A Jack Lewis Print, with Our Thanks to You!

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]For our Annual Appeal, we are excited to offer a beautiful Jack Lewis Print to everyone who donates $50 or more by our June 30, 2019 deadline! Read below about this prolific artist. And click here now to contribute to Heart of Biddeford!

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Here are three important facts to know about Jack Lewis – he loved being with people, he respected everyone and he enjoyed hard, physical work. That’s a lot of what attracted him to paint in the Biddeford-Saco area. He told me he could look at the mills and feel the work that had been accomplished within those walls. Already in his 80s and financially secure, he and his wife Dot moved from Delaware to York in 1998 to be close to their two daughters, but he didn’t enjoy being in York. An amazingly prolific painter – his artwork numbers in the thousands of pieces— but he didn’t enjoy painting in York or Kennebunk. He wanted to be where people put in physical labor.

You might not believe this if you knew just some of his history. His friends included artist N.C. Wyeth, Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglass and former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt. He has an art degree from Rutgers and did graduate work at New York University, even being a Fulbright Exchange Teacher in Scotland in 1955.

But where did this 6’3”, Don Quixote-like man work? As a young man during the Depression, he captured the work done by members of the CCC (Civilian Conservation Corps) as they tried to control mosquitoes in the Delaware marshes. Those were hot, humid, buggy summers. He enjoyed the water, but he didn’t paint large yachts or rich people, instead focusing on the working watermen in Delaware and Maryland. Jack constantly worked with people. His adopted hometown of Bridgeville, Delaware has a number of murals and he worked on all of them, but he did so with other townspeople. He wanted the murals to be the work of many people and he just kind of guided them in his friendly, persistent but never condescending way. He wanted others to enjoy art and their own creativity so he taught in public schools, with art leagues and the inmates at the Delaware State Prison.

These three works capture part of Biddeford’s and Saco’s spirit. First, he painted the view of Saco Island into Biddeford, making sure to include part of the Saco mills, but also part of Biddeford’s architecture and the steeple atop St. Andre’s Church. Next, he painted what he called the “Twin Towers” of Biddeford – again you have the mill building looking strong and powerful. Finally, he did Saco’s City Hall.

Please notice that all three paintings have a bicyclist – that’s common in his work and a mode of transportation he preferred over cars. All of the paintings have at least a half-dozen people in them. Jack was always about people – painting them, entertaining them with his always-present harmonica and accordion and just laughing with them.

High grade, acid-free paper was used for these prints. They are numbered and all signed personally by Jack Lewis, who died in August 2012 just weeks before his hundredth birthday.

Submitted by David Flood
February 26, 2013

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