunday morning on the Mid-Shore of Maryland.

This video is approximately 50 minutes in length.

 

 

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

Delmarva Review: You Learn Transaction, Before Anything Else by Marlowe Jones

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Author’s note: This poem spurred several conversations among my classmates about the ethics of writing about one’s family. To me, it’s about nostalgia and childhood innocence, how innocence is another word for ‘ignorance’, and how childhood nostalgia doesn’t discriminate between negative and positive experiences. I attempt to communicate this disconnect between reality and memory with my lack of capitalization and my choppy line breaks and enjambments. As for the ethics, I landed on this: where else can I say what happened, if not a poem?

You Learn Transaction,
Before Anything Else

this is the game
this is how it works

dad dares you you
do the dare dad 

pays you money
the first dare is small 

eat the hot peppers
in the bottle in the diner 

booth you get five bucks
you swallow six peppers 

ask him if that means you
get 30 he laughs which means 

not this time but you keep
that in mind the next dares 

go quick you squeeze small body
into even smaller spaces you 

get ten bucks you lick
the frozen bus stop 

pole that’s fifteen would’ve
been twenty but your tongue 

didn’t stick the game has
one rule this is the rule 

you follow above all
don’t tell mom don’t 

tell mom any of this
and you don’t his money’s 

good the last dare the very
last but you don’t know 

that yet is out in the nowhere
by the railroad tracks dad 

says lay down you say how
long he says til i say get 

up you say how much
he says fifty you lay 

down close your eyes
spread hands on warm 

wood and wait for his
words or the rumble 

you lay still and dead
or close enough you think 

you hear a whistle three
stops off you wait for him he 

waits til the gates go ting
ting ting and pulls you off 

you say nothing you hold
out your hand he gives you 

the money you walk home
still saying nothing 

when mom asks if you had fun
you still follow the one rule 

and when he leaves three
weeks later for good this time 

you can only
think to yourself 

my god i should’ve
asked for more 

⧫

Marlowe Jones is a student in the Northeast Ohio Master of Fine Arts Program (NEOMFA)  through Cleveland State University. His poems have been published in Green Blotter, Sink Hollow, and The Courtship of Winds under a previous name. His interests outside poetry include horror movies, folklore, and birdwatching. 

The Delmarva Review, published in St. Michaels, MD, gives writers a desirable home in a printed edition (with an electronic version) for their most compelling new prose and poetry. Available to all writers for their best work, the review has been produced  at a time when many commercial  publications (and literary magazines) are closing their doors or reducing literary content. For each annual edition, the editors have read thousands of submissions to select the best  new poetry, fiction, and nonfiction. Almost half of the writers are from the Delmarva and Chesapeake region. As a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, support comes from tax-deductible contributions and a grant from Talbot Arts with funds from the Maryland State Arts Council. Website: www.DelmarvaReview.org

 

 

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

From and Fuller: Politics and Rhetoric After 2nd Attempt on Donald Trump and Andy Harris’s Freedom Caucus

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Every Thursday, the Spy hosts a conversation with Al From and Craig Fuller on the most topical political news of the moment.

This week, From and Fuller discuss the political consequences of the second attempt on Donald Trump’s life and the potential for his security to become a campaign issue. Al and Craig also chat about Rep. Andy Harris’s appointment as the new chair of the Freedom Caucus this week.

This video podcast is approximately sixteen minutes in length.

To listen to the audio podcast version, please use this link:

Background

While the Spy’s public affairs mission has always been hyper-local, it has never limited us from covering national, or even international issues, that impact the communities we serve. With that in mind, we were delighted that Al From and Craig Fuller, both highly respected Washington insiders, have agreed to a new Spy video project called “The Analysis of From and Fuller” over the next year.

The Spy and our region are very lucky to have such an accomplished duo volunteer for this experiment. While one is a devoted Democrat and the other a lifetime Republican, both had long careers that sought out the middle ground of the American political spectrum.

