Ask the Author discussion

I love to engage in questions and conversations about my memoir, art, life, the writing process, ect. The work is really completed by the readers. I learn so much from you.

Hi Patrice,

I have mostly recovered from the accident. I had to have two more surgeries on my leg and my left leg will always be weaker. But I am active, and unless I told you and showed you the scars, you might never know.

My dad is 95 and still working. After my book came out two of the art estates, the Len Lye Foundation and the George Rickey Estate, contact me about getting in touch with him to write on these artists who’d he’d shown so long ago. So my book brought my father work. He’s lucky that way.

Yes, I still own the Duchamp on page 289. I still own the Carracci Madonna and child that Dad tried to spirit away from me.

Wow, those are amazing coincidences. And you are right. When my father was a small child in Germany he was sent away to a “camp” because he was too active. Today we might label these boys ADHD. He was forced to hike during the morning and restrained to a bed in the afternoon. This was not exactly a Kinderheim, but, yes, I think he repeated this experience with us. Also, my mother contracted Diphtheria when she was four years old and visiting Greece with her parents. Her father had to leave her and her mother and return to America. The depression had just started and he would lose his job if he didn’t get back. Though her mother stayed with her, my mother felt deserted by her father. And she spoke to me many times about how that early experience may have led to her poor choice to leave her children behind in a foreign country. I was the opposite type of parent. Very attached. I barely left my son with a babysitter.

Hmmm, probably not. Honest thinking is a very good legacy indeed. Thank you Patrice.

Yes, Patrice, my father is still married to Carole. He is the irresistible force to her immovable object.

Dad speaks French and some Italian.
I will check with my father and get back to you on your question on the venerable Mr. Barr's personality. I don't remember him personally, though I do remember Rene d'Harnoncourt very well since we lived in the same building and he was so very tall and hard to miss.

Hi Patrice,
I remember Alicia Legg, she was my father's assistant. And Dorothy Miller didn't want the Tinguely going off in the garden. When I was working on the book, each time I reread it I liked a different chapter the best. Sometimes I became very attached to the early days at MoMA, then other times to our adventures at Westbeth, then the California days. What I love about the en--when my father re-introduce himself to my mother and then later when he arrives at me feet wrapped up in art, is that it spins you back to the beginning. But you're right, it's with some foreknowledge. So happy you are enjoy it again!

Yes, and I remember the day I left my mother in the nursing home. I walked out and had a visceral reaction. "This is what if felt like to be left in the Kinderheim." It was awful for it to come full circle, but maybe necessary.
You are such an astute reader!

Good point.