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Joe Summerford
October 22, 1987
More than twenty years ago a young painter whose work I knew but whom I had never met came to see me at The American University. He later joked that the meeting went something like this. He said I'm Robert D'Arista and I said hello, I know your painting and like it. Will you come and teach for us? While the formalities may have been somewhat more complex than this, the fact is that he did come to teach at The American University, first as an adjunct faculty member, then as a full time instructor and ultimately as a full professor and Chairman of the Department. That meeting was one of the luckiest days I, or the Art Department, ever had, for Robert D'Arista was not only an inspired painter, but he was one of the world's great teachers. Thus began the long association and friendship which I treasure. His death leaves a void in my life and in that of hundreds of others that can never be filled, for he was a uniquely gifted human being. It is with much sorrow and an humble sense of inadequacy that I attempt to assess the influence and meaning of such a life.
Because it is perhaps easier to understand the professional brilliance of Bob as a painter and teacher, I would start with that. I have known no other person so intelligent and quick-witted. This is not praise, it is fact. From that intelligence arose not only the singularly direct line of inquiry that guided Bob's own painting but the imposing synthesis of ideas he brought to his students in demonstrating the essential problems of art. He was charismatic as a teacher but that gift of grace was created from a solid foundation of knowledge, experience and perception. He was a born teacher. He loved to instruct, he loved to demonstrate, he loved to weave his way through the intricacies of ideas and techniques of painting to the clear conscious act of doing. In short, he was inspired and he brought this well of understanding to all who would listen. His influence on students was profound and transforming.
He was, however, much more than a splendid painter and teacher, he was a man whose relentless intelligence illuminated all that he encountered. He was as astute a political, economic or social observer as he was an observer of the art world. His opinions on a great diversity of subjects were dazzling in their ability to cut through cant and pin down with exactitude the real problem or solution. Such rectitude might have been intimidating, except for a quality he possessed which alleviated this. He truly cared for his friends, neighbors and associates in a most unaffected way. Errors he could not have forgiven himself, he allowed in others and he did not ask that we be either brilliant or scintillating. Such endowments of mind and talent and wit which might easily have resulted in being highly selective in one's acquaintances were assumed with a grace and modesty that placed no barriers to friendship. There was a quality he had, hard to define, but which gave him the unusual ability to be absorbed in whatever issue or circumstance that arose without imposing on it a pejorative sense of scale. He seemed to walk free of that illusion we so often have of either being in charge of what we will concern ourselves with or of being too important to have to concern ourselves with what we encounter. This gave him often an objectivity which we imputedly seek but seldom find.
Still, the quintessential Robert D'Arista is not to be found in his brilliance, his talent or in his objectivity, but rather in the love he had for his family and friends. This was absolute and inviolate. His world was built on the permanence of this love. He was distrustful of organizations, institutions, governments and parties. His allegiance was not to any of these but to the love he shared with wife, children, his larger family and friends. In return he was loved by family, scores of students, associates and friends who found in this proud, independent, scrupulous man an unremitting source of affection, mutual trust and shared belief. We mourn him together. We shall not seek his like again.
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