Al From, the genius behind the Democratic Leadership Council’s moderate agenda which would eventually lead to the election of Bill Clinton, has never compromised from this middle-of-the-road philosophy. This did not go unnoticed in a party that was moving quickly to the left in the 1980s. Including progressive Howard Dean saying that From’s DLC was the Republican wing of the Democratic Party.

From’s boss, Bill Clinton, had a different perspective. He said it would be hard to think of a single American citizen who, as a private citizen, has had a more positive impact on the progress of American life in the last 25 years than Al From.”

Al now lives in Annapolis and spends his semi-retirement as a board member of the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University (his alma mater) and authoring New Democrats and the Return to Power. He also is an adjunct faculty member at Johns Hopkins’ Krieger School and recently agreed to serve on the Annapolis Spy’s Board of Visitors. He is the author of “New Democrats and the Return to Power.”

For Craig Fuller, his moderation in the Republican party was a rare phenomenon. With deep roots in California’s GOP culture of centralism, Fuller, starting with a long history with Ronald Reagan, leading to his appointment as Reagan’s cabinet secretary at the White House, and later as George Bush’s chief-of-staff and presidential campaign manager was known for his instincts to find the middle ground. Even more noted was his reputation of being a nice guy in Washington, a rare characteristic for a successful tenure in the White House.

Craig has called Easton his permanent home for the last eight years, where he now chairs the board of the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum and is a former board member of the Academy Art Museum and Benedictine.  He also serves on the Spy’s Board of Visitors and writes an e-newsletter available by clicking on DECADE SEVEN.

With their rich experience and long history of friendship, now joined by their love of the Chesapeake Bay, they have agreed through the magic of Zoom, to talk inside politics and policy with the Spy every Thursday.

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

Remembering Neil King Jr.

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The Spy lost a good friend and gifted writer a few days ago. Neil King, Jr. passed away after a courageous fight against cancer that ultimately took his life on Tuesday. We shall miss him terribly.

Neil generously contributed some of the best writing this publication has ever published after leaving a twenty-year legacy as the Wall Street Journal’s correspondent and editor. A wise, thin, and tall man, he had an almost Lincoln-like bearing about him, both in person and in his writing about an America he loved so much.

It is some modest compensation for this loss in knowing that Neil had a very rewarding moment in the sun as critics and prime-time outlets such as CBS Sunday Morning documented his rare talent after the publication of American Ramble: A Walk of Memory and Renewal two years ago. But in terms of unique gifts that he left behind for the Mid-Shore via the Spy, I hope our readers will go back to his masterpiece treatment of Frederick Douglass with his friend and photographer Jeff McGuiness as just one example of his powerful and elegant voice.

The Spy was lucky enough to have several video interviews with Neil when he was in residence in Claiborne from time to time, and we have selected our chat about American Ramble for our readers to remind ourselves what a loss this has been in the world of arts and letters.

This video is approximately five minutes in length

Dave Wheelan is the founder of Spy Community Media and executive editor of the Talbot Spy. 

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

A Second Assassination Attempt on Trump by J.E. Dean

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The 2024 presidential election keeps getting uglier and uglier. Last week, we heard more about immigrants eating pets than about school children who don’t get lunch. We also read that Donald Trump took a conspiracy theorist who speculated that the September 11 terrorist attacks were an “inside job” to events memorializing those attacks. 

I was reading about Ms. Loomer when the news about the assassination attempt was posted. I was relieved that it was immediately clear that Trump was not hurt. 

Fortunately, police spotted the shooter in time and eventually apprehended him. We should be grateful for the excellent work of the Secret Service and other law enforcement officers involved.

The suspect, Ryan Wesley Routh, is now in custody. Unlike the shooting in Butler, Pennsylvania, authorities will be able to fully understand why Routh sought to kill Trump. That information will be useful but could also be dangerous if it motivates more political violence. 

