Born in Hungary in 1900, Carl Pappe showed an early interest and talent in drawing, taking up the only tools available, chalk and slate. When just five years old, his father immigrated to the United States in search for a new life for his family. Six years later they were reunited in Lorain, Ohio. While in his early teens, Carl was apprenticed to a Hungarian muralist working in Cleveland. From 1921 to 1925 Carl attended the Cleveland School of Art (now the Cleveland Institute of Art).

Awarded a scholarship by the Hungarian Society, he enrolled at the school of his choice, the prestigious Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. He studied under Daniel Breckenridge and Hugh Garber from 1925 to 1926. The Academy awarded him a full scholarship but he was unable to complete his third year of studies due to medical problems. In 1929 he worked in stage design for Paramount Studios in New York but was laid off due to the recession. "If I am going to die of hunger it won't be here, he said.

Amidst the Depression, Carl worked crafting repairs to the gold leaf of the ceilings of theaters while refinishing furniture and sail boat decks in Philadelphia and Boston. He started a drawing school for children in Easton, Pennsylvania in a downstairs room of the Masonic Temple. Tuition was 50 cents per week. This was the first of many opportunities Carl took in instructing young people in the arts.

Carl visited Mexico City in 1934 and began to work as a cook and tour guide to earn money for rent on a studio where he could paint. He met Bernice Goodspeed, his future wife, an anthropologist and tour guide specializing in sites of antiquity. She became a designer of silver jewelry and authored books on Mexican folklore, illustrated by her husband Carl. They opened a gallery in the still quaint silver mining town of Taxco, southwest of Mexico City.

Acquainted with many interesting and influential people during his four years in Mexico City, he heard lectures on art given by Diego Rivera and shared the same Swedish doctor with his friend Frida Kahlo, Rivera's wife. He was a great admirer and friend of the sculpture Isamu Noguchi. He also worked to become an apprentice to muralist Jose Orozco, visiting his studio often. As a personal tour guide to Amelia Earhart upon her arrival via solo flight, Carl took her to the studio of Diego Rivera as well as the Pyramids of the Sun and Moon outside of Mexico City.

Carl's friendship with Carlos Merida, Juan O'Gorman and Ruffino Tamayo brought them to Taxco in an effort to escape the politics and distractions in the Capital. He died at age 98, in 1998 in Taxco, he was poor financially yet very rich in personal friendships. This series of original woodblock prints were found recently in a Taxco shop and are the smaller 6"x7" versions of the original woodblocks from a 16 print portfolio published in the mid 60's as "Taxco en blanco y negro".. CLICK TO ENLARGE | Home