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<text>
<title>
(1950s) Presents from Grandma:Grandma Moses
</title>
<history>Time-The Weekly Magazine-1950s Highlights</history>
<article>
<source>Time Magazine</source>
<hdr>
TIME Magazine
December 28, 1953
Presents from Grandma
</hdr>
<body>
<p> In the sunny front room of a trim ranch house in Upper New
York State, a sprightly little old lady sat working one day last
week, an array of paint tubes on the table in front of her.
Through the window she could see the fallow corn and tomato
fields falling away to the Hoosier River, which curves
northwest toward the hamlet of Eagle Bridge (pop. 250).
Sycamores edged the riverbank; the hills beyond were quilted
with thick-ranked birch and maple trees and patches of frosty
pasture land. Anna Mary Robertson Moses--better known around
the globe as "Grandma Moses"--sketched in the line of distant
hills on a piece of white-coated Masonite. Then she dipped her
brush--worn down to the barest bristle--in a can lid of
turpentine and rubbed it on the mouth of a tube of burnt umber.
</p>
<p> Peering through her spectacles, chatting as she worked, she
added some ungainly vertical strokes of brown in the right
foreground, explaining: "this is a butternut tree way down
yonder by the river. I used to go down and gather the nuts."
She smeared green on the brush and began daubing in leaves.
"This is what I like this brush for--you can make leaves so
easy with it. Now I'll put on some yellowish green, and whitish
green like you see on the undersides when the wind blows them."
</p>
<p> Pointing to the center of the panel, she announced:
"There'll be an old mill there, and I guess I'll have some oxen
goin' to the mill with a load of grain." Tapping her forehead,
she added: "I can see the whole picture right here."
</p>
<p> The Oldtimy Things. In the years since she first started
painting these rosy visions of her imagination, Grandma Moses
has earned a unique place in the hearts of millions, and in the
history of American art. Her paintings (more than 1,500 by her
own count) have been shown in more than 160 U.S. exhibitions,
and in five one-man shows abroad. She is represented in nine
American museums and in Vienna's State Gallery; hers is the
only "Ecole Americaine" picture hanging in Paris' Museum of
Modern Art. Grandma's originals--priced at $150 to $3,000 each--hang on the walls of such discriminating collectors as Mrs.
Albert D. Lasker, Katharine Cornell and Thomas J. Watson.
Reproductions of her work have entered thousands of less famed
American homes, along with Grandma Moses china, fabrics, tiles,
and, most of all, Christmas cards. Altogether some 48 million
of her cards have been sold in the U.S. Next year, for the first
time, they will also be printed in Vienna and distributed in
15 European countries.
</p>
<p> The secret of Grandma's success lies partly in her back-
door approach to painting. Most painters make a great display
of devoting their lives to art. Grandma Moses, who did not even
think of painting seriously until she was 76, devotes her art
to her life. It is commemoration, celebration and thanks for the
blessings of her many fruitful years. The results are as cheery,
nostalgic, yet common-sensical as Grandma herself. Says she: "I
like to paint oldtimy things--something real pretty. Most of
them are daydreams, as it were." Then she smiles and adds
reflectively: "I will say that I have did remarkable for one of
my years and experience."
</p>
<p> Varnish and Hemlock. Last week Grandam was busily preparing
for her own 94th Christmas. She had sent out some 400 cards,
penning "Grandma Moses" on each with slow, even strokes of her
gnarled hand. Most of her cards went to people who had sent her
one the year before. She had carefully clipped the return
address from each envelope, and saved it for this Christmas.
Some of the cards she sent were reproductions of her paintings,
but many were cheaper ones she bought at a church benefit.
Grandma frugally cut in two the folding cards with pictures on
both parts.
</p>
<p> Grandma has decided to have a goose this Christmas, and of
course a Christmas tree. One of her great-grandsons--probably
eleven-year-old Tom--will go out and cut down a hemlock for
her. On Christmas Eve, choral singers will come to her door, and
Grandma will give them candy or prunes. Next morning she will
have presents for all her 19 great-grandchildren--small
trinkets she has saved over the year.
