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A PORTRAIT OF VINCENT WHITEHEAD

 Premiering May 18 and running through July 8, and in its 89th year,
The Toledo Area Artists Exhibition
is one of the longest-running annual juried arts exhibitions in the
country. Artists from Northwest Ohio and Southeast Michigan enter
works of art in media ranging from ceramic to wood and from
watercolor to glass.

Toledo Museum of Art

2445 Monroe Street at Scottwood Avenue
The Museum is just west of Toledo's downtown business district, directly off interstate 75.
419-255-8000 or toll free 800-644-6862
Cover Section Artist
www.toledomuseum.org

THE ART-TO-ART PALETTE Cover Section 2007 Annual Winter Edition


‘Fedex Artist’ keeps on
It is late in the afternoon and the sun offers a blinding
glare to westbound travelers. Annoying to many, one man
pulls off to the side of the road, noticing a different angle of the
orange glow that lights up an old barn. He takes a still photo for later use
while admiring the alluring warmth of the setting sun, not wanting it to fade.
Another simple, beautiful sketch
is about to begin, different from the
last, even though these country
roads have been traveled and
viewed thousands of times. The
vividness and detail will need no
color or texture to inflame the
emotion portrayed by one man’s
passion and skill.
Vi ncent Whitehead is a
modest man who loves to draw.
You’ve probably seen him around
on northwest Ohio’s country roads,
delivering packages by day for
FedEx, a nationally known delivery
service, capturing photos along his
route, turning each one into distinct
variations of earth’s most pleasing
scenes, using only ball point pens.
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Born and raised in Lima, Ohio,
Vince had always been at ease with
a pencil in hand. His seventh grade
art teacher reinforced what his
parents had always known, that
Vince had a natural talent for the
visual arts. This teacher was the
first to introduce an eager young
man to the history and masters of
art in a world he knew little about.
Vince absorbed the history,
methods of drawing, oil painting,
light sources, tones and the
importance of a good beginning,
until he graduated High School in
1978.
As is the way of many talented
people, life’s activities are prone to
take president over what we know
will eventually be. Six years in the
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Air Force, a wife and family to
support became foremost in
Whitehead’s life even though he
would steal free time whenever he
could, for his joy of drawing.
A good friend and pastor of
Whitehead’s once instilled a passage
of hope into his mind, one that he
has never forgotten and uses as his
artist’s motto today. ”Good, better,
best. Never let it rest till your good is
better and your better is best.”
This artist believes that as long as
you can see a need for improvement
in life and work, you will always
strive toward that goal, with your
best always growing.
One day while traveling his daily
FedEx delivery route, a scene
captivated Vince and he pulled over
to sketch a quick beginning. Of all
days, he discovered that he
had forgotten to bring along
his #2 pencil. Not wanting to
lose the moment, he turned
over his delivery log and
grabbed an ink pen and
actually liked the feel as he
started the draft. Today,
Vince uses the Steadtler
“Triplus” ball point pens in
fine and medium points,
finding that he can get up to
ten different tonal values.
Since 1996, Whitehead has
been using mainly ink as his
medium and has been
commissioned to draw
several pieces for people,
businesses and societies of
historical landmarks, barns
and wooded areas in
2007 Annual Winter Edition
fluids and rest. Nancy took her
vacation time to nurse him back to
health.
On the third day, Nancy walked
into Sar’s bedroom to find him
doing pull-ups, sweat pouring down
his face. She resisted the urge to
reprimand him and patiently waited
until his sets were complete.
“Your teachers have put together
your homework and Mr. Johnson will be
dropping by after school later today with
the books and assignments,” said
Nancy, careful to keep the ripping
emotion out of her voice,
Sar just nodded as he fell back
into his bed, finally content that his
goal had been reached.
A bout 4 pm, Mr. Johnson
walked slowly up to the door,
not looking forward to this meeting.
“Just drop off the books, make your
apologies and get out of there,” he kept
telling himself. None of the teachers
had wanted to come to this
godforsaken neighborhood where
the crime rate was off the charts.
And besides that, the kid was just
plain strange. But Sar had never
