What meant a lot to me was Gabriel would look at my paintings and drawings and talk to me about them in detail. And Gabriel had all kinds of history stories about the art world and personal experiences with famous painters like Uglow and Guston. I wasn’t really being mentored by anyone except Stanley Lewis at that time and Stanley wasn’t on email or the internet. Gabriel was quite technologically adept so I had more regular communications including phone conversations with emails. With Stanley, I would call as frequently as it seemed he had time between his teaching schedule, travels and his strict daily painting regiment which I tried to respect. So Gabriel filled a gap in that generational seniority I’ve always wanted and probably needed for their experience and wisdom. I used to be able to connect with Lester Goldman on my trips back to Kansas City that same way. I never had that with Wilbur Niewald until I got to work with him on the Midwest Paint Group Figure exhibition catalog in the 2010’s. After that we reconnected and had some interesting phone conversations and visits at his studio in KC. I’ve gone on to keep my connection with several other mentors. I was close with Ron Weaver who joined the Midwest Paint Group. Ron was a studio mate and friend of Stanley Lewis at Yale. His passing was a blow to me. I’ve had a similar connection with other painters like William Barnes who ran the painting program at William and Mary College and Bill White who is also in the Midwest Paint Group. I was close to my father and when he died I really saw how significant all these mentors have been to me as a painter and as a person.