I am presently and have for the past ten years or so been liveing in Santa Rosa California which is 60 miles north of San Francisco. For the past 45 years I have here, and in many other places in the U.S.A and Europe been makeing and selling the pictures, Paintings, Drawings and etchings you see on these pages. I have pretty much made my entire liveing in this way and as a result there are thousands of pictures Oil paintings Acrylic paintings, Water colors, pencil and pen and ink drawings many of them framed and protected by glass.
Egotistical is the only way to characterize what follows and its kind of a win win situation for me. As; if what I say comes to pass many people will know I said it and I will seem to have been prophitic; on the other hand if I am wrong no one will see this.:)
Someday this large body of work I have created and distributed here and there around the world will become very valuable. Not because it is GREAT ART! but because there is so much of it, because it is so varied in subject,style and medium. And because it is well done and the baic style is acceptable to a wide range of people.
This etching I did sometime in the 80's some how says more to me about myself than any number of words or photographs and I guess that is what art is about . CLICK HERE FOR FULL SIZE
This painting"The tree of life" unfinished at this date 5/1/2000 is based on a painting that I saw in NYC's MOMA I used to go to the Museum to see it often while I was in High school in the late 40's and early 50's then sometime in the 50's there was a fire at the Museum and the painting was destroyed. My version is nowhere near as good as the one I remember. That man was a genius, I am prolific and good .
A very recent picture of all of my children mid 1999
JJ Johnny Harry,
Tripper, Elisabeth Helen,
Michael Klein
Sunnie, Sheila Agntha,
all Friedmans
Hucky, Marty Olson
Bianca Partee
Bucky, Ivan Pugh
(who made this picture happen)
JJ
Michael
Bucky
Hucky
Tripper
Sunnie
Bianca
Partee
These are all of my children at this date All well and healthy if not wealthy. Problems there are, as with any group of people, but as you can see a pretty happy bunch
So thats some of what is happening now but as long as we are at this picture I might as well show and tell a little of the history of these wonderfull offspring of mine..
Although it seemed like it to me they didn't all just pop out at once, and yes I knew what caused it:) But in what seemed or maby seems now like an instant
to me. My Dannish wife (Danske Kone) Inga and I had produced 4 beautifull children. A boy Johnny a girl Elisabeth then another boy Michael and finally Sheila the tiny little baby above. I guess these children were Ingas' purpose on earth because soon after Sheila was born, Inga 26 was killed in an automobile accident ; driveing alone through Golden Gate park in San Francisco. An Opera student she was on her way to a singing lesson.
We had movd from Copenhagen Denmark to Los Angles Ca. with our first two children Johnny and Elisabeth then back to Denmark for Michaels birth then to Paris and finally to San Francisco where Sheila was born in May of 1963. In march of 1964 shortly after John kennedy was shot Inga died.
One and a half years later I met Patricia Feeney a wonderfull girl from the midwest, via Los Angles. She baby sat for me for a while and soon we were engaged to be married. Her Brother Michael a Catholic priest came out from Wisc. to Marry us.
From then to now became an incredible rollercoster ride with twists and turns to numerous to tell or even remember but this being the modern world of interacrive electronic communication I am not going to rely only on my own memory to relate this story. I am going to open the telling of this history to the people all over the world who have experianced it with me. And I am not going to limit the story to myself and my family this will be the story of everybody and any body who wishes to contribute. My only stipulation; requirment, being that the story you tell in some way relates to mine. Not that you are required to know or have known me, just that in some wise something in your story has something, however slight the relationship, to something in my story. I.E In 1979 in Masstrict in the Neatherlands I purchased from a girl a "Tonka" (a Religious painting on silk) which she had purchased in India. Have you seen a Tonka? Been to India, Lived in or visited Masstricht? are you Dutch, or Indian? These are all doorways to my story. WHEN YOU SEE A STAR LIKE THIS CLICK ON IT TO SEE SOMEONES INPUT
Meanwhile back on the other side of the Rainbow I am going to take you back in time
want to join in? OK then e-mail me with your part of our story. but just the facts please, leave judgments, editorials, and philosophys at the door
OUR extended family 1975 this will be repeted later Photograph by Gordon Adelman click pic for his site
Me totaly amazed to be here in the 21st century
These are my forbearers left to right
George Friedman Fathers Father
Harry Friedman my Father
Helen Friedman my Mother
Ida Kaufman Mothers Mother
Friend
Friend
Helen Friedman Fathers Mother
They all except my Mother who was born in America, came from eastern Europe and Russia
around the turn of the cntury my Father was 6 and the youngest of 4; 2 brothers and a sister.
