As I sit down to write this post, I find myself having difficulty
finding the right words to describe who Mac was as a person, a teacher, a
mentor and a friend. I find this hard not because he was an
unremarkable person, or that there is little to say, but because he was
that extraordinary, and it's difficult to know where to start. I came to
Converse as a 24 year old transfer student, coming straight out of some
pretty life altering events. As I started my classes, I had trouble
pinning down my artistic direction mainly because I wasn't sure what
direction i was going in myself. Mac was the first to tell me that what I
was feeling was alright and instead of telling me what direction he thought I
should be focusing on, he told me what he saw developing in my work. He
gave me something in my art that I wasn't able to give myself,
perspective. He encouraged me to develop my intuition, to listen to that little, subtle voice inside telling me the direction that I needed to go . He introduced me to the idea that art for arts sake can be enough
of a reason to create, that a work doesn't need to have an underlying
social or emotional reason to make it valuable. He taught me to
celebrate life through my art, and that the only thing that can limit
the scope of our dreams is ourselves. I had the honor of being a student
of Macs for a year and a half, not nearly long enough if you ask me. He
had one of those beautiful, infectious souls that could touch the heart of almost anyone and
we, his students, were the lucky recipients. He will live on not just
through his family, or his art, but in the hearts and minds of every
student who passed through his classroom. His inspired, creative mind
continues to influence us, as we now take up his mantle of finding
beauty in the world around us.
Thank you Mac not only for being who you
were, but for making us who we are. We will never forget you.
http://www.southcarolinaarts.com/verner/2013/artsed.shtml
http://www.converse.edu/news-article/2014/03/converse-mourns-passing-beloved-professor-mayo-mac-boggs
http://www.goupstate.com/article/20140311/ARTICLES/140319944
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