Trump, like Kamala Harris, Joe Biden, and dozens of other political figures, is hated by some. That hate, some of it reflecting policy disagreements on issues like immigration, reproductive rights, civil rights, education, and foreign policy, and some of it reflected in race-hate, misogyny, or even the way a candidate looks, is a fact of life for candidates. You cannot run for office in the United States without experiencing it.

Running for public office involves receiving threatening letters, including death threats, efforts to produce damaging information to use in campaigns, and the risk of assassination. As a result, many people who would be outstanding candidates for public office do not run. The risks outweigh the benefits, especially the possibility of assassination.

After the first assassination attempt on Trump on July 13, I was appalled when the ex-president’s campaign launched fundraising efforts intended to monetize the event. I was disgusted when Trump and other suggested that God had intervened to save Trump—if God wanted to save Trump, he would have prevented the shooter from taking a shot at him. Right?

I was equally appalled at sick humor suggesting it was unfortunate that the assassin’s bullet missed. I heard, “He had it coming” and “violence begets violence.”  I do not subscribe to the eye for an eye principle. 

Everyone should condemn both attempts on Trump’s life and pray that another would-be assassin does not make a third attempt on Trump, Harris, or anyone else. That risk is higher than ever now.

Political violence is an attack on democracy. Had either assassination attempt against Trump been successful, I would be denied my opportunity to vote against him. The entire 2024 election would also have been thrown into chaos. Given Trump’s dominance in the Republican party, there is nobody to replace him on the ticket. Certainly not J.D. Vance.

If Harris won the election (against who?), many people would not accept her presidency as legitimate, especially Republicans who, regardless of what police uncovered about the assassination, would blame the Democrats.

Hate can kill democracy, not only because democracy does not work without civil discourse between candidates, but because hate injects fear into voters and candidates. Hate distracts everyone from talking about America’s future and how government should serve the people. And hate makes us question whether we are human enough to be able to govern ourselves.

J.E. Dean is a retired attorney and public affairs consultant. He writes on politics, government, and, too infrequently, other subjects.

 

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

My Five Favorite Books I Have Read this Year by Maria Grant

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As an active member of three book clubs, I read a lot of books. Since I assume you are all caught up on political news, I thought I would share my top five favorite books I’ve read so far this year. 

No. 5. Absolution. The setting for Alice McDermott’s book is Saigon, 1963. The focus is on the “wives” whose husbands have important jobs in Vietnam—foreign service, military, big corporations. The wives are portrayed as “helpmates.” The story is told in retrospect from decades later by letters from one “helpmate” to and from the daughter of another “helpmate” whose mother had died. McDermott was motivated to draft this novel after reading Graham Greene’s The Quiet American. It made her think about Greene’s so called “unimportant characters” perhaps not being so “unimportant.” When considering a title, McDermott met with a good friend of hers, a monsignor in New York. She told him she was thinking of calling her novel Absolution. The monsignor explained that most people do not understand the true meaning of that word. They think it means a get-out-of-jail-free card. But he explained that if you look at the Latin root of the word absolution, it means one who is set free and one who sets free. McDermott then said, “That’s perfect. That’s what I will name my book.”

As an aside, when I was researching information about this book for my Eastern Shore book club, I discovered that McDermott lives in Bethesda. I emailed her and asked if she would have any interest in coming to our book club meeting. She wrote me back that she would love to but was in New York that week. She asked that I let her know how the book club discussion went. I sent her a return email, summing up our discussion which was very favorable. She then replied with a substantive email reviewing some major themes and quoting Flannery O’Connor and more. I thought that was amazing! So is this book.

No. 4. The Situation Room. In this book, George Stephanopoulos details how 12 different presidents dealt with crises during their administrations in the situation room. He tracks events ranging from the defeat of Vietnam, to the defeat of the Soviet Union, to 9/11, to capturing Osama bin Laden, to January 6 and more. The book gives fascinating information about the origins of the room, the improvements that were made to the room over the years and details the numerous ways different presidents used the room. For Jimmy Carter, it was a place he went each day. For Donald Trump, not so much. The book is insightful, entertaining, well-researched and a must-read for those who want to learn more about exactly what transpires when momentous events occur. 