My mother and Father had one child, My sister Sheila until I was born when she was 10
About two years later Sheila B died.
It was 1936, just befor the dicovery of ant-biotics which may have saved her.
Three years later My brother Stanley came along.We lived in the bronx N.Y.C
My Mother Father , Brother and I Lived in the Bronx until 1952, When I finished High school at which time we Moved to Los Angles California. About 4 years later My father then My mother passed away. After which I Moved to Europe, setled in Denmark
started my career as a working Artist, married Inga and started my family. My brother continued his education gradutated law school at U C Berkely Married Mary and started his family. Around the same time Inga and I moved to San Francisco, then the accident happened and the oddesy began.
This has been a very brief . discripion of the first 30 odd years of my life, and the whole of the lives of my forbearers; and from time to time I will, and I hope some of you out there will, add too this history. But for the moment and for the sake of some sort of completion. Ill try to keep it simple.
this is my brother Stanley J Friedman who arrived in 1939
Me Partee Irwin Johnny Kaufman Friedman ( It started as Irwin Kaufman (my Moms madein name ) Friedman, Johnny came at 18 when I got tired of mispronounced "Irwins" and Partee at 40 in the late sixtys When many people became new.
And my sister Sheila who I sometimes think lives through me.
Back over the rainbow through the night sky of time to the summer of 1966 the summer of Love
Partee Irwin Johnny Kaufman Friedman p.o.box 43 Villa Grande Ca 95486
Phone and fax 707 576 7500 pikf@pacbell.net WEB www. http://parteeandpals.homestead.com
follwing is a letter I am sending to various people I have known over the years and have not been in touch with for some timeJune 2001 not sent yet :)
Dear, Friends jan 2001
This is just to let you know that I am alive and well and living here in Santa Rosa California
And can be reached at the Address and phone or email above and if you want to you can look at my web sight which I have been working on for the past year or so. You may be on it, but if not you will be someday as I am trying to make it my Biography as well as my Memoirs and all of you who receive this are or have been an important part of my life.
As I said I am living in Santa Rosa which is a beautiful small city in northern California wine country I will include some paintings I have done here for you to see. IM 66 now and I still paint and try to sell my work everyday.
I hope this finds you and your family and friends well and happy. And I really hope you will call or write to me.. Thank you very much for all of your kindness and help while I was there with you.
Sincerely yours Partee
Santa Rosa Ca. And the rest of the world acrylic 3'x5' Partee partee by Louise zhang
Partee Irwin Johnny Kaufman Friedman P.O. Box 43 Villa Grande Ca. 95486
Phone and fax 707 576 7500 phone EMAIL pikf@pacbell.net
WEB SITE www. http://parteeandpals.homestead.com top
Playing with colors
I am going to use this opportunity (that is the auction of this painting to raise funds for A SCHOOL school) to after fifty years of painting and drawing talk publicly about my art ((my life's work really ) I believe that everything people do is an art! )). Over those fifty years I have often been asked the question; what kind of art do you do? Or what kind of an artist are you? Realist, Impressionist, expressionist, abstract expressionist, surrealist, Dadaist, etc. OR what school of art do you represent? California, N.Y. Eastern, Western, wild life, still life, Tromps le oyez, pointillist, cubist, or are your paintings, allegorical, political, philosophical, psychological. Etc etc etc ad ifnitanussem
I think I am all of the above, critically and economically, NOT A GOOD IDEA. A Friend OF mine an art dealer ( David Waitman) in Amsterdam said to me one day, "Partee your work is all over the place, You need a signature, a style that is unmistakably yours. Well he was right, my paintings and drawings and etchings mirror all of the art I have experienced all of my life and I am very pleased with that. It seems to me to constrain oneself to one style one particular way of making pictures would be as boring as repetitive factory work, there is though if you take the time to look (David I think only studied what someone else said was good) a same-ness in my work, a signature if you will. I work in a great variety of mediums and each medium has a flavor a look all its own that will make the work of one artist seem very different from that persons work in another medium.