</p>
<p> Thinking of Christmas always reminds Grandma of "the smell
of hemlock and the smell of varnish." Hemlock is for all the
Christmas trees of years past; varnish is for the shining toys.
Grandma's main present to her own children at Christmas was
always an old hobbyhorse, repainted and left by Kris Kringle
each year. Originally it had been dapple-grey, but it returned
year after year repainted in all shades and hues.
</p>
<p> In those days the Christmas tree was decorated with strings
of popcorn and "cat-stairs" made of colored paper. Amidst the
branches would shine a few oranges--a wonderful treasure.
There would also be a knife, a comb, or a jew's-harp for the
children, along with the hobbyhorse.
</p>
<p> Hog-killing traditionally came just before Christmas, and
that meant big, juicy spareribs and sausage cakes. "We used to
tell people, `Come and see us during the Christmas.' Why, we'd
keep the table set with plates, ready for anybody to come in and
eat, until New Year's." Says Grandma: "Christmas is not just one
day."
</p>
<p> Back in the Meadows. Grandma's first Christmas was spent
"back in the green meadows and wild woods on a farm in
Washington County," not far from her present home. She was one
of ten children of a frugal farm family. Her ancestry was
"Scotch, Irish, English, French and Indian, and," says Grandma,
"that's a good combination, isn't it?" She also takes gentle
pride in the fact that one of her great-grandfathers fought in
the American Revolution and left a powder horn with the
inscription:
</p>
<qt>
<l>Hezekiah King.</l>
<l>Ticonderoga. Feb. 24th 1777</l>
<l>Steal not this horn for fear of shame</l>
<l>For on it is the owner's name.</l>
</qt>
<p> Grandma's earliest artistic effort was painting paper
dolls (with her mother's bluing for the eyes and grape juice
for the lips) and making dresses for them of colored paper. One
winter her father was ill and passed the time painting a
landscape around the walls of a room. Little Anna Mary "got
into" the paints. She remembers making "some `very pretty
lambscapes,' as my brothers said I called them," on scraps of
slate, wood and glass. "Father would say, `Oh, not so bad.' But
Mother was more practical, and thought that I could spend my
time other ways."
</p>
<p> Among the "other ways" were ordinary household chores, plus
candlemaking, soapmaking and dressmaking. "Little girls did not
go to school much in the winter," Grandma recalls, "owing to the
cold and not warm enough clothing." Therefore she got only
"through the Sixth Reader."
</p>
<p> The cold did not stop the children's play. Remembering
those days in her autobiography, she exulted: "Wintertime!
When zero stands at 25 or 30, when we cannot deny the pleasure
of skating til we have bumped heads and bleedy noses, and the
ice is like glass. Oh, what joy and pleasure as we get together,
to go for the Christmas tree, what air castles we build as we
slide down the hill, who can rebuild what we see on that
Christmas tree. Oh, those days of childhood!"
</p>
<p> To the Ridgepole. Even in those days, playing with her
brothers, Grandma made a habit of excelling. "If they'd climb
up a tree," she says. "I'd climb higher. They weren't goin' to
outdo me. If they'd climb to the eaves of a house, I'd climb to
the ridgepole."
</p>
<p> Grandma's childhood was brief. "When twelve years of age,"
she recalls. "I left home to earn my own living as what then was
called a hired girl. This was a grand education for me, in
cooking, housekeeping, in moralizing and mingling with the
outside world." After 15 years of this education she met and
married a farmhand named Thomas Salmon Moses. She remembers,
with the certainty of true love, that he was "a wonderful man,
much better than I am."