No. 3. Tom Lake. Ann Patchett’s Tom Lake takes place in a cherry orchard in Northern Michigan. The story revolves around a mother and father and their three adult daughters who are thrown together at the family’s cherry orchard during Covid. While they pick cherries, the mother tells them about her short-lived career as an actress while playing Emily in Thorton Wilder’s play Our Town. Her co-star in the play goes on to become a famous actor. Much of the story revolves around their relationship and the decisions that they make that form the trajectories of their lives. Patchett expertly weaves in themes from Chekov’s Cherry Orchard, and Wilder’s Our Town. You will learn a lot about cherries and the fact that, “Sweet cherries must be picked today and every day until they are gone.” In other words, it is important to take time to enjoy life’s simple pleasures. I loved this book. Meryl Streep reads the audio version, and she is, of course, spectacular. 

No. 2. Demon Copperhead. Barbara Kingsolver’s Demon Copperhead reimagines Dicken’s David Copperfield. She places her story in poor and opioid-addicted rural Appalachia. This novel deals with the shortcomings of American education, the plight of true poverty, and the fact that big pharma contributed mightily to the opioid crisis through its aggressive marketing of Oxycontin.

The first line of David Copperfield is, “Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages will show.” The first line of Copperhead is, “Save or be saved, these are questions.” 

A brilliant masterpiece, Demon Copperhead won the Pulitzer Prize in 2023. 

No. 1 James. James by Percival Everett is my favorite book this year. Everett is a Renaissance man in the true sense of the word. He teaches writing at USC, as well as a course in the American Western film genre. He is an abstract painter. He is an avid fly fisherman who makes his own lures. He is married to Danzy Senna who is also a professor and author who recently published the acclaimed novel Colored Television (It was reviewed in Sunday’s NY Times Book Review.) And he is a prolific writer who has written more than 30 books. (His novel Erasure was turned into the Oscar-nominated film American Fiction—one of my favorite movies last year.)  This year, James has been nominated for the Booker Prize, the Pulitzer Prize, and the National book Award. Similar to Kingsolver basing her story on David Copperfield, Everett based his story on the slave Jim, in Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn. 

In Everett’s novel, James expertly gives white folks what they want. That means that White folks have no idea that James can read and write and often has conversations in his head and in his dreams with Locke, Rousseau, and Voltaire. What I loved most about James is Everett’s depiction of a deep-thinking James who grapples with complex concepts about race, the bible, philosophy, justice, hypocrisy and, of course, freedom. It is a stunning expose about how the White man has consistently underestimated the Black man throughout history. 

For those of you who attended last week’s book talk at the Avalon Theater hosted by Shore Lit founder Kerry Folan and featuring Christopher Tilghman and his new book On the Tobacco Coast, prolific writer and professor Carole Boston Weatherford and her son, as well as Jason Patterson, an African American history-based artist, you will recall that these same concepts were discussed. The four speakers talked about how much history just “got wrong” and how few historians and authors have delved deep into the cerebral depths of many slaves. 

In James, a pencil and a notebook are symbols for freedom—freedom of thought. They represent the concept that thoughts and ideas are something no White man can take from him. It made me think about the book banning going on in today’s world–an effort to squelch the freedom to think about things in a different light—to let the darkness prevail. 

By the way, we held our book club meeting at Book Hounds, a delightful and cozy new bookstore in St. Michaels. Be sure to check it out.

Here is a quote from the author Roald Dahl. “Oh please, oh please we beg, we pray. Go throw your TV set away, and in its place, you can install a lovely bookshelf on the wall.”  Yes indeed. 

Maria Grant was principal-in-charge of the federal human capital practice of an international consulting firm. While on the Eastern Shore, she focuses on writing, reading, piano, kayaking, and nature. 

