Randall Asprodites 1965

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I copied things. I learned to paint on my own. Mom came home with a box of paints and a table to draw on when I was about 7. In school, if anyone had a poster to do, I did it.

He took two busses from Metairie to St. Aloysius each day.

• The teachers he remembers most are Brother Donald Robichaud, Brother Gregory, Louis Levy, and Brother Pius (now Joseph Donovan).
• But his favorite was his sophomore religion and Spanish teacher, Brother Paul Montero, who was Brother Paulus at that time.

Aloysius didn't offer art classes. But they saved my life because I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do. I got a good education that prepared me for anything.

• He played JV football and was on the JV and varsity track teams.
• Randy's father, a Greek immigrant who forged a career as an engineer, told him he needed to study something practical to make a living.

I loved animals but didn't like the sight of blood. Smelling formalde­hyde at 7:30 AM in the Biology Lab wasn't my cup of tea.

• So he switched his major several times before deciding to transfer from LSU to UNO. He wound up getting a degree in Psychology in 1971 at Nicholls State.
• About the only job available to a Psychology graduate was with the Louisiana Welfare Department. But that proved a boon to Randy's art aspirations.

I got all my work done on Monday or Tuesday at the latest. So I had plenty of free time. I'd sketch and read art books in my small office.

He took night classes at the John McCready Art School in the French Quarter for two years.

That's where I decided that art was what I wanted to do. I learned portrait painting, figure painting, and landscape painting. McCready taught the traditional Old Masters technique. So I received classical training.

A trip to Europe also factored into his decision.

My wife and I saved our money and went to Europe for two and a half months one summer. We stayed in youth hostels, backpacked, and used a Eurail pass. We went to the museum in every city we visited. That's how you should study art - by looking at art. I saw paintings I'd seen only in books. I became enamored with the Impressionists and the explosion of colors in their paintings of outdoor scenes.

When he returned to New Orleans, he planned to go back to school to get a Master of Fine Arts so he could get a teaching job to support himself as an artist.

• He reentered UNO to take credit hours in studio art to build a portfolio to present for acceptance to a graduate program.
• One of his first professors was Ida Kohlmeyer, who was already a well-known painter and sculptor. She converted him to a new style of art.

I rejected her work at first because I had never seen or studied abstract art until I went to one of her shows and saw that she sold out everything at $10,000 a pop.

• At the end of the semester, Ida hired Randy to be her assistant at her studio. Not only did she mentor him, but she also opened doors for him in the art world.

One of those was the opportunity to do graduate work at Indiana State University.

• Ida offered to arrange a full scholarship for him at Tulane so that he could remain her assistant. But Randy had other ideas.

I felt like, after working for her for over two years, I needed to break away and be on my own. She was becoming so much of a demanding personality that I was afraid I would start copying her work.

• She was good friends with the head of the Art Department at Indiana State. So Randy sent him slides of his work and got an assistantship.
• As part of his MFA program in Terre Haute, Randy taught History of Art classes. He recalls how intimidated he was when he faced his first group of students. But he soon learned to enjoy teaching.
• One of his students went on to great fame and fortune - but not be­cause of Randy's class. Larry Bird was the All-American leader of the Indiana State basketball team that reached the NCAA Finals in 1979. Larry and some of his teammates took Randy's course to satisfy liberal arts requirements for their degrees.
• Each graduate student had to have a showing of his works as part of the degree requirements. So Randy produced his first art show at the university. He also got showings in Cincinnati and other midwest cities.
• But he knew what it meant to miss New Orleans. His work in a variety of media for his final thesis centered around scenes he remembered from the Crescent City.

Randy in 1981-2, his first year at Brother Martin

• He interviewed in Baton Rouge but decided he wanted to be in New Orleans where he would have more interaction with other artists.
• He substituted in the New Orleans public schools for $25/day.

I realized, "This can't go on. I have to get a job." I couldn't rely on just selling my paintings until I made a name for myself.

• So he sent in a resume to the Archdiocese and the next day Michael Cottingham, head of the Brother Martin Fine Arts Department, noting that Randy was a St. Aloysius grad, asked him to come for an inter­view.
• He met with Brother Celestine, the Assistant Principal, who asked him if he could teach Technical Drawing. Randy said yes even though he'd never taken a course in that area.
• So he was hired and stayed two days ahead of the students and found that he enjoyed teaching the course which went into architecture and building styles.

For the final project, students had to turn in a full, blueprint-quality floor plan of their dream house. Some of them told me later on, "I still have that plan and built my house based on it." Many of the students became engineers and architects.

Randy today

In Art I, they did more of an Arts & Crafts type of class - make Mardi Gras floats out of shoe boxes. I'd taken a few education classes at Nicholls but never got certified. Back then, if you taught five years, you were automatically certified.

• When the previous teacher left, Randy inherited the Art I class.

I made it clear to the principal, Brother Ivy, that I wanted to make it more of an academic course where students would learn painting, drawing, and design. He thought that would be great.

• Over the next few years, Art II and Art III were added to the curriculum.

I thought I'd teach five years, then go to New York. But I really fell in love with teaching. I've had college offers along the way. But teaching college, you don't get the summers off, and I get so much time to work on my own painting then.