So I am all of the things mentioned above realist, surrealist, pointillist and abstractionist and my paintings are modern and traditional, allegorical, philosophical and psychological and just plain pretty pictures, with nothing to say but what you see. IM afraid I will never have the opportunity to see all at once all of the work I have created over the years from 1957 when I started making water colors while hitchhiking around Europe till now. I know from time to time I have changed some basic things about my pictures I.E. in the sixties and seventies I painted almost exclusively with orange and brown. In the late seventies and mid eighties I did etchings printed in sepia ink almost exclusively. IN the early sixties I did mostly pen and ink drawings. Late fifties and early sixties it was large 24 or 36 x 48" oil paintings of cities, NY and Paris and at any of these times I would do some of the things I had done previously. From the late 80's till now 2001 I have done a lot of watercolors. But no mater what or where or when it was always me behind the brush pen needle or pencil and my work on the paper or canvas and if you look carefully you can easily see it is my work.
warning this page goes on forever.... SCROLL SCROLL SCROLL YOUR MOUSE GENTLY DOWN THE PAGE, MERRILY, MERILLY, MERILLY ETC. ETC ETC. ETC AND NOW 2/12/2001 ANOTHER THOUGHT OCCURS THAT I WILL BE ATEMPTING TO COMPLETE THIS BIOGRAPHY IN A CHRONOLOGICAL MANOR , SO PLEASE IF YOU ARE FOLLOWING THIS SCROLL TO THE END TO FIND THE LATEST ENTRIES, SORRY FOR THE CONFUSION I WAS NEVER MUCH AT PLANING.
They say one picture is worth a thousand words and thats true so I will add some pictures as I go along here. Biogrophys (The truest form of Ego Mania from which I suffer greatly ); Have a format I.E Start at the begining and end wherever you are. But never haveing done anything according to the rules, I won't start here. So to begin at the end, which will probably be updated from time to time as computers allow the kind of immediate editting . Today is April 19 2000 in a few days, on the 25th I will be 66
I find that hard to believe no less type, I think any one my age will agree that it is just unbelievable that one gets so old so fast. Conversly young people don't really believe it will ever happen to them. any way here I am
THESE ARE THE PLACES I WAS AND SOME OF WHAT I DID From 1993 to 2001
THIS ENTRY APRI 15 2001
1993/1994
August 1993 drove cross-country with Bianca on our way to her freshman year at Mt Holyoke College I stay in car (some how the other car got to the East Coast in here some way? I think I let her have her car Back and flew to Cal. And stayed in the studio and this must have been the summer she came to Ca. And bought the little red car then she went back and then I drove my car that windy had been watching back to east coast and stayed in a motel in northhampton) then Motel through the fall and paint and draw for hemstead art then I go to Florida for the winter and stay in St Augustine where I meet Walt and Brad and Ann and got job doing 10 W/C's of Jacksonville Fl. 1994 spring break Bianca and her friend Caroline come and visit and we go to key West stayed On-------- key. I stay with Brad and Ann for a while in St Augustine
and soon after drove south stopping in Mastricht, and clearvaux in the Grande Duchy de Luxembourg where I stayed with other friends from 79/80, Norbert and Catharine Furter in the Hotel central where they have a marvelous Museum of toy (another long story).
