Paul G. Anderson, Noted A, 72
DGH
Paul G. Anderson died of cardiac failure October 6, 2005, at his
Gloucester, Massachusetts, home, at the age of 72.
In his third-floor walkup studio apartment on Huntington Avenue, across
the street from Symphony Hall, artist Paul Gerard Anderson would often
work at his canvas for 48 hours straight before collapsing on the bed.
"Paul led a real artist's life. He was a true, pure, 100 percent artist
guy," said his brother Richard, of Napa, California. "There was nothing
untrue about him. He was pursuing a calling."
Mr. Anderson was a widely exhibited artist who used his passion for art
to inspire others as a teacher in the Boston, Massachusetts, area.
A stocky man with a mane of black hair not yet totally gray, which he
often cut himself, he dressed like a Bohemian artist, except for formal
occasions, said his stepson, Timothy King of Pine Plains, New York. "He
was quite a character with a terrific sense of humor," King said.
Mr. Anderson told his family little about the two years he spent in the
Army's Security Agency, Counterintelligence Division, in Japan and
Korea in the mid-1950s. His brother knew only this: "Paul was on the
lookout for messages that flew around the world. He was kind of a Morse
Code expert," he said. "He was such an expert that he could talk in
Morse Code. When he and his colleagues were on coffee breaks, they
would talk to one another in dots and dashes."
While in Japan, Mr. Anderson also studied Japanese art and became
skilled in woodcuts, which he later used in his work and to make his
Christmas cards.
His passion for art began early in life, his brother said. The oldest
of three sons, Mr. Anderson was born in Boston to Gerard and Katherine
(Kearns) Anderson. His parents named him for Paul Revere, because he
was born on Patriots Day. He grew up in South Boston.
Mr. Anderson was an altar boy at St. Monica's Church, along with former
state senator William M. Bulger, Richard Anderson said. Mr. Anderson
was so studious that his family thought he would be a priest. When he
was about 11, his brother said, he "became entranced by art" and opted
to attend Brighton High School because of its art curriculum. He also
played hockey there.
After he graduated from high school, Mr. Anderson enlisted in the Army
and was assigned "with other bright guys," his brother said, to
counterintelligence. Out of the service in 1956, Mr. Anderson studied
to be a medical illustrator by drawing the human body from cadavers at
the morgue at Boston City Hospital and at Harvard Medical School, his
brother said.
Under the GI Bill, he enrolled at Tufts University and earned a joint
bachelor of science degree from Tufts and the School of the Museum of
Fine Arts in 1962. He earned his master of fine arts degree in painting
from the Massachusetts College of Art.
For 11 years, Mr. Anderson taught color and drawing at the college's
evening continuing education program. A colleague, Nancy Cusack, said
he taught drawing and color there and ''was beloved" by his students.
At the end of each semester, he would host a lobster bake for his
students in Gloucester.
Over the years, some of Mr. Anderson's paintings have been exhibited at
the Museum of Fine Arts, at the Archives of American Art at the
Smithsonian Institution, a New York gallery, and Boston City Hall, his
family said. In 1984, he received the Massachusetts Council of Arts and
Humanities Award -- now the Massachusetts Cultural Council -- in
painting.
About 30 years ago, Mr. Anderson studied privately with nationally
known Cambridge painter Hyman Bloom, and was influenced for a time by
his many anatomical paintings, said Paul Rahilly, another colleague at
the Massachusetts College of Art. At one time, he said, Mr. Anderson
painted "dozens and dozens of mouths."
Rahilly described Mr. Anderson as "a great companion.
"If you met him on the street," Rahilly said, "you might talk to him
for an hour about almost everything. He was well respected by his
colleagues as well as by his students."
At various times, Mr. Anderson also taught art at adult education
classes, at the old Vesper George School of Art in Boston, a school of
commercial arts, at Bunker Hill Community College, and Northeastern
University.
Mr. Anderson remained a bachelor for many years, and had few material
needs, his brother said. "I think art was Paul's priority in life," he
said.
At the age of 52, Mr. Anderson had a major heart attack, his brother
said, and at 58, he had a stroke. But, he said, Mr. Anderson "fought
back. Paul always had a good sense of well-being," he said. "I don't
think I ever saw him angry or heard him raise his voice."
In 1996, at the age of 62, Mr. Anderson married Hilda Rice Ayer of
Gloucester. Together, they designed the Ayer-Anderson Foundation in
Gloucester, a nonprofit community center that offered swimming and yoga
therapy for the disabled, the elderly, neighboring schools, and nursing
homes. The facility has since closed.
In recent years, the couple enjoyed an observatory on their property,
and Mr. Anderson threw himself into the study of astronomy, his brother
said.
Besides his wife, his brother, and his stepson, Mr. Anderson leaves
another brother, James of Quincy, Massachusetts; two other stepsons,
Daniel Curtis of Beverly, Massachusetts, and John S. King Jr. of
Manchester-by-the-Sea; and a stepdaughter, Claudia King of Falmouth,
Maine.
Boston Globe