Stirling Dickinson
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Stirling Dickinson (1909 – October 27, 1998) was an American artist who spent much of his life in
San Miguel de Allende San Miguel de Allende () is the principal city in the municipality of San Miguel de Allende, located in the far eastern part of Guanajuato, Mexico. A part of the Bajío region, the city lies from Mexico City, 86 km (53 mi) from Queré ...
, Guanajuato in Mexico, where he was one of the first members of what would become a colony of expatriate artists from the
United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
.


Early years

Willam Stirling Dickinson was the son of Francis Reynolds Dickinson (1880-1974) and Alice May Stirling (1884-1952). Dickinson's grandfather William Dickinson was born on a New Hampshire farm in 1837, moved to Chicago, and after joining the firm of Hugh McLennan & Co. became a millionaire trader in the Chicago grain futures market. His father, a Chicago lawyer, was a 1903 graduate of Harvard, where he was an editor of the
Crimson Crimson is a rich, deep red color, inclining to purple. It originally meant the color of the kermes dye produced from a scale insect, ''Kermes vermilio'', but the name is now sometimes also used as a generic term for slightly bluish-red colo ...
and a member of Signet. Both were painfully shy, a trait that Stirling inherited. Stirling Dickinson was born in Chicago in 1909, and studied at the
Berkshire School Berkshire School is a private, co-ed boarding school for grades 9 through 12 located in Sheffield, Massachusetts, USA. History 1907–1943: Founding and early years Berkshire School (for boys) was established in 1907 at the foot of Mount Ever ...
and then at
Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial Colleges, fourth-oldest ins ...
graduating in 1931. He attended the
Art Institute of Chicago The Art Institute of Chicago in Chicago's Grant Park, founded in 1879, is one of the oldest and largest art museums in the world. Recognized for its curatorial efforts and popularity among visitors, the museum hosts approximately 1.5 mill ...
for post-graduate studies, and as a graduate student went to the Écoles d'Art Américaines in the
Palace of Fontainebleau Palace of Fontainebleau (; ) or Château de Fontainebleau, located southeast of the center of Paris, in the commune of Fontainebleau, is one of the largest French royal châteaux. The medieval castle and subsequent palace served as a residence ...
in France. However, he accepted that his talent would never place him in the top rank of artists. In 1934 he and Heath Bowman, whom he had met at Princeton, made a six-month tour of Mexico in a green 1929 Ford Model A convertible. Bowman described their experiences in the light-hearted book ''Mexican Odyssey'', which Dickinson illustrated. The book sold well. They wrote a second book on South America. ''Westward from Rio'' records their extremely difficult journey from
Rio de Janeiro Rio de Janeiro ( , , ; literally 'River of January'), or simply Rio, is the capital of the state of the same name, Brazil's third-most populous state, and the second-most populous city in Brazil, after São Paulo. Listed by the GaWC as a b ...
west to the shore of the Pacific Ocean. The two men then decided to write a novel based in Mexico, choosing to live in San Miguel while writing ''Death is Incidental'', and first building a house that they called "Los Pocitos" in part of the ruins of an old tannery. The property cost just $90. After the book was published, Bowman married and moved away, and Dickinson bought his share of the house. He remained there, a bachelor, living very simply despite having inherited considerable wealth.