I did Water colors in all of these places it was how I lived and traveled as the money I had coming went for expenses stateside. From there I drove East through France to viit with Biancas roommate Dana
in Strasbourg France where I did several W/C's I stayed about 2 weeks and then drove west to Paris. In Paris I located another old Friend Annie Marie Rechner 's son who told me where I could find her and gave me lodging for the night. Went to visit Annie in Val de Mercy and she helped me find a nice room in a "gite" a kind of French rooming house with kitchen very inexpensive and comfortable. Where I stayed for several weeks painting and selling in Auxerre and visiting with Annie and her Friends. Annie gave me the number of Jean baptist Defour her nephew who we had also met in 79/80 and who had come to Cal. In the early 80's to live for a while (yet another long story). I drove back to Paris and had a very nice visit with Jean Baptist and his wife Claire (she also came to Ca. When he was there (to get him )). They recommended a place to me in the south of France in Provence It was a small B&B/ vineyard in a Village called Lacoste which was the ancestral home of the Marquee De Sade, his Chateau in ruins is still there. The farm is/was called the Ferme (farm) de la Avalen and owned by a Danielle and I ended up staying there from that October through April of 1996, during which time I did a large painting for my brother Stan in return for which he financed the following) My Daughter Bianca came to visit me there for her January break (6 weeks) 2 of which we spent in Paris (more long stories). After returning from Paris (Bianca flew home from there), I started to sell my work in the nearby city if Apt. Where I did 20 W/C's of local Villages for M. Marc Leferve. In April I moved to Avingnon and lived with Joel Roi and Fred and my friend Juan Galvese. And in June leaving my car with Juan I returned to N.Y.C and retrieved my car, which wonder of wonders worked. (To my cousin Mickeys Amazement!!! ).. My brother Stan invited me to come to San Pablo Ca. Where he was involved in a new Casino which I had made the painting for and He wanted another one it was a very large detailed acrylic Painting and took all summer to do when it was done I flew with Bianca, (who had spent the summer in New Mexico with her Mom and had come to Ca. To visit friends,) back to Santa Fe and drove with her in her car to Mass where I had left my car in storage.
Soon after I returned to France and did a painting for Laurent and Sabene Analoro At there B&B in Chusclan north east of Avingnon and near Bangnol sur Sez, Stayed there till November 1996 at which time I decide to go to Mass and visit with Bianca for Thanksgiving and the holidays. I arrived in NY and went to my cousin's house and got sick I felt really bad and Bianca came and we drove to Mass. That night. The next Morning I couldn't breath and Bianca took me to the Hospital, Colley Dickensen And the doctors there diagnosed me with COPD which is Emphezyma. Was in the hospital for 3 weeks. Then flew to Ca. and stayed at Sunshines. Bianca and Melisa come at Jan break and to bring me car I move to studio and start to work in town srtting up on 4th street till may of 1997 when I Drive cross country with oxygen tanks in my car, for Biancas Graduation. Spent the summer in northhampton painting and selling got a commission to do 13 paintings for the Hotel Northhampton and got Bianca a job there, Drove back cross country in Sept 97 and moved into Joan and bills house. Working on 4th St near the cigar store until the summer of 1998. (I had become a patient of Dr. James Gude during that year.)
I was given a plane ticket to Amsterdam in July and with the help of Dr gude I went once again to Europe. I moved into a small apartment with my old friend Jim George who had separated from his wife and was staying in a town called Woomaveer North of Amsterdam stayed there for about 1 month and then moved to Arnhem on the east side of Holland on the Rijn river where I was commissioned by Frans Gasandam to do a number of paintings and drawings of the town stayed there until march of 1999 and then returned to Ca. And here I am in 2001
December 28 2001 I just recovered the topmost of these 2 paintings both were done in the middle 1980's A time I have not written about yet. Perhaps I will use them as an excuse to start to tell tell of the period between 1967 and now but not yet
the pictures below are of some of my children and of Windy (Pamela Olson White) who is the mother of my 2 youngest children, Bianca Partee now 27 and Huck (Marty Olson) now 30
Windy and I began our relationship in 1972 in Aspen Colorado and Sante Fe New mexico and remained together till around 1985.
All of my older children, in the 80's and 90's above Shiela (Sunnie) left Johnny (J J ) lower left Michael and his lady Shanita and Elisabeth (Tripper) and MY 2nd wife Patricia (Holly) the pastel is of Elisabeth at about 7
See a star click it to see someones input
sometimes it seems that the present invalidates the past, I.E. some current event of a negetive nature colors all positive past events and accomplishments in a neggative light that shouldnt be.
TO SEE RECENT PICTURES OF MY BROTHER STAN AND HIS FAMILY CLICK HERE OR ON THE PICTURE
On march 15 ( the Ides of March ) My son Marty Huck Olson Passed away peacefully in his home in Guerneville Ca. He is survied by Me Partee and his Mother Windy and his six brothers and sisters all of whom you can see below , for some old and current pictures of Hucky please scrole right >>>>>>>>>> amd visit Hucks own page HERE