 

 

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

The Awkward Gentrification of Bellevue by Hugh Panero

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In 2022, Talbot County first heard about a new fourteen-home luxury housing development in the Village of Bellevue, one of twenty-two unincorporated Villages in Talbot County. Bellevue stands out from other villages because it is a predominantly black community with a rich African-American maritime history. It is a quiet, off-the-beaten-path, peaceful community where people are neighborly. 

The villages’ tranquility was shaken when Long Iron Investment Group, LLC, purchased a plot of land in Bellevue with beautiful waterfront views near the ferry in partnership with Paquin Design Build. The land had been on the market for a while. The Ripple family owned the vacant waterfront property, and the investment group waited patiently and eventually bought 15 acres of land for an estimated $2.4M, setting forth what could become the gentrification of Bellevue. 

The development represented a traumatic change for this small, mixed-use waterfront community of about 100 residents and maybe 80, mostly small homes in what is called “Historic Bellevue.” Homes are one to two stories on lots ranging in size from .15 to .7 acres. Community trauma has morphed into a sense of helplessness and resignation. Four of the fourteen luxury homes have been sold. The largest can be 3500 sq ft on a 1.5 acre lot. Water views will be blocked. 100-year-old trees have been cleared and replaced by luxury homes designed for people in another tax bracket. From the project’s onset, there has been a lack of sensitivity and respect for Bellevue’s unique racial history. 

What is happening in Bellevue is a cautionary tale for small, poorer communities that don’t have the time, talent, organization, or capital to organize an effective grassroots effort to slow down development they may not become aware of until it is too late, or how to negotiate with a stealthy, fast-moving developer armed with lawyers and other resources. 

Residents in such communities are not well-versed in the complex regulatory processes involving land use and lot history. They do not attend Talbot County public regulatory or Council meetings. They do not have lawyers or other surrogates monitoring such proceedings over the years, nor do they have any inside information and get bulldozed and blamed for their ignorance. 

The first phase of gentrification can begin with a name. Residents learned that the developer had named the project “North of Oxford” when ads appeared. It was an insulting embrace of the wealthy, white community a short ferry ride away, in place of Bellevue and its historical legacy – so much for community outreach and racial sensitivity. Change is inevitable, but this was too much, too fast. Bellevue was being erased. Imagine naming a development in Harlem, New York, “North of 5th Avenue”, or building luxury homes in Anacostia and calling it South of Georgetown. 

After residents objected to the name and other elements of the plan at a public meeting with the developer at St Luke’s United Methodist Church, Bellevue’s spiritual center, Paquin appropriately renamed the project “Bellevue on the Tred Avon” and renamed streets within the development boundaries after historical references but rejected street names suggested by residents. The rebranding was also an effective public relations move to limit negative racially-tinged press from appearing in Google searches about Bellevue by potential home buyers. In a press release announcing the name change, Brent Paquin, Founder & President of Paquin Design Build, said, “Attending community meetings and engaging local residents plays a major role in fostering tight-knit communities,” oddly making it seem like the heated meeting resulted from planned community outreach rather than community outrage. 

It was a sleeves-off-your-vest concession in response to the community backlash of Paquin’s own making. By the way, the last time a friend checked, the Homeowner’s Association (HOA), which will eventually take over management of the development once all the units are sold, is still called “North of Oxford.” 

If Paquin read the 2017 Bellevue Master Plan, he should have known better. The Plan emphasized, “Although Bellevue is no longer a center of maritime commerce, the village’s significant African-American maritime heritage is still evident and an important historical context that should continue to shape its future.” 

The Bellevue Master Plan focused on balancing the often competing interests of working watermen and new and old residents with the community’s historic African-American legacy. According to the Plan, Bellevue is within the County’s adopted Critical Area Boundary and designated as a Limited Development Area.

