Speaking of haunting, several people wrote or posted to say they liked Sunday’s A&J comic strip upon the death of painter Andrew Wyeth. I enjoyed drawing it; it was an interesting exercise. I refrained from mentioning Mr. Wyeth’s passing at the time, because I was working up this cartoon. I thought we’d discuss it when it appeared. Which is now. Got that?

So much has been said about Andrew Wyeth already, but this is my one shot at it. He was a great painter. If there are those who disliked Wyeth’s work, because they saw only treacly bucolic scenes, then they weren’t seeing the same things most people saw. Anyone who disliked Wyeth because his paintings were representational, as opposed to abstract, might as well have disliked him for the paint or the canvas he chose. Anyone who, for whatever reason, disliked Wyeth the artist because of Wyeth the man, well… do we even need to go there? I suspect the criticism of Wyeth was proportionate to the awe his work commanded. If there is a single better standard of good art than “it commands awe,” I can’t think of it.