</p>
<p> In her autobiography, Grandma gives a memorable description
of her wedding outfit: "A going-away costume of a very dark
green dress, and jacket the same, a hat, the same, trimmed with
a pink feather. The first thing I had on was a chemise, then my
corsets, a corset waist, a pair of pantsies, a little flannel
skirt, the bustle, a white shirt, then the dress. The dress was
made with a skirt lining and wigging stitched on up to the
knees, and the dress cloth went over that, a long skirt reaching
the floor. Then an over-skirt tucked up on the sides and the
top. Long stockings, black, and high-buttoned shoes...Then
I had a stiff high collar and white linen cuffs. My dress was
all braided in the front, and the long jacket I wore, that was
also braided. We bought the braid in patterns. My gloves were
tan-colored, doe skin, they called them. And then, the ring."
</p>
<p> Some Sit Down. "I believed when we started out," says
Grandma, "that we were a team and I had to do as much as my
husband did, not like some girls, they sit down, and then
somebody has to throw sugar at them."
</p>
<p> With $600 in savings, the young couple traveled south and
rented a farm in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia. In that
valley, Grandma bore ten children and raised the five that
survived birth. There, too, she supplemented the family income
by making butter and potato chips (a novelty in those times) for
sale to the neighbors.
</p>
<p> After 18 years in the South, the Moses family moved north
again to Eagle Bridge, N.Y. and began a dairy farm there. The
children grew up and married. In 1927, Grandma's husband died.
</p>
<p> Two of her sons had started nearby farms of their own;
Grandma's youngest stayed on with her. The grandchildren,
and then great-grandchildren, gave her increasing pleasure. She
occupied herself with making worsted pictures (of yarn drawn
through netting) until arthritis made handling the needle too
difficult.
</p>
<p> Says Grandma: "I used to wrap my hands up in scarves and
lay them on a chair beside the bed on account of the aching,
just like a toothache. Then, one night I got desperate, so I got
up and hunted the doctor book, the `Family Adviser. Philosophy
of Diseases.' The best recipe was: 3 cups of sweet milk every
day, and from 3 to 5 drops of turpentine in it. I took it for
about three months, and all of a sudden there were no pains any
more, but the hardness of the joints stayed."
</p>
<p> "Shake, Shake, Shake." It was Grandma's sister Celestia who
first suggested that painting might be fun for her. Grandma
tried and found it was. "I painted for pleasure, to keep busy
and to pass the time away," she recalls, "but I thought no more
of it than of doing fancy work."
</p>
<p> When Grandma was finally persuaded to send some of her
pictures to a country fair, along with canned fruits and jam,
her preserves won prizes but her paintings attracted little
attention. Not long after, however, a drugstore in the nearby
town of Hoosick Falls, N.Y., put some of her pictures in the
window. There they were spotted by a Manhattan collector named
Louis Caldor. He bought them all and began trying to interest
New York art dealers in Grandma's work. Finally he tried the
newly opened Galerie St. Etienne, run by a solemn Viennese
expatriate named Otto Kallir, who fell hard for the pictures.
Dealer Kallir put Grandma under contract, and her first big
show, in 1940, lit the match to a bonfire of public enthusiasm
which has been crackling brightly ever since.
</p>
<p> Grandma's next show was held at Gimbels department store,
which invited her down for the opening. Grandma had not been in
Manhattan for years; she later described her visit: "Oh, it was
shake hands, shake, shake, shake--and I wouldn't even know the
people now. My, my, it was rush here, rush there, rush every
other place--but I suppose I shouldn't say that because those
people did go to such bother to make my visit pleasant." A
sizable audience gathered at Gimbels to hear Grandma talk about
painting. Instead, she told them in detail how she made
preserves, and concluded her talk by opening her handbag and
showing a few samples. No one could possibly have invented an
old lady more refreshing to a jaded urban public.
</p>
<p> Doctor Without Cap. In the past dozen years, honors have
been heaped upon Grandma Moses. Russell Sage College made her
an honorary doctor of humane letters ("Only they didn't let me
keep the cap"). She has been give the key to the city of Albany.
President Truman once presented her with an award ("I talked with
him, and I could not think but that he was one of my own boys").
General Eisenhower sent her a card from Europe reading: "For
Grandma Moses, a real artist, from a rank amateur."
