+Shantung Edingburg Zuber " My Dad, the Artist"

My dad, Shantung Edingburg Zuber was born Nov. 23, 1923 by Dr E.R Wheeler at 1:00pm at Walden Hospital, Chattanooga, Tennessee to Georgia Lee Louanda Edingburg-Zuber and Shantung Zuber.

Shantung and Georgia

 I'm going to save the story of him growing up and military life for another post. I want to share this post for  his art work.  I  know from what my mom told me that when my mom was in Howard High School the school principal asked him if he would paint something on one of the large walls in the high school entryway. My mom said that it was so beautiful, and it stayed there for many years. I wish someone would have thought to take a picture of it.  My dad attended Ozenfont School of Fine Arts in New York. Here is a link about the school. 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Am%C3%A9d%C3%A9e_Ozenfant

He was commissioned to paint this owl for a man who loved owls and other birds,  I didn't want him to sell it I thought it was so pretty as I love owls also.  He told me that he would paint an owl just for me, which he did and I still have it hanging in my home. 

After this painting another man asked him to paint a picture of his wife that had died, he wanted to put the painting over the fireplace in his home, so he gave my dad some photos of his deceased wife and my dad started that one.  This is when my interest in oil painting started when I saw the portrait and I knew right then that I wanted to paint portraits.

My dad painted almost every day, he said it was his relaxation and it took him to another reality.  If he wasn't painting he was lighting weights or reading. His other great talent was carpenter work, he could build anything that you asked him, but then carpenters run in the family so that's not surprising.
Some time in the 1980's he was asked if he would teach art in one of the local colleges at first for a night school class, which he did and eventually that turned into a regular class after he had so many people signing up for the courses.

Our recreational room downstairs became the hang out for the family, my mother brought her sewing downstairs, my brother brought his Kung Fu equipment down and my dad already had his art studio and work out room there, so we all would hang out there and really watch him paint.   Sometimes it seemed like he took forever just to paint one grape or one apple but when it was finished it looked like you could take it off of the painting and eat it. The dog painting was also purchased by the same man that wanted a painting of his deceased wife. 

The yellow roses were a special gift to me.  My dad painted two yellow roses for a woman and he asked her that if anything happened to her since she didn't have any family would she return it to him either to buy back or in a will..she agreed and here they are in my dining room.
It seemed like every painting that he did I wanted it. It was wonderful that other people wanted his work I was proud of his work but I wanted to make sure that I had some of his work also. 

I just had these framed not to long ago. Another tidbit of info on my dad, when I was in grammar school, we had to do an art project so I decided to do a Bust of a mans head.  I twisted up some coat hangers into the shape of a head and stuffed news paper into the hanger wires and started putting the clay over it,  my dad  saw what i was doing and got it all stabilized for me and I made this Bust, he helped me by telling me what to do but he didn't do anything himself on it for me. I got an A on that project.  I wish there was a photo of it. I was proud of that Bust.

The Bird painting is one that my mom had also in her home, when she came to live with us she brought all of my father's paintings with her that she had and of course I was thrilled to have them as well.

Shantung my dad 1923-1983

My dad was my best friend, my mom use to call us ducks if my dad got up and left the room, I followed him as did my brother. We'd hear my mom say, "There go the Ducks" .
My father died, July 28, 1983 at his home, in Parlin, New Jersey

My cousin Darryl L. Zuber took the DNA Paternal Y test back in 2009 it shows the Haplogroup as R1b for the Zuber line.