Don’t Fence Me In

Memories in the Making 2021

Both my parents were artists, although mom would never acknowledge her ability.  “I am an art teacher, not an artist,” she always said.  She gave all the credit to my dad.  Although now, she paints quite a bit in her Memory Care, and she clearly has talent.  

Two of her watercolors were entered in the “Memories in the Making” Alzheimer’s Art Fundraiser in Denver this year. One painting was a farm scene with a pasture filled with beautiful poppies -which the administrators mistook for red pumpkins (?) and titled it “It’s Pumpkin Time”.  The other was a landscape covered over by tall tree trunks resembling bars.  They titled it “Fenced In.”  When my siblings and I saw it we immediately saw the metaphor that Mom was feeling fenced in.  I don’t know if this was her intention, but it definitely speaks to what Alzheimer’s has done to her and others. This brain disease robs those we love of their ability to be free, and to live their lives the way they wish. Eventually we have to fence them in to keep them safe from their inability to care for themselves.

Memories in the Making 2021

Artist’s name:  Barbara Luther         

What are the artist’s favorite things to do?

Barbara was a middle school art teacher for over twenty-five years in Edina, Minnesota, Greenwich Connecticut, Mill Valley, California, and Littleton, Colorado. Her husband, Jim, was in advertising, so they travelled a lot. Her favorite thing about teaching was watching the kid’s face light up when their work was displayed.

After retirement, she was on the Littleton Arts Council and helped choose art to beautify Littleton, most notably the mural at the Littleton Light Rail Station.

Barbara spent a lot of time researching the family genealogy – she even travelled to out of the way cemeteries looking for family records, and she made connections with family members living across the world.

Barbara loves nature – flowers, gardening, collecting rocks, and bird watching:  she knows the names of most all Colorado plants and birds.

What are the highlights of the artist’s life?  Things she is most proud of?  Stories she tells and retells?

The highlight of Barbara’s life was meeting her husband, Jim Luther.  She never tires of telling the story of how they met.  She was 17, and working at The Lafayette Club, a resort on Lake Minnetonka, in Minnesota, when her friend invited several guys over to meet them.  As Barbara saw them approaching, she called out “I get the tall one with the crew-cut.”  Maybe because she was nervous, she kept forgetting his name that night, until an exasperated Jim told her that his name was “Roger.”  Amazingly he asked her out again, and they were married six years later, living together happily until his death in 1983.     

Secondly, when she was 39, and she and Jim had two teenage children, Karen and Dave, she found herself pregnant with triplets.  Told by her doctor to go home immediately and get into bed, she couldn’t resist stopping at the green stamps store to get a nice outdoor recliner for the porch.  She gave birth to Lauren, Allison, and Melanie with a cast of doctors in attendance and made the front page in The Marin Independent Journal.  Sadly, Lauren died two months later. So, when Barbara discovered she was pregnant again at 40 – she felt that her little baby Charles, was a miraculous gift.

Third, Barbara has had a life-long passion for Egypt.  Growing up on the farm, she would swing on the mattress frame hammock under the large oak in the back of the house, and dream of floating down the Nile like Cleopatra.  Her favorite book was The Lost Queen of Egypt.  In 2008, eight members of her family went with her to Egypt. She saw the Pyramids, the treasures in the Cairo Museum, Luxor, and the tombs in Valley of the Kings. She even took a boat ride down the Nile!

What are the little things that make her such a unique person?

     Barbara is a determined woman – growing up on a farm in southern Minnesota, she longed for adventure outside of her small town of Albert Lea. During the summers in high school, she would work as a waitress at resorts a hundred miles north.   She went to the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis and majored in Journalism and Art.  After college, she married Jim, who was a navy jet pilot, and then an advertising executive. She travelled wherever his ambition took them and embraced each new city.  

     After Jim died in 1984, she never even thought of dating another man.  “Once you have the best, no one else can compare.” As a widow with three teenagers at home, she worked hard to give her children a safe and happy life.

      How do other people characterize the artist?  What are her best qualities?

      Barbara is a self proclaimed “bad cook”, but loves to eat out.  She also loves a glass or two of Chardonnay.  Barbara has an affinity for clouds and contrails – they remind her of Jim when he would fly over her parent’s farmhouse on his way back to the navy base. She can always see a picture in a cloud- a dog or an elephant.  One of her famous quotes now is, “Look at the clouds!” When we were growing up, we would take many long car rides to visit mom’s relatives in Albert Lea, Minnesota.  As we would get near farm country she would excitedly call to us in the back seat to sit up and “Look at the cows!” None of us were very impressed with looking at cows- they pretty much all look the same. But to her they were beautiful and they were a symbol of her heritage. She still reminds us all to stop and look around – to appreciate what we have.

      Barbara also has a positive attitude and a good sense of humor. She loves to be around her family, and her face lights up whenever a grandchild is in the room. She was instrumental in raising them – babysitting, planting gardens, teaching them drawing and painting, and cheering at their various sporting events.  Barbara has 8 grandchildren:  Trevor, Nick, Jocelyn, Dexter, Mac, Charlotte, Kiernan, and Caden. She also has a great granddaughter Zoe.

Why might the artist have chosen her subjects?

Barbara may have painted the little red house because her mother was a teacher in a little red schoolhouse during the Great Depression and she is very proud of her mother’s independence.  The red schoolhouse is on display at the Freeborn County Fairgrounds, in Minnesota. Also, Barabara grew up on a farm with lots of green acreage.  And as for the “Fenced In,” it certainly may reflect her life with Alzheimers.