The Plan also references the Talbot County Center Design Policies regarding villages, excerpted from the Talbot County Comprehensive Plan, Chapter 9. According to 9.12, “New development and redevelopment in villages should be compatible with the existing character, in terms of land use, density, scale setbacks, mix of use, and general design to maintain their “unique sense of place’.” And added in 9.13, “New village residential development and infills should be designed to be compatible with and complement that of the adjacent or surrounding community. How does a 14-home luxury development with its own HOA align with these village policies? 

The Master Plan provided a detailed history of Bellevue, showing why preserving its cultural heritage is so meaningful and emotional. Two seafood processing facilities, owned and operated by the Turner family, were two of three African-American-owned seafood packing houses on the Eastern Shore (the other being the Coulbourne & Jewett Seafood Packing Plant in St. Michaels). Bellevue first evolved around W.H. Valiant Packing CO., which operated a large seafood and vegetable cannery and packing house from 1889 to 1946. Later, the W.A. Turner and Sons Packing CO and the Bellevue Seafood Company operated from 1945 to 1996 and 1964 to 1998, respectively. The original Bellevue housing stock was for African-American workers at these plants. There even was a general store, gas station, restaurant, and community center. 

However, here we are in the Fall of 2024, and the relationship between the community and the developer is anything but tight-knit. There has been litigation. Tensions have risen as residents sadly watched old trees get chopped down, docks and pools pop up, and the property excavation become more dramatic. All design suggestions made by the community to help better integrate the project with the community at large were rejected or ignored, and now, several luxury homes have appeared. 

Community representatives also suggested creating a short pedestrian pathway for residents from the historic Bellevue community to the Bellevue Landing, where the public Bellevue Park and boat docks are located. The path would weave its way around the perimeter of the development. The Master Plan also recommended such a path. The developer’s help in making this happen would be a meaningful olive branch to the community and public safety measure, eliminating the need for residents to walk along Bellevue Road, which is regularly lined with trucks, boat trailers zooming in and out, and cars from the ferry. However, aspects of creating this pathway have stalled and should be revived. 


The developer should also consider investing in the Bellevue Passage Museum, a new museum created by community members to preserve the Village’s important place in the African-American history on the Eastern Shore. The pathway concept has been incorporated into the Bellevue Passage Museum footprint, which would provide pedestrian access off Orchard Terrace. Imagine walking along the path, with access to the Museum and Bellevue Landing.

I know a lot of developers. Some see the big picture and find a way forward in a complex situation; others just want to bang out a bunch of homes, sell them, hand over management responsibility to an HOA, and move on. I hope the builder and the investors will do the right thing as they did regarding the name change.

The developer should meet with community representatives and find a reasonable way forward. Otherwise, when the builder packs up and leaves, the community will be divided: luxury homeowners with their HOA on one side and the greater Bellevue community on the other. If that fails, Representatives should meet directly with the Long Iron Investment Group investors, the people behind the curtain, who might be more creative in mending fences. If nothing happens, luxury home buyers interested in waterfront property should look elsewhere where true community harmony exists.

Hugh Panero, a tech and media entrepreneur, was the founder and former CEO of XM Satellite Radio. He has worked with leading tech venture capital firms and was an adjunct media professor at George Washington University. He writes about Tech and Media and other stuff for the Spy. 

Donations to support the non-profit museum can be sent to the Mid-Shore Community Foundation Attention: Bellevue Passage Museum. Or use this Museum website link 

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

Looking At The Masters: Gustav Klimt

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Internationally known artist Gustav Klimt (1862-1918) grew up in Baumgarten, a town near Vienna. His father was an engraver of gold and silver items, a occupation that made a strong impression on Gustav. Klimt studied at the Vienna College of Applied Arts, where he excelled. He and other students were assigned mural projects in newly built private and public buildings on Vienna’s Ringstrasse. When Klimt was teenager he and fellow artists began painting wall and ceiling murals in the villa built for Empress Elisabeth and in the Art History Museum. He was awarded the Emperor’s Prize for his murals in the auditorium of the Burg Theater in Vienna (1887-88). Klimt’s early paintings were influenced by art of ancient Egypt up to the Renaissance. Many were paintings of young semi-nude females representing allegorical figures. They were considered by some to be too sensual, but Klimt’s reputation grew.