missed a day of school and they
didn’t want to be responsible for his
graduation being in jeopardy.
Figures, he’d draw the shortest
straw.
Aunt Nancy answered the door
with a cheerful smile. Mr. Johnson
was already planning his escape, as
he smelled freshly brewed coffee.
Stepping inside the door, his fear
seemed to disintegrate. The first
thing he saw was the huge mural
that encompassed the entire living
space.
A scene unlike any he had ever
witnessed, he felt as though he had
just crossed over into another
dimension. Faces and scenes of
beauty and happiness swirled into a
theme of symmetry, continuing
around the edges of each wall,
forcing his eyes to keep retracting so
as not to miss a single detail. He
didn’t see Christmas as much as he
felt the season, twinkling tinsel,
gingerbread shapes and then,
suddenly, it was summer. Apples
floating along the ground, the sweet
tartness filling his mouth, a Mother
THE ART-TO-ART PALETTE
cat nursing four kittens, hearing
them purr and stretch. An absolute
feeling of joy and wonder filled his
soul and he felt himself catching his
breath.
“Sar likes to paint,” said Aunt
Nancy, noticing the startled look on
Mr. Johnson’s face, catching the
books ready to slide out of his arms.
“Why don’t you sit down and I’ll go get
Sar.”
But Mr. Johnson wasn’t listening
as he followed Nancy down the
narrow hallway that separated the
partitions of rooms. He felt as if he
were in a dream, amazed at the
intricate detail in each paralyzing
flowing scene. A kitchen of the
1800s, massive stone fireplace along
one wall, the flames whipping at a
pot of soup, stone etched floor, a
window presenting a beautiful large
oak just outside, so real the branches
appeared to be swaying.
The home was scantily clad with
furnishings but they were not
missed in the abundance of what
one imagined throughout this
convoluted maze of art. In fact,
decorations of any sort would have
spoiled the scenes, not even the
richest pieces able to compete.
Sar emerged from his bedroom
and saw Mr. Johnson’s look of
puzzlement.
“ I….. I’m sorry you had to bring my
homework,” said Sar, not
understanding Mr. Johnson’s
reaction. Outside of delivery people
and Aunt Nancy’s few friends, no
one came to visit them. It was a
haven, only to them, not used for
socializing, as if they had anyone to
entertain.
The history teacher looked at Sar,
dazed. “Where did you learn to paint
like this,” he whispered.
Aunt Nancy beamed, “I keep
telling Sar that he should study art. I
think he’s actually quite good.”
“Good?” said Mr. Johnson,
advancing toward the kitchen wall
where the window had been
meticulously placed. “I feel like I am
actually looking out at a meadow, I can
even smell the grass!”
He went on to say how he and
his wife were avid art collectors and
Storybook Section
that he had never seen such
precision and detail, shadows and
depth. Running up to Sar, Mr.
Johnson grabbed Sar’s hand and
began pumping it.
“You are a great artist, my boy,” he
began, “I can get you into the best
schools at no cost, introduce you to
people who will pay for your work. The
sky is the limit!”
Sar seemed pleased and a bit
embarrassed by his teacher’s
excitement but did not seem to share
in his delight. He walked to the
scenic view, gazed outside the
invisible window and sighed.
“When I look out of this window, I
see me and my Mom sitting under the
oak tree, sharing a piece of watermelon,
the birds cautiously approaching to steal
the dropped seeds.”
Sar turned toward the fireplace.
“This is where me and my Grandma
sit while she boils her vegetable soup
M
and reads books to me.”
r. Johnson looked at Nancy
for answers but she quickly
shook her head as if to say, “don’t “.
They watched as Sar walked into the
living room and followed him
slowly.
“And this is me and my Aunt
Nancy,” said Sar, proudly raising his
hand and passing it around the
mural in the main room. “I come in
here to remember and to feel the love
that she has given me. I could never do
this for anyone else. This is me, my life.
It’s very personal.”
Before Mr. Johnson could begin
an argument, Nancy thanked him
for stopping by and opened the
front door. It was painfully clear
that he did not want to leave. But he
stepped out of the door, leaving
without so much as uttering a
goodbye.
As Aunt Nancy closed the door,
she turned to watch as Sar gathered
the books that Mr. Johnson had
brought which were splayed out on
the sofa, where Aunt Nancy had
dropped them. He lifted each one
carefully and placed on a small TV
tray, largest ones on the bottom,
smallest ones on top, in complete
symmetry.
By Kate Eglan-Garton
2007 Annual Winter Edition

