To Begin at the Beginning

...sometimes means Identifying an end.

Of all William Mix’s myriad series of drawings, I feel like the most succinct would be a collection that would in fact be his last—whether he knew it, or not. I’m thinking… not.

I believe my artist father would have created until the end of his days.

After he had brain surgery to drain the hematomas found in two different locations on his brain, waking up in his hospital bed from the procedure it was almost as though he was the most chipper version of my father I had ever seen. Perhaps it was the after-effects of the anesthesia… Very likely so.

After some weeks in the Nursing Rehab Facility and once William Mix was back at home, the doctor informed us when pockets of blood on the brain which had been there for some time are drained surgically, the physical impressions already made on the brain tend to stay.

The body doesn’t like there to be a space on the brain where a mass of blood was trapped before, so naturally over time those spaces fill up with fluid. We were told it shouldn’t affect my father’s cognitive function too much more—as it had already been several weeks to a couple months—but moving forward he would have “less brain matter,” in a way, as the doctor explained, where the hematomas had been.

We accepted that fact and so did my father. I believe he intended to continue drawing and creating his stencils as long as he could. I can tell by evidence of dated artwork he did put in effort to push on. As far as I can find or delineate from this stage, however, it seems like his last series focused only on drawings of antique cars.

Here, I will fully begin.

Yes, of course, I have scanned various other photographs of oil paintings and other random works I’ve found as I’ve tried to decide where to dig in, finding a workflow documenting his prolific body of art.

This collection of antique cars is distinct. It is already organized. It is filed by me in a box straight from a huge filing cabinet I had salvaged and gifted him.

My father was angry with me about that filing cabinet and said he never wanted it at the time it was moved into his room. However, he must have warmed up to it enough to leave mostly just this collection there in the top left drawer for me to find. apart from all his other work.

All of these antique car drawings fit nicely together and were done in landscape. Perhaps all of them have at least slightly different measurements, but overall, they are all very similar in size and shape. So far I have scanned 17 different make and models of antique vehicles—some of them having a stack of handmade stencils with 3 or 4 versions of the same car replicated—and I am not even halfway through my scanning of this collection.

What I find so interesting are the dates.

The earliest date, February of 2015—exactly one year before his brain surgery. Most of what I’ve scanned so far are distinctly from August 2015, September 2015 and October of that year.

October 2015 is when my father tripped and fell on his way to the bathroom, catching himself on the door jamb, but not without receiving a knock on his head in the process. Neither of my parents though much of that event, and he continued on as usual as his quality of life had gotten to be during that time.

February 2016 the surgeon at Flagler Hospital did mention how the CT scan showed old brain bleeds, perhaps old hockey injuries—but also impressed upon us that one was newer. William Mix very well may have had an injury which was not so obviously in need of care all those months. However, his drawings seem to continue straight on through until the next year, 2016.

Note for yourself the dates and slight differences between these drawings made by his own originally created stencil of this 1908 Stanley Steamer:

I have noticed, also, how William Mix began signing some of his drawings with this very different initialized signature only since the beginning of 2016, seen here, just above.

Had he also noticed a change in his cognition or in his artistic expression?

Were the slight variations of stenciled drawings and his sudden changed signature by choice? But, of course!

This collection may have been the last works my father completed at age 72 and 73, but for me this is really the beginning… getting down to the knitty gritty of creating SEO friendly file names as I scan his work, detailing distinct metadata into the properties of each image, measuring the original work, and storing each file image digitally in its proper folder.

Switching gears briefly to mention something I also realized while scanning antique cars tonight…

It was the same window of years when my father was fading out of creation mode in his life that I, myself, was just beginning to create visual art of my own.

Even though in my youth our relationship felt strained, William Mix made a most important impact on me by inadvertently showing what it looks like for a human being to follow his or her creative drive and intuition, to never give up on art.

I am so grateful for my experience, even though I’ll admit, some chapters I haven’t written yet were tough as nails.

It all made me who I am today.

It gave me passion.

Watching my father follow his own call lets me know it is wholly alright to follow my own volition while I am still here to also create, to live, to lean toward love of learning and to be myself—even if that means it may look different to others who knew me years ago. Sometimes, reinvention is inherently necessary.

If I flex and I flow, I am guaranteed to grow.

Just gonna keep on keeping on.

I might be featuring antique cars often for some time. I plan to include some comprehensive rundowns on each and to tie some themes together as well with one of William Mix’s oil paintings of Henry Ford and Thomas Edison from Distinguished People and Historic Events.

My father worked for Chryslers in Michigan before I was born, so I’m about to jump down a rabbit hole and learn what he might’ve known about each of the antique vehicles I’ll feature.

Stay tuned!

All the love,

Colleen Noelle