“Judith I” (1901)

The art of Vienna was moving into a new phase known as the Vienna Secession. The young artists of Vienna, like others in major art academies in Europe, were rejecting the old Academy style and embracing a new and different style. When the Vienna Secession was started in 1897, Klimt was elected its first chairman. “Judith I” (1901) (34”x17”) is an example of his more decorative style, known as his “Golden Style.” The decorative gold frame was designed and made by his brother who was a goldsmith.  The subject is Judith and Holofernes, the Old Testament story of the beautiful Jewish woman who cut off the head of Holofernes, the general who was about to destroy her town. It was a popular subject for artists from the 17th Century onward.

Klimt’s figures are more sensual as a result of the gold leaf used to create the background pattern. Judith wears a diamond choker and diaphanous gown with gold patterns. Judith’s eyes are almost closed, her mouth is open, and she shares an ecstatic moment with the viewer as she presents the head of Holofernes.  

The model for Judith was his life-long lover Emile Floge (1874-1952). She was the sister of Helene Floge, who married Klimt’s brother in 1897. Klimt had many affairs during his life, resulting in six children, none with Emile. They did not live together, but the affair continued until Klimt’s death in1918. Emile modeled for many of his paintings. On her own, Emile was a fashion designer and proprietor of a popular women’s clothing store in Vienna. She provided the Viennese avant-guard with elegant fashions in the new style.  

Klimt visited Ravenna, Italy, in 1903, and he fell in love with the golden Byzantine mosaics in the 6th Century Church of San Vitale. He described the mosaics as being “of unbelievable splendor” and a “revelation.” His golden mosaic frieze decorated a room in the Vienna Secession building for the 14th exhibition. Titled “Beethoven Frieze, the work” was 7 feet tall and 112 feet long. He used gold paint, stucco, mirrors, and mother of pearl. The gold mosaic style also was used in painting the dining room walls of the Vienna Werkstatte (workshop) (1905-09) and three walls of the dining room of the Villa Stoclet in Brussels (1905-11).  

“The Kiss” (1908)

Klimt was incredibly prolific. He managed to paint many individual works despite his heavy schedule of commissions. The subjects of “The Kiss” (1908) (71’’x71’’) are considered by many art historians to be Klimt and Emile, locked in a passionate embrace. His unruly black hair is crowned by green leaves, resembling ivy, and his hands embrace her face. Her hair is decorated with flowers. She turns her face to his, eyes closed, waiting for the kiss. One of her hands circles his neck and the other holds on to his hand. Her face, shoulder, elbow, and feet are painted in flesh tones. Both figures are encased in a gold, patterned robe. His side is decorated with a variety of black rectangles representing maleness. Her side is decorated with circular patterns representing the female. Klimt made her gown partially transparent by creating a different set of circular patterns with bouquets of flowers and using the patterns to elongate and outline her back and buttocks. The couple kneel on a bed of individually painted flowers on bright green grass.

“Adele Block Bauer” (1907)

“Adele Bloch-Bauer” (1907) (55.1”x55.1’’) was one of Klimt’s last works in his “Golden style.” The painting was called the Austrian “Mona Lisa.” Klimt was a popular portrait painter among the new Jewish bourgeoise. Adele Bloch-Bauer (1881-1925) was a salon hostess and patron of the arts. 

This portrait is considered a masterpiece of his style. Adele’s large, dark eyes, blushing cheeks, and red lipstick are sensuous. The unusual position of her hands was to hide a broken finger that she found awkward. The stunning diamond choker was a wedding present from her husband. Lavish gold bracelets encircle her arm. Her gown, meant partially to reveal her shape, is designed with patterns of the all-seeing eye and golden triangles. The diaphanous outer gown contains squares with her initials A and B.

