The last time I saw Wayne was just 6 months or so after graduation, when I was working at Target. I actually ran into him while he was shopping and I was working on a particularly bad day, and I broke down and cried right there in the store. He was kind enough to stand around until I got myself together and gave me a pep talk, telling me that where I’m working right after college is no indication of whether I’ve succeeded or failed. Find the lesson, he said. Find the thing to learn here and now, and learn it, and then move on when the opportunity comes.

One of the last lectures he’d give to his graduating class was about the same thing. Keep learning, keep thinking, keep writing. He was very honest with us- we didn’t choose art school, we chose public university for any number of reasons, and we could very well be less prepared to find and get the jobs than our art school peers, whose education includes a built-in network and overall more time and individual attention. He said to think of it as putting Sweat Equity into our education, keep seeking opportunities to learn and grow and get better.

I remember visiting him in his office hours often (he was also my academic advisor), and once I mentioned that I felt like my work- all of my work, not just for his class- was really hit-and-miss. He agreed, but he also told me the hits were more important, and the best thing to do is keep doing it, and eventually I’ll miss less. I always appreciated his honesty, and his encouragement, which he somehow managed never to  have contradict one another.

I got the word rather abruptly- Wayne is the second person in the county to have died from H1N1, which makes it news, and somebody asked me while they were preparing for the 5 whether I knew him. I’m still pretty shocked- it just doesn’t seem right, but when can something like this seem right? I’m so sad for his family, and for his current students, and for the program at school which he built from the ground up. It was a privilege to be his student, especially there at the beginning (he started at HSU the same year I did), and there are lectures and conversations that I carry with me every day, things that changed my technical and philosophical approach to my work then, and new understanding of those things as my career progresses and I get older and braver.

Thanks, Wayne.

Tags: art, good influences, h1n1, HSU, M. Wayne Knight, mentors, professor, school, teachers