Finding Jean Cohen: An Aunt's Art, A Nephew's Journey

When my Aunt Jean was in town for my wedding in 1996 she told me that some people take the conventional path through life and some have to follow their own. She said that I was one that she thought may need to follow my own.

I knew she was right.

It took me some time to get there really, but I’d always been that way. I played football like my brothers and continued to do that into college at the University of Michigan - following the roadmap of go-to-school-get-a-job. But I also loved to write, I played in my high school orchestra and I’m a music fanatic and a history fanatic. I was always diving into my interests and knowing that corporate America was NOT for me. I was always pursuing. Pursuing, pursuing, pursuing.

Finding Jean Cohen

My Aunt Jean had an impact on me, and she certainly didn’t take a “conventional” path. She was an artist, and she was unconventional among the unconventional. She was eccentric - a “crazy cat lady” (like my wife Ally - the crazy cat lady part) who, as I understand it, may not have advocated for herself consistently or made the best decisions for her career.

I don’t think she made the best decisions personally either. As my parents would tell it she was in a couple of not-so-great relationships, and at one point she starting signing her work as “Jean Cohen Miller.” WHY would she do that…. ugh. This Miller guy was not THE guy and she was already established. And I don’t even think he was the biggest loser of the lot.

Alex Katz - yes that Alex Katz - was clearly the most solid of her partners, but I don’t think they were ever completely in love. I think they were close friends and it was convenient. Alex says as much in this piece on his website. They parted after about 5 years of marriage and I believe remained on good terms after their divorce. He did create at least one drawing and one painting of her that I know of, and there is this photo of the two of them on the Smithsonian website from 1950 that I love.

To Maine…

I was aware of the Maine connection and that my family had visited there before. My brother Dan has made many trips up there. I had vague visuals from the landscape paintings I’d seen by Aunt Jeannie - several of them were on my parents’ walls. But I didn’t really know the story very well until recently. I’ve been obsessed with the National Park System for many years - often with the historical units of the NPS and our bucket list roadtrip of two years ago out west has me obsessed with the National Parks as well. So Acadia National Park seemed like a logical choice for a recent road trip since we had never been to Boston OR Maine and we could retrace some of her steps along the way. The trip was epic, and you can read about it with a ton of photos here.

Lincolnville

I found that Aunt Jeannie spent time in Lincolnville, ME, originally moving there with Alex Katz, Lois Dodd and Bill King - two other married artists who attended Cooper Union with Jean and Alex. I found the Lincolnville Historical Society online and emailed them - figuring it might be a long shot, and I got a call from someone there who knew my Aunt! She even gave us directions up to the road where the barn and the blacksmith shack was where they lived. We drove there, found the house and knocked on the door. The folks who live there now couldn’t have been nicer and they even had a framed photo of what it originally looked like back in the day before the structure was moved, renovated and added to.

Incredible to see that photo. Both Alex Katz and Lois Dodd still spend time up there and I’m hoping to get in touch with them to find out more about those days if possible. Stay tuned. Meanwhile here’s the painting Alex Katz did of my Aunt Jean in 1953:

Skowhegan

They were all involved with the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture which was founded in 1946 by artists and it’s a 9 week summer program next to gorgeous Wesserunsett Lake. They all studied and taught there as I understand it. There is housing for both students and faculty along the shores of the lake on the property that the school owns. What a beautiful setting with little free standing studios all around - it feels like a summer camp. It’s private property but the groundskeeper was really nice when we told him why we were there and we were able to take a look around. It was so cool to see the grounds and the lake that I had seen Aunt Jeannie’s paintings of my whole life, and to picture her sitting there painting it.

Aunt Jeannie and Lois Dodd opened the Accent Gallery in Lakewood, ME - a town next to Skowhegan also on Wesserunsett Lake in a garage converted by Alex Katz and Bill King. Lois Dodd reminisces about it in a 2015 interview published here on Hyperallergic.com. The Jean Cohen papers at the Smithsonian site include a photo of the gallery and a couple of Aunt Jean in the gallery - so cool.

I felt her presence on this trip as we retraced the places where she spent many of her days. I have a lot of fond memories of my Aunt Jeannie. I remember visiting her loft in the West Village in NYC on a trip when I was younger, sitting in my bedroom in Farmington Hills playing records for her - introducing her to Prince and just talking music. She had a sharp wit and we always clicked.

The last time I saw my Aunt Jean was in 2010, three years before she passed. We took a family trip to New York and by this point her health wasn’t the best and she was having a hard time taking care of herself. She was living in her house in Shirley on the south shore of Long Island and there was a local couple who had been looking out for her. They picked her up and brought her to their house and we had a nice visit where I interviewed my Aunt Jean on camera about family and growing up with my grandparents. I’m so glad I did that, and I wish I would have asked more about her life as an artist. I wish I had more time. I’m glad I did it though, and that she got to see my kids and that they were old enough to remember her now - she never had any of her own.

Her art hangs on the walls of my home and she has pieces in some of the top collections in the world including The Met, The MOMA and The Whitney. She even has one that belongs to the Wright State University Museum in Dayton, OH which seems a bit random and crazy to me. In a past corporate life I worked ONE MILE down the street from Wright State. I was only 23 and would not have known. I reached out to them as well, and they sent me back an archived correspondence between them and Aunt Jean about the piece they accepted into their collection. They were very helpful with instructions for the image credit below:

There is a detailed bio of her life at this link on the website of the Berry Campbell Gallery in New York City. I spoke with Martha Campbell at the gallery and she told me they LOVE my Aunt Jean’s art. They even had an exhibition of her work there last year. I will be visiting that gallery next time I am in New York - I can’t wait, and I’m sure I’ll have a blog post about it. You can see their collection of her works here along with the publication from the exhibition they had there of her work in 2024.

I look at her art every day since we have a few pieces on the walls of our home… here are a few below:

I’m just getting started learning more about my Aunt Jean’s life and her art. It’s been a personal and rewarding ride, and I hope you’ve enjoyed it so far. Stay tuned…

M10 Social is owned by Doug Cohen in West Bloomfield, MI and provides social media training and digital marketing services from the Frameable Faces Photography studio Doug owns with his wife Ally. He can be reached there at tel:248-790-7317, by mobile at tel:248-346-4121 or via email at mailto:doug@frameablefaces.com. You can follow Doug’s band Vintage Playboy at their Facebook page here. You can also visit our other business Detroit Jerky at the website www.DetroitJerkyLLC.com!

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M10 Blog

Finding Jean Cohen: An Aunt's Art, A Nephew's Journey

Finding Jean Cohen

To Maine…

Lincolnville

Skowhegan

M10 Social