San Miguel art schools

In 1938 Dickinson was appointed director of the ''Escuela Universitaria de Bellas Artes'' in San Miguel. Dickinson actively promoted the new school, visiting universities and cultural centers and handing out flyers in several U.S, cities. The school mostly targeted foreign students and wealthy Mexicans, but also offered low-cost workshops for local students, teaching traditional weaving and pottery techniques and thus helping to preserve their cultural traditions. During
World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
, Dickinson served in Naval Intelligence and the Office of Strategic Services in Washington and Italy between 1942 and 1945. When
World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
ended in 1945, the
G.I. Bill The Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944, commonly known as the G.I. Bill, was a law that provided a range of benefits for some of the returning World War II veterans (commonly referred to as G.I.s). The original G.I. Bill expired in 1956, bu ...
funded free education for veterans. Many took the opportunity to study art in San Miguel, where the cost of living was very low. The school hired the muralist
David Alfaro Siqueiros David Alfaro Siqueiros (born José de Jesús Alfaro Siqueiros; December 29, 1896 – January 6, 1974) was a Mexican social realist painter, best known for his large public murals using the latest in equipment, materials and technique. Along with ...
as a lecturer, a prominent communist. He had a dispute with the school's owner, Alfredo Campanella, over funding. Most of the students supported Siqueiros, and in the end most of them walked out. The school was forced to close in 1949. Dickinson launched his own school, but without accreditation from the U.S. Embassy had difficulty attracting students. On 12 August 1950 Dickinson was deported along with five other American teachers and the Canadian couple
Leonard Leonard or ''Leo'' is a common English language, English masculine given name and a surname. The given name and surname originate from the Old High German ''Leonhard'' containing the prefix ''levon'' ("lion") from the Greek wikiwikiweb:Λέων, Π...
and Reva Brooks. The official reason was that they did not have proper work visas. It was said that Campanella had bribed officials to deport the teachers in revenge for the closure of his school. An article in the ''New York Times'' said the reason was that they had opposed U.S. involvement in the
Korean War , date = {{Ubl, 25 June 1950 – 27 July 1953 (''de facto'')({{Age in years, months, weeks and days, month1=6, day1=25, year1=1950, month2=7, day2=27, year2=1953), 25 June 1950 – present (''de jure'')({{Age in years, months, weeks a ...
. Leonard Brooks was eventually able to get the deportation order lifted through his contact with General Ignacio M. Beteta, whose brother Ramón Beteta Quintana was an influential politician at the national level. On Dickinson's return to San Miguel, he became art director of the newly opened
Instituto Allende The Instituto Allende is a visual arts school in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. The institute provides a range of courses, and offers a BA in Visual Arts and an MA in Fine arts in association with the Universidad de Guanajuato. Its courses and deg ...
. On 29 August 1957 the ''
New York Herald Tribune The ''New York Herald Tribune'' was a newspaper published between 1924 and 1966. It was created in 1924 when Ogden Mills Reid of the ''New-York Tribune'' acquired the ''New York Herald''. It was regarded as a "writer's newspaper" and competed ...
'' ran an article titled ''More than 100 Expatriate Reds in Mexico Viewed as Peril to US''. It said: "Two of Mexico's most picturesque communities - Cuernavaca and San Miguel de Allende - have become the headquarters of some of America's richest and most active communists. The real leaders of the group, Embassy sources say, are lbert Maltz,
aurice Aurice () is a commune in the Landes department in Nouvelle-Aquitaine in southwestern France. Population See also *Communes of the Landes department The following is a list of the 327 communes of the Landes department of France ...
Halperin, and a so-called 'mystery man' named William Sterling Dickinson...". ''
Time magazine ''Time'' (stylized in all caps) is an American news magazine based in New York City. For nearly a century, it was published weekly, but starting in March 2020 it transitioned to every other week. It was first published in New York City on Mar ...
'' ran a version of the story titled "Red Haven" in which it said that Dickinson "keeps open house for communists and fellow travellers." A Chicago law firm of which Dickinson's father was a partner threatened to sue and obtained public apologies from both journals. The ''New York Herald Tribune'' published an article that praised the institute, the low cost of living and the diversity of the students, making a point of saying "there is nothing Bohemian about the Instituto's group." Dickinson continued to work at the Instituto Allende until retiring in 1983.


Other activities

Dickinson was charitable, and gave considerable anonymous assistance to the San Miguel community throughout his life there. He was involved in many programs including schools, the Lions club and the local hospital board. On the 400th anniversary of the founding of San Miguel he was formally adopted as a native son of the town. He founded a baseball team in San Miguel, and helped the players financially. In return, they helped him with his other passion, orchid collection. Encyclia dickinsoniana and Cypripedium dickinsonianum are named after him. He contributed article to the '' Bulletin of the American Orchid Society In his old age, after retiring from the Instituto Allende, he became involved in a rural library program, continuing to help until his death in a car accident on October 27, 1998, when his van ran off the road and fell over a 50 foot cliff.


Legacy

Dickinson was one of the prime movers in establishing the conditions under which San Miguel revived economically and became a magnet for painters and sculptors as well as retirees from the United States. A campus at the ''Academia Internacional San Miguel de Allende'' bears his name. During the period from the 1950s to the 1970s the Instituto Allende attracted hundreds of students from the United States.
Beat Generation The Beat Generation was a literary subculture movement started by a group of authors whose work explored and influenced American culture and politics in the post-war era. The bulk of their work was published and popularized by Silent Generatio ...
writers including
Jack Kerouac Jean-Louis Lebris de Kérouac (; March 12, 1922 – October 21, 1969), known as Jack Kerouac, was an American novelist and poet who, alongside William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg, was a pioneer of the Beat Generation. Of French-Canadian a ...
and
Neal Cassady Neal Leon Cassady (February 8, 1926 â€“ February 4, 1968) was a major figure of the Beat Generation of the 1950s and the psychedelic and counterculture movements of the 1960s. He was prominently featured as himself in the "scroll" (first d ...
spent time in the town. By 2010 almost one tenth of the population, or 8,000 people, came from the United States. The impact was not all positive. Dickinson tried to get his students aware of the Mexican lifestyle and culture through excursions where they encountered the ordinary people of the region in their homes and workplaces, but perhaps did not manage to generate as much interest as he hoped. Where Dickinson lived simply and respected the Mexicans, newer migrants from the north have been more interested in a high standard of living at low cost. Housing prices have soared and the foreign community has become increasingly isolated from the local community. Dickinson and other foreign residents were also in the area.


Bibliography

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References

;Sources * * * * * * * * * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Dickinson, Stirling 1909 births 1998 deaths 20th-century American painters American male painters Princeton University alumni Berkshire School alumni Instituto Allende faculty 20th-century American male artists