Educator

The Distinguished Educator has attained the highest standards of academic achievement and has demonstrated interest in and capability of furthering the Society’s educational programs. Past Distinguished Educators include Murray Tinkelman 1999, Marshall Arisman and Phil Hays 2000, Barron Storey and Tom Allen 2001, David Passalaqua 2002, Ben Eisenstate 2003, Howard Pyle and David Macaulay 2004, Rudy Gutierrez 2005, Harvey Dunn and Alice "Bunny" Carter 2006, Robert Weaver and Barbara Bradley, 2007, Burne Hogarth and Vincent Di Fate, 2008

2009 Distinguished Educators in the Arts

TOM SGOUROS
Tom Sgouros talks to me all the time, and he doesn’t even know it. I was a student at the Rhode Island School of Design, and it is his voice I recall most often when I am working now. What he had to say - whether in history of illustration, editorial illustration, studio drawing, or my independent study - was always illuminating and funny. His words have been touchstones I return to again and again.

In studio drawing, he would give us a semester-long assignment to work on between classes. We were to take one object and draw it over and over for the entire twelve weeks. He wanted to see “mountains” of drawings. Well, it didn’t take long for us to reach the “I have to draw this again?” stage. But that was when it got interesting. We had to push beyond the obvious and find new ways to approach that object on the page - to look beyond the object itself and really explore composition and design within the rectangle of the paper.

Tom’s enthusiasm about the process of art is contagious. When I recall what he said, it’s not just his words I hear, but also the quality of his voice. As much now as when I was a student, that excitement makes me want to get to work.
David Wiesner

In 1965 all sophomore architecture students at RISD were required to take drawing. It was a transforming experience for me and may very well have sown the seeds that would eventually lead me away from that noble profession and into the world of illustration and books. I’m not saying any drawing course would have had such a life altering effect, but I was lucky enough to find myself in one of Tom Sgouros’ classes. The primary focus was on drawing the figure. Anyone familiar with my handling of the human form in my early books will quickly surmise that I spent as little time as possible in front of a model. I was, with Tom’s blessing under a bridge somewhere or on one of Providence’s many street corners drawing another landscape. What mattered to Tom was that we were engaged enough by whatever was in front of us so that we would actually think about the marks we were making and their placement on the paper. To encourage us further, Tom would drag in prints of drawings by Degas, etchings by Pyranesi and photographs of Cartier Bresson among others.

Because of their wit, wisdom and eloquence, I remember many of Tom’s words, which is a good thing since I probably couldn’t fully appreciate them at the time. The insight he offered verbally has been continually reinforced by the integrity of his example. As Tom gradually moved away from illustration and into painting, his determination to maintain the highest level of accomplishment in spite of the cruel assault of macular degeneration, has simply added to that resonant wisdom a profound inspiration.
David Macaulay

THOMAS FOGARTY
(1873 - 1938)

Now two generations past, Fogarty’s work captured the core values of an American Society bookended by world war and economic depression. There is no greater example of this than in his illustration of Jacob August Riis’ Making of an American, or Sailing Alone Around the World, Captain Joshua Slocum’s account of his solo circumnavigation of the world aboard his 40 foot Spray, or his lifelong friendship and illustrative collaboration with Pulitzer Prize winner Ray Stannard Baker’s alter ego, David Grayson. Fogarty was a prolific master having provided countless illustrations in not only some of the most popular books of the period but also in periodicals still popular today including Harper’s, Ladies Home Journal and Good Housekeeping.

In the great tradition of instructors at the Art Students League, Fogarty stands among the greatest. While not a seeker of publicity, Fogarty quietly but firmly encouraged his students to seek avenues where they would find their greatest success. His impact on this nation’s illustrative culture extends in the work of his students. As with many great instructors, Fogarty often placed his responsibility to his students above that of his own ambitions to ensure an ongoing and predestined value in the work of the next generation. When we think of Fogarty the teacher, we simply have to ask ourselves; where would our images of Southern gentility be without Walter Biggs? Where would the great depictions the Pacific Naval Fleet have been without McClelland Barclay or for that matter, where would we be as a nation without Norman Rockwell? Never in the history of American Illustration was there a time when the great illustrative masters fanned the flames of great illustrative talent. His teaching as in his work was as much valued for its artisanship as it was for the cultural values that it instilled.

While a native of New York City, Fogarty was also part of the great tradition of artists who spent summers working in the finger lakes of New York capturing the elegant simplicity of life in Bristol Springs and Naples on Lake Canandaigua. Many summers were spent working in his studio adjacent to the family’s beloved summer cottage, the Wigwam, where he created many of his most famous images in oil and pen and ink. In the fall, the family would return to New York City for him to continue his teaching at The League and his work for many of the most renowned publishing houses of the time.

In 1938, Fogarty died but not before passing his great talent onto his two sons Alexander, a composer, and Thomas, Jr. who followed in his father’s footsteps to become one of the most beloved instructors at the Art Students League and a great American impressionist of his day.
Tom Fogarty

FRANK REILLY
(1906 - 1967)

A newspaper columnist once wrote, “Frank Reilly is the greatest art teacher in the country”. Wherever he was teaching, Mr. Reilly’s classes were so popular, they filled to beyond capacity. With the model completely obscured, students in back rows drew and painted from easels in the line directly ahead of them. His ability to thoroughly present concept, technique and procedure, were both legendary and instrumental to his success as a teacher. It was once related that, “Mr. Reilly could lecture for six hours on how to paint a bubble in a glass of beer.”

However, the ability to inspire is truly a gift. In this regard, Frank Reilly’s unselfishness is unparalleled. Although he enjoyed a distinguished career as an illustrator and innovator of artists materials, it is possible that the most important part of his life was teaching. Mr. Reilly could easily be considered one of the most influential artists of the Twentieth Century, so impressive is the roster of his former students. Born in the heart of New York City, Frank J. Reilly, was the son of a Broadway actor, and stage manager. This early exposure to the value of rehearsal and preparation undoubtedly had a lasting impression on the young Frank Reilly. Years later, as a pupil of Art Students League co-founder, Frank Vincent DuMond, Reilly would carefully chart and record his instructor’s every brush stroke. He studied for a year and a half with DuMond, and another three with renowned anatomist, George Bridgeman.

As Bridgeman’s successor at the ASL, Frank Reilly taught drawing, painting, picture making, and color abstraction. He was a meticulous perfectionist, who quickly became associated with success. Reilly witnessed the passing years of the Golden Age of Illustration Art, but recognized that there was an even larger landscape of assignments for well trained artists that were prepared to work hard and approach art as a profession. In this regard, his success was nothing less than monumental.
Kent Steine