You never know who is going to show up at our little Saturday gallery at the Pavilion of the delightful five-star Farmers Market in Ithaca, New York. A few weeks ago, early in the morning, before we were even open, a lovely Chinese woman stopped by. She recognized Jim's work--and even remembered his name-from a long time ago, the time of our family's sojourn in Taiwan in the early 1980's. At that time, this very welcome visitor had been studying fine arts at the National Taiwan University, which is where she met Jim. Later, the world being as small, she moved to Ithaca, where she had acquired a painting of shrimp that Jim had painted at a demonstration of Chinese brush painting at Cornell's Johnson Museum of Art.
Her visit brought a flood of memories. Our apartment near the university. The little restaurant where we feasted on student food. The little alley at the end of our street occupied by old men who kept (better to say, pampered) singing birds and brought them to the park to engage in contests of voice.
A few days later, my visitor sent me a photograph of her shrimp painting, and it is beautiful! How many pieces of art Jim sent off into the world while he was with us!
I have one of Jim's shrimp paintings, shown above. Maybe someday soon I will put prints of it up for sale at our little online gallery, which you are welcome to visit.