< Continued from previous page
What most people might perceive
as playing silly little games was
Sar’s life. Trimming off his
sandwiches into perfects circles,
creating vivid, realistic pictures in
his head, counting every step he
took, never ending on an odd
number, having complete symmetry
in his life.
Seventeen years old, living with
his great aunt in an old shoe store,
Sar didn’t feel animosity toward
mankind, no desire to keep up with
the Joneses, no expectations for the
future. Things were just the way
they were, that’s all. He knew what
other people thought of him but he
didn’t care. He could find harmony
whenever he needed to.
The abandoned Chicago
storefront building had been a
challenge. One of Nancy’s friends
had offered it to her, the rent dirt
cheap, and together, she and Sar had
turned it into home. Finding old
partitions to make walls, salvaging
abandoned pieces of furniture,
linens, dishes, along with Sar’s
knack for drawing and oil painting,
the place had a delightful charm
throughout.
S ar wasn’t a bad looking boy but
terribly shy and withdrawn.
He had short light brown hair,
perfectly parted and combed to one
side, bright green eyes that
nervously jutted around a room, and
an athletic body that the entire high
school basketball team would die
for. Sar took his exercise very
seriously and was religious not to
miss a single day. He had advanced
to three sets of twenty-five sit-ups
and pull-ups and could never do
less. Once a number was reached,
you could never go back.
Aunt Nancy arrived home from
her factory job one cold February
THE ART-TO-ART PALETTE
evening to find Sar passed out on
the floor. She placed her hand on
his forehead and felt the heat before
even touching his skin. Never one
to complain about aches and pains,
it was hard to say how long the boy
had been sick and she feared the
worst.
Sar was only five years old
when Nancy gained custody of him.
Not that she particularly wanted a
child to rear, barely able to take care
of herself, but she wouldn’t have
been able to live with herself if he
had gone to strangers. Even though
Sar had turned out to be a Godsend,
the scene from that horrible day
twelve years ago still played over
and over in her mind. She couldn’t
even begin to imagine what must
twirl around in Sar’s mind every
day since then.
H er sister, Carol, and Sar’s Mom,
Brandy, had been fighting
again. Carol was balancing her life
after a broken marriage, a full time
job that didn’t even come close to
paying the bills, in addition to
raising Sar. Brandy was always off
somewhere, trying to find herself, so
she said, usually with a new
dreamboat of a drifter. Her
occasional pop-in visits were always
a disaster. But after a couple of
hours, she would storm back to
wherever it was she came from and
things would settle down. This time
was different.
“He is my son and I will take him if I
want,” Brandy screamed, after
announcing that she and her newest
beau of two weeks, a taxi cab driver,
were going to get married and raise
Sar.
As Carol tried to calm down
Brandy, she noticed something
different about her daughter today.
Brandy appeared to have a wild,
glazed look in her eyes, an inability
to sit still, a hostile nature about her.
The autopsy would later show large
amounts of crystal meth in her
system.
Sar was always happy to see his
Mom, always secretly hoping that
she had changed but today he also
felt a strange difference and crept
out the back door when the yelling
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started. He ran to the detached
garage and hid behind his pet
rabbit’s cage. When he heard the
shots, he ran back to the house.
The police found Sar sitting
between his Mom and
Grandmother, on the kitchen floor,
lining up toothpicks in rows. When
they tried to coax him out of the
puddle of blood, he resisted.
“Not done, not done!” Sar shouted.
The police called for social services
and stared in disbelief as the young
lad finished lining up and counting
his toothpicks in ten perfect rows,
each row containing ten toothpicks.
Only then did Sar stand and calmly
announce that he was ready to leave.
Suddenly, Sar’s eyes popped
open.
“I have to finish my exercises,” said
Sar, straining to sit up.
The years had taught Nancy that
interfering with Sar’s unusual
routines was a big mistake. He had
never openly disobeyed his Aunt; in
fact, he would cook and clean
without being asked and had held a
