THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, February 18, 1995 TAG: 9502180270
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A11 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: George Hebert
LENGTH: Short : 49 lines
In the quiet watercolor my wife and I came across several weeks ago, a few dozen strokes of gray, yellow and brown had captured a salty Chesapeake shore scene - a luminous patch of water, a couple of old fishing boats, a nondescript shed on pilings and a human figure leaning back against one of the shed walls.
The painting itself, offered for sale among some other framed pictures and used household items, was what first caught our eye. It had simplicity, as well as a timeless quality. And the price was modest. But the clincher was the signature of the artist down in the right corner above the date, 6-42. The name was H.D. Vollmer.
For years and years, Vollmer - usually ``Volly'' to people around the office - and his Speed Graphic took most of the news pictures that appeared in the old Ledger-Dispatch and then The Ledger-Star.
But in addition to his hard-edged, black-and-white depictions of life in those days, Volly left behind a softer, multihued record, the local world as translated by his imagination and paint palette. For in his private time he was a skilled and often-shown watercolorist.
So the marsh-scape we had come across was a sort of double window into the past.
Those of us who worked as reporters or on the editing desks in those earlier days knew H.D. Vollmer, in print, as a daily credit line - as did almost everybody hereabouts - and in person as a key part of our hurly-burly work-place, unruffled by pressure or by those breaks in the routine of life which made much of the news.
As for Vollmer, the avocational artist, the picture we've acquired has some special meaning, too. Every time I look at it, I'll think of a little piece of conversation. No big deal, but just a dry suggestion he made one time when I was talking to him about painting.
I had now and then tried my own hand at it, with oils mostly. I confided - complained, rather - that I always got too detailed in whatever I was working out on paper or canvas. The results were always disappointing, amateurish.
As on the job, Volly's words were few:
``Use big brushes.'' MEMO: Mr. Hebert is a former editor of The Ledger-Star.
by CNB