| Charles Charlie Ware, artist, pianist, mystic and self described rustic died in San Francisco in September of 2005. He lived his life in complete devotion to his art, at least once he recovered from a long bout of drinking all else be damned.
A great story teller, Charlie was a man who defined his world through his lifes story. In World War II he was in Paris before most U.S. troops reached the city. The soldiers were on orders not to enter the city but Charlie needed a drink so he got into the city and found a bar. As a medical orderly during the war he did not see front line action but once a sergeant just back from the front came demanding replacements for his unit. He turned on Charlie and said You there, come with me! Charlie looked around then ran like hell. Later, when his unit was occupying Innsbruck, Austria, he painted a mural in the mess hall using house paints and kerosene.
Upon returning from the war, he found his father had sold his farmland in Santa Rosa, California. The idyllic youth on the farm was gone and Charlie returned to the California School of Fine Arts, (now the Art Institute,) but he didnt last long. Before the war he had been a star student winning a prestigious award for draftsmanship, but after the war the school had changed and Charlie didnt take to the new environment.
He left school and worked as a sign painter, while living in bars in North Beach, paying for drinks with paintings of barroom nudes and patron portraits. He rode the rails in the Southwest, being chased out of towns by local sheriffs. He ended up in New York for a stint, painting signs, living in flophouse hotels, all the while making his art with a style his own, divorced entirely from the currents of the day. |
