I shared the stage at the Hideout once with legendary photographer Art Shay and legendary artist/actor/poet Tony Fitzpatrick for an event which was billed as an evening with legendary Chicago artists. I took my sketchbook up on stage figuring I’d be lucky to get a solitary word in with those two legendary talkers on the mics. The surprise was that Tony barely got a word in either. The then-93-year-old Shay has never let a chance to hold forth pass him by. I just sat back and tried to catch a likeness of the man doing his thing. Now he’s gone, no doubt busy telling St. Peter or whoever the gatekeeper is if there’s a hereafter, about his times knocking about the slums of Chicago with Nelson Algren or about his time fighting in Nazis in World War ll or about how much he loved his wife. With his passing one more link to the legends of the 20th century has been severed.
RIP Art Shay