RAiR | 1969-71
Willard Midgette †
Willard “Bill” Midgette (1937-1978) was born in Baltimore, Maryland and spent most of his later life in Brooklyn, New York interspersed with a few years in New Mexico. He attended the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, Harvard College, Boston University College of Fine Arts, the Pratt Institute and lastly Indiana University where he attained his MFA in 1962. Bill was an Associate Professor of Art at Reed College in 1963-1971 when he took extended leave to go to Roswell to complete a mural commission for Don Anderson’s Henge and attend the artist-in-residence program. From 1971 until his death, Bill taught and chaired the art department of St Ann’s School in Brooklyn and taught at Skowhegan in the summers of 1976 and ‘77. He was a realist figurative painter who focused on narratives such as the artist in his studio, street scenes of New York City and the lives of Native Americans in the Southwest.