Paint and Metal

Klaus and I completed our trip with a Sunday visit to the Brandywine River Museum at Chadds Ford, PA, and a Monday stop at the Wendell August Forge at Grove City.

The Brandywine River Museum serves as a major repository for the Wyeth Family's art — the artists being N.C., Andrew, and Jamie.  N.C. and Andrew spent most of their lives at Chadds Ford, west of Philadelphia.  Jamie grew up at Chadds Ford, but now lives and works in Maine.  The family home and studios are now part of the Museum's holdings.

Klaus at the Brandywine River Museum.

I first encountered Wyeth art as a child while reading books illustrated by N.C.  His son, Andrew, became one of the most celebrated (and, by some, berated) American artists of the 20th century.  Andrew is a representational painter working mainly in watercolor or tempura, but he is more fairly   considered an abstract painter.  The objects he portrays so realistically serve as emotional metaphors.

For example, in one of the Museum's galleries I found Andrew Wyeth's Spring, painted in 1978.  An old man lies on his back on a hillside of brown stubble.  Spring-Man is shown emerging from snow, just as spring emerges from the snows of winter.  We usually think of springtime as young and vibrant, but Wyeth's season is already old, even ancient.  His eyes are closed, too.  Is Spring-Man sleeping?  Is he dead?  In any case, Wyeth's Spring is no lighthearted festival of daffodils, cherry blossoms, and butterflies.

After a couple hours at the Museum Klaus and I drove from Chadds Ford to Grove City in northwestern Pennsylvania, and the next morning found our way to the Wendell August Forge.  This claims to be the oldest continuously operating metalworking forge in the U.S., and was established in 1923.  My memory is not clear, but I believe I shopped here many years ago; a Wendell August aluminum serving tray may be packed away in a box somewhere in my basement!  Check our their web site here.

A serving tray by the Forge's craftsmen.

This was just the place to purchase wedding gifts for Klaus' son Daniel who wed Fanny just before Klaus flew here to the U.S., and for Sharon and Attila's daughter and son-in-law.  Then we travelers headed across Ohio and north into Michigan.  I left Klaus at Williamston, where he continued his visit with high school friends, and in due course I found myself back at Presque Isle.  It was a delightful trip with an excellent traveling companion, and for me, in so many ways, a sentimental journey back to where I spent much of my boyhood. •••