Obituary of Gobin J. Stair

Gobin Stair, of Kingston, died on November 26, 2008. Gobin Stair, artist, book publisher, author, free speech advocate, and humanist philosopher was born in 1912, grew up in New Jersey, and attended Dartmouth College where he studied with Sidney Cox, and Robert Frost, and assisted Jose Clemente Orozco in painting the brilliant and revolutionary murals that can still be seen in the library reading room. From 1935-38 he was the curator of the Carpenter Art Gallery at Dartmouth. He moved to New York City, where he belonged to the Art Students League in the company of such notables as Willem de Kooning, Stuart Davis, Misha Reznikoff, and Arshile Gorky. Stair developed a career in commercial art, working first in newspaper graphics production and then in design and production work in the book publishing industry. In 1956 he joined Beacon Press first as Production Manager, and two years later as Director. He was responsible for publishing such important authors as mary Daly, Herbert Marcuse, and Victor Frankl, as well as producing “The Pentagon Papers” – a collection of public documents and commentaries revealing the political realities of Nixon’s presidency and the Vietnam War. He designed most of Beacon’s distinctinve book jackets, and illustrated new editions of Shakespeare ’s “King Lear” and Swift’s “Gulliver’s Travels.” Stair retired in 1975 to paint fulltime at his home studio in Kingston, MA. During this time her wrote and illustrated “True to Form,” based on the Tao Te Ching “The Way of Art”, and collaborated with Robert Wolley on the multimedia presentation “Testament”. He painted “The Alphabet Mural” in the Kingston Public Library, and the “Evolution of Spirituality Mural” at the Beal House Parish Hall of the Kingston Unitarian Church. He has had numerous exhibits of his work in galleries in Boston, Providence, Cambridge, Duxbury, Plymouth, and Kingston. Most recently, his art has been shown with the New Art Forum in Kingston, the Celebration of the Arts at the Beal House, the PAC TV Gallery in Plymouth, the Visual Arts Center at Adirondack Community College in New York, and the yearly Arts Festivals. Stair was a member of the Unitarian Universalist Association, and also received an honorary doctorate from the Star King graduate school. He died peacefully at the Braintree Sunrise Assisted Living reside nce where he has lived for the past year and a half. He was 96. He is the husband of the lateJulia Stair. Father of Charlotte Rivers and Adrian Stair. Grandfather of Kevin Oliveau, and Yvan Kawecki, and two great granddaughters. A memorial service will be held at the Beal House, 222 Main St. Kingston on Sunday, December 7th at 2:00PM. In lieu of flowers donations may be made to the Gobin Stair Memorial Art Scholarship Fund, c/o Adrian Stair, PO Box 391385, Cambridge, MA 02139. Arrangements by the Shepherd Funeral Homes, Kingston.