When the Nazis stole the painting from the Block-Bauer residence, it was given the name “Woman in Gold” and put on display. Adele’s diamond necklace was taken by Hermann Goering. The 2015 movie “Woman in Gold,” starring Helen Mirren and Ryan Reynolds, told the story of Maria Altmann, niece of Adele Block Bauer, who fought to retrieve the painting. “Woman in Gold” was a landmark case of restitution of Nazi plunder. The painting was purchased for $135 million from Maria Altmann in 2006 by the Neue Galerie in New York City. It hangs in the New York gallery at the wish of the Altmann family. 

“Death and Life” (1910-1911)

After his “Golden style” period, Klimt painted several allegorical paintings such as “Death and Life” (1910-1915) (71’’x79’’). They tell provocative stories. When the painting was originally exhibited in 1911 at an International Exhibition in Rome, it was titled “Death” and it won first prize. When the painting was exhibited in 1912 at the International Exhibition in Dresden, it was titled “Death and Life.” Klimt retouched the work in 1915, two years after World War I began, painting large black crosses on Death’s robe. He added more figures and brighter primary colors to the group, and he painted over the gold background with a dark gray-green. In that year his mother, with whom he still lived, died. The 1915 version of the painting is the one shown here.

Death is represented by a dark figure with a grinning skull that stares at Life. His skeletal fingers grip a red club. Life is represented by several figures from all stages of life, infancy to aged. Prominently placed is a newborn male baby surrounded by several young women, the largest female nude, probably representing the mother. The older woman with gray hair wears a blue patterned head scarf. The lovers, one a single adult male with dark hair and tanned skin, the other a nude female with pale skin and red hair, embrace. The cycle of life is represented. The group is surrounded with a pattern of brightly colored flowers and geometric designs. 

With the exception of the female just to the left of the mother figure and whose eyes are open, all appear comfortably asleep, unaware of the presence of Death. Whether or not she is looking at Death is a mystery. The 1915 revisions are often interpreted as Klimt offering hope.

“Death and Life” in Leopold Museum, Vienna

On November 15, 2022, a climate activist group threw an oily black substance on “Death and Life,” on display at the Leopold Museum in Vienna.  One protestor glued himself to the glass that covered the painting. Having tried several different ways, and for several years, to get European governments to stop drilling for oil, and having had no success, the group announced it was disbanding. The group’s message was “New oil and gas drilling is a death sentence to humanity.” Fortunately, the group always chose paintings that were under glass, so no damage was done to the paintings. 

“Bauermgarten” (1907) (43”x43’’)

“Bauermgarten” (1907) (43”x43’’) represents another source of Klimt’s inspiration: his love of rustic gardens. Klimt also loved Vienna, and he left it reluctantly for very short periods. Friends who traveled with him observed he was never so happy as when he was coming home. He would sing, “The wind is blowing briskly toward my homeland.” He made several paintings of gardens filled with daisies, poppies, roses, sunflowers, and others, all popular garden flowers, composed in triangular patterns. These paintings also were incredibly popular in his time as well as today. This painting was sold at a Sotheby’s auction in March 2017 for $59.3 million, the highest price ever paid for a Klimt painting at auction.

“Avenue in the Park of Schloss Kamer” (1912)

In addition to painting flower gardens, Klimt painted scenes near his beloved summer home in the village of Unterach, located on the south shore of Lake Attersee. “Avenue in the Park of Schloss Kammer” (1912) (43.3”x43.3”) is one of his many depictions of scenes around the Schloss Kammer castle and the Lake. A cobble stone drive leads to the yellow walls of the castle, but what dominates the painting is the avenue of tall trees along the way. Later in Klimt’s life, he experimented with realism, but he always included his decorative patterns. This scene is a kind of paradise. It is peaceful and inviting. Klimt painted for his own pleasure, but these were among his most popular and purchased paintings.

 

“Art is a line around your thoughts.” (Klimt)

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.