Ernest Hemingway
Over the years, except for required reading of The Old Man and the Sea, I avoided Papa Hemingway, turning instead to foreign writers like Goethe, Dostoyevski, Camus, Balzac, and the many modern Americans like Vonnegut, Mailer and Robbins.
But it’s hard to avoid a legend, especially after I decided to paint Havana and traveled there “under the radar” in 2009 with my wife and two friends. Along with the crumbling buildings and the ubiquitous 1950 cars, Hemingway’s presence seemed to be everywhere, and after visiting his home on the outskirts of the City, I became entranced with his persona.
I painted Hemingway in his living room and on his boat, Pilar, which is dry-docked in his former tennis court. We visited his favorite bars and heard the stories as legendary as his being.
That led to a reading of For Whom the Bell Tolls and a few biographies, and a re-revisit with The Old Man and the Sea, better understood at 60 than at 20. It also brought me into the charms of this larger than life man and the fragile sturdiness of his being and his prose.
So here he is in paint! My wife says his head’s too big. I say, “Yes it was!”