</p>
<p> Professional critics have praised her just as warmly. Oddly
enough, U.S. critics were, and still are, inclined to temper
their praise with a touch of condescension. They note her
obvious limitations of draftsmanship and range, and only then
admit her ability to evoke atmosphere and create lively scenes.
But the European reaction has been full-out. A Zurich critic
speaks of her "magic spontaneity...completely unsentimental,
and as untouched as nature herself...a phenomenon of our
times." Paris' Arts votes "thanks to Grandma Moses for the
happiness she shows us." Vienna-born Otto Kallir flatly insists
that Grandma is "one of the very great painters in America
today." In his opinion, she outranks even Henri Rousseau, the
Paris customs inspector who was the first modern "Primitive"
painter to be revered by connoisseurs.
</p>
<p> Realism Without Exactitude. Ever since Rousseau's
sophisticated friends--Picasso, Braque & Co.--began
promoting him at the turn of the century, primitive art has been
a subject of controversy. In the first place, few can agree on
just what the word is meant to cover. Two things it always
stands for are an untrained hand and a childlike eye. Primitives
are would-be realists whose charm depends on their very
inability to paint photographically accurate pictures. Most of
them have trouble with figures (as does Grandma) and make a
habit of cluttering their canvases with niggling details (as
Grandma does not). Very few have Grandma's luminosity of color,
and almost none can match her in creating an illusion of deep
space.
</p>
<p> Because of these qualities, Kallir believes that the word
primitive does not apply to her. He urges "natural" as a
substitute. Expert Sidney Janis thinks "self-taught" a better
word. Grandma herself is not worried about such intellectual
distinctions. Grandma simply aims to please.
</p>
<p> "As for publicity, says Grandma, "that I'm too old to care
for now." The present-day realities of life amidst her family
are still what matters most to her. Some 30-odd descendants and
in-laws live nearby, and her eldest daughter Winona shares
Grandma's house. The low, efficient L-shaped structure--with
picture windows, false shutters, garage and freezer--was put
up for her by Grandma's son Forrest and two grandsons. They took
the plan from a magazine illustration and finished building it
two years ago.
</p>
<p> Secluded Sunshine. At 93, Grandma still "makes a batch" of
three or four pictures almost every week. She paints each day
until she begins to tire: "Then I leave it to do something else;
when my hand gets tired, it isn't so stiddy." Sometimes Grandma
turns to television, "Though it's gettin' to be monotonous," or
more likely just chats with Winona. Grandma's hearing is
perfect, and she says: "I love the gossip." Now and then she
entertains her neighboring great-grandchildren who "come
troopin' acrost the field, lookin' like Coxey's Army."
</p>
<p> For breakfast and lunch she has coffee and oatmeal, "with
lots of sugar--that's for vitality." Her dinners are hearty.
"Good eatin's and good keepin's" is Grandma's recipe for health.
At 10 o'clock Grandma is ready for bed. "The minute my head hits
the pillow I'm dead to the world." She sleeps on an old feather
tick under an electric blanket.
</p>
<p> For her years, Grandma is in fabulously good fettle, though
she does complain that her feet "get clumpy" when he walks. A
neighboring doctor drops by twice a week just to keep tabs on
her. When people tease her about his being a beau, Grandma
points out that "he's 15 years younger than me." The doctor is
round in the middle, and, says Grandma, "he wouldn't have such
a pot on him if he'd just lay down on the floor and roll over
like he did when he was three years old and I first knew him."
</p>
<p> Grandma's great and utterly unexpected fame, coming at the
close of such a long, useful life, pleases her mainly for the
personal contacts it brings her, and bothers her only because
it brings too many. A "Do Not Disturb" sign from a hotel room
hangs outside her front door to ward off the thousands of
tourists who besiege her sunny old age. Yet those who get past
that painted plea find that Grandma's main interest, now as
ever, is people. Recently a visitor asked the radiant little old
lady of what she was proudest after her 93 years of life and
labor. The answer could not have been more Christian, or more
grandmotherly: "I've helped some people."
</p>
</body>
</article>
</text>