And another one...

 

Our old friend Chris Bobrick has passed in Colorado. Her daughter Emily reached out to Horsley and he called me. 

Chris was the front end office person for the late John Morris and Kim Martindale, a tandem of show promoters that we followed all over the country doing shows for for over three decades. I still do shows for Kim.

They put on shows in Denver, Santa Barbara, Seattle, Napa and other locales which we exhibited at but we principally did their shows in Santa Fe, two and three a year for a long while. We were basically a family. A great big gypsy family of eclectic free spirits and independent thinkers. Not an employable one in the bunch.

It was a heady time and we had the cream of the crop of ethnographic dealers. Business was great and we exhibited at beautiful shows. This was the tail end of the last wave of great older boomer collectors, there was an interest and institutional knowledge extant in those days that will never be repeated again in our lifetimes. Buyers with an interest and love for beauty and history.

John and Kim's dealers developed a deep friendship and camaraderie. We ate together and drank together, bought from each other, competitive but supportive. Same for Albuquerque.

Chris was the wife of longtime dealer and friend Lew Bobrick, who we lost far too early. She sort of faded into the sunset after Lew died, didn't visit at all that I can remember, didn't make it to John's memorial.

Michael said that he talked to her about coming and seeing the old crowd a few years ago and had to tell her that they mostly didn't exist any more. Dead or nearly dead or possibly doing something else. She would know me and Leslie and a few others. She never made it.

I got up at two last night, couldn't sleep, my mind thinking about all the faces and good souls from our long tenure that have since departed our mortal coil. Baughman and Gentry and Brooks, all the people you see in this photograph. LewBob, Mark and Gunther, Favors, Joyce, Rosenthal, Laney, Rita, Reggie, Economos, McCullough, Skip H.,  Skip V., so many more that we dearly miss. 

Rob from the crew hurt. John's passing left a big hole in my heart, it will never go away. Same with Don Baughman. Did you know that I met him when I was fifteen? We were out on the hippie trail together. Been so long now since he left.

I could get maudlin and say that we will be joining you all soon but I won't go there. Enjoy the good times, they don't last forever and don't forget to tell the people you love how much they mean to you.

Goodbye Chris.