Part of the Fractured Memories paintings series that I’m working on includes little 6″x6″ oil paintings of things that remind me of my dad. As his own world view fractured and he became able to only see pieces of it, so did, in some ways, my view of who my dad was. I have little snapshots in my head of who he was and what he loved. So my goal was to do a series of small fragments of things that represent him so that even people who didn’t know him would have an inkling of the things that made him him. For the next few Thursdays, I’ll try to remember to post a new one. Here’s what we’ll start out with:

My dad was a musician and played the clarinet and saxophone with his swing band, Nick Page and The Red Hot Smoothies. They mostly played events around Charlottesville, but his identity was very much tied in to his role as a band leader and musician. The Smoothies still exist and play a few gigs here and there with the remaining members and new members as needed. Dad’s go-to guitar player, Tom Harbeck, posted on Facebook a couple days ago that he was playing a gig with the Smoothies and someone came up at the end of the night to compliment the band and asked who the sax player used to be. Tom told him, “Nick Page” and the man smiled and said, “Yes, that’s the one.” Glad to know he’s still remembered even though he hasn’t played a gig in about 5 years. So, with that in mind, here are two paintings that give snapshots of who my dad used to be: