When I thought about today being International Women’s Day, I had a lot of women come to mind.
My mom, of course. The absolute strongest woman on the planet and I’ll fight you over it. In her prime, she could outwork the strongest man you could find and I’d put money on her outworking most of them still to this day. She’s a beast in the best, most respectable way.
My aunt LJ, who you can read about on this blog somewhere in the past. Former Head Nurse in the ER who enjoyed physically removing rowdy troublemakers from the waiting room.
My wife, who obviously deserves some sort of medal or sainthood for “enduring” me.
My daughter, who just in the last few weeks, overcame some self-doubt and bounced back to have one of her best track meets ever. (If you’ve ever run more than a few steps on purpose, you’ll get the importance of this.)
My students, and please forgive my ignorance on how to word this if it offends anyone, who seem to me to be about 90% female in number. I know that not all prefer the “she/her” pronouns and I also know that some of my more “male” students may prefer “she/her/they” pronouns, but I can personally attest to their strength and endurance in one of the most physically demanding studio areas. For whatever reason, I tend to have less than 5 guys in my classes each semester. Women rule the sculpture studio. These women can weld, grind, chainsaw, hammer, bend steel, carry 50 pound bags of plaster and move very heavy sculptures and they can do it better than most men.
It was thinking about my students and their general badassery that got me thinking about another strong woman from my past. Mary Freakin’ Mintich.
“Freakin’” was not, of course, her middle or maiden name. In my memories of her, though, it is implied. He name was actually Mary Ringleberg Mintich and we just happen to be coming up on the 10th anniversary of her death.
Mary, or Ms. Mintich, was my undergraduate sculpture professor. Before I reached her class, I would see this older lady walking the halls of McLauren Hall and Rutledge on the campus of Winthrop University. She was always smiling, never in a hurry, and she was always wearing the coolest socks with her Birks. To this day, when I think of a college professor, she is the image that comes to mind.
Her office was on the main floor of McLauren and just outside her door was a large sculpture. A tall pyramid with a mirrored face and a small, metallic resin cloud near the top. It occurs to me just as I’m typing this that the cloud image that I have used so regularly in my work all these years was embedded in my brain on those daily walks down that hallway 20+ years ago.
Inside the office, she had a small fridge and you’d find her having lunch with her friend David Freeman while also doling out advice like the most helpful fortune cookie writer ever. It was often not the advice you thought you were seeking, but it was always the exact advice you really needed.
The sculpture studio, though, that’s where she belongs in my memory. She was a classic art professor, demanding that you sketch and think through every aspect of your project. She would walk around the class and look at your ideas and from my perspective now as a teacher, I understand that she knew immediately which sketches would be successful sculptures in a few weeks. She would ask questions you never thought of and she would offer advice that wouldn’t make true sense to you for weeks. Calling her wise would be a severe understatement. She was a treasure.
In 1992, when I had her class for the first time, I noticed that every sculpture I saw her make was larger than she was. Every sculpture I saw her make also brought the word “beautiful” to mind. If there was one thing she did better than offering wisdom, it was craftsmanship. Her work was perfect.
I took every class I could take from her while in undergraduate school. I even took a class my advisor told me not to take because it was during my student teaching semester and I have zero regrets about that. Ms. Mintich essentially had to make up a class for me to take that semester and it was a wonderful, one-on-one class that we scheduled around my teaching schedule. She may have had a soft spot for me since she was also once a K-12 teacher. She also seemed to like me because I grew up around so many sculpture tools in my dad’s welding shop. When it came time to teach welding to one of our classes, she decided to keep her socks and Birks on and let me teach everyone instead.
Or maybe I wasn’t special at all. Maybe that’s the magic of a great teacher like her. Maybe she had a presence that made all her students feel like they were liked and special. I wonder how much that feeling had to do with me switching my interest from 2D to 3D. I wonder if she had any idea how much she changed the course of my life. That’s power.
Thanks Ms. Mintich.
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