part-time job since he was 15. But
instead of arguing with Aunt Nancy,
Sar would just quietly disappear
until, Nancy suspected, his tasks in
symmetry had been completed.
Trying to stay calm even though
worried sick, Nancy said, “Yes, you
need to finish your exercises, right after
we get home from the doctor.”
The small woman helped her
nephew up from the floor and into
the car where they headed for an all
night clinic.
T wo days later, Sar still hadn’t
finished his exercises, not even
knowing that it was another day.
Walking pneumonia, the doctor had
said, keep him down for a week and
with that, had stuck Sar’s hip with
the largest needle Nancy had ever
seen. It had been quite a chore to
roll him out of the car once they
returned home, but like everything
else, together they did it.
A hospital was where he should
be, Nancy kept telling herself but the
people at the clinic knew her
financial situation and insisted that
Sar was in excellent physical shape
and just needed medicine, lots of
2007 Annual Winter Edition
northwestern Ohio.
Between Two Trees is
a tribute to the large Oak
and the Eastern, North
American Spruce,
protecting the family barn
in Delphos, Ohio. The
barn is gone now but not
its memory.
A favorite of Vince’s is
Conkles Hollow, West
Rim Trail. Ballpoint pen
on acid free 100 lb. heavy
cover stock portrays the
upper trail at Conkles
Hollow in the Hocking
Hills area near Old Man’s
Cave. You can feel the
blissful emotion pouring
from the scene, knowing
that something special lies
within. A private get away
spot for Vince and his wife
prompted this drawing, presenting
Mrs. Whitehead this treasure on
his in an 11”x17” ballpoint pen on
acid free 100 lb. heavy cover stock.
This engine has now been fully
Vince nt D. Whitehead has
come to this conclusion, “If they took
their anniversary.
restored and is owned by the Fort my pens and paper then I would find a
Allen County Memorial Hall,
Wayne Railroad Historical Society, burnt stick and a flat rock but I must
a historic landmark was
housed at New Haven, Indiana, draw. It is in me and must come out.”
commissioned by the Historical
making regular runs under its own On his correspondence, the
Landmarks Society of Allen County,
power. There are 250 Limited signature says it best, “Keep on
depicts a preserved site that only
Editions of Whitehead’s prints, creating”. Instilled in his mind and
Vince and a radiograph pen and ink
signed and numbered, available to in his heart a long time ago, he has
on acid free velum can capture.
the public. learned to live by his own motto,
The Lima Built Berkshire 765
features a captured moment of the
Other pieces shown on the next
page include Ainsworth Road
“Good, better, best.
past when a small boy and his
grandfather witnessed the last run of
Shed, Metropolitan Block, Kings
Bridge, Ludwig Mill in Sight, Red
Never let it rest
sister 779, instilling a love of steam
engines and trains. Vince
Bud Cabin and the Wellman till your best
Family Home in Delphos, Ohio.
immortalizes this vivid memory of
A love of trees and foliage has is better
encouraged Whitehead to create a
section in his
and your
website dedicated to
the real ‘how to’ of
better is best!”
bringing these
images to such a
brilliant light. Visit
the website at
www.rural-route-
one.net for first
hand knowledge on
how the quality of
drawing a natural
setting can make or
break a good
portrait.
THE ART-TO-ART PALETTE Cover Section 2007 Annual Winter Edition
 Sar chewed off a tiny piece of crust from his sandwich that was filled with
creamy peanut butter and honey. Around and around he went until the
crusty exterior was completely gone. Next, he drank exactly one half glass
of milk, knowing this because of the line placed there with a permanent
black marker.
Staring out of the imaginary window that he had carefully painted on the
once dark and dreary kitchen wall, he saw colorful birds flying over a vast
green meadow, stopping only to perch and sing from the branches of a large
oak.
Quirky. That’s what his handful of friends called him. Not quite right, was
his Mother’s version. But then, what could you expect from a woman who
would name her only child, Sar Dane, thinking it was a sign of royalty, only
to be misconstrued by everyone as Sardine.
> Continued next page

THE ART-TO-ART PALETTE Cover Section 2007 Annual Winter Edition THE ART-TO-ART PALETTE Storybook Section 2007 Annual Winter Edition