Barry Moser in 1972, adjusting the second of Williston’s two printing presses. By 1969 the Castalia Press was producing broadsides and other fine printing from its home in the old Easthampton railroad depot.
Some of this is necessarily in the nature of a personal reminiscence. Barry Moser spoke at Williston Northampton’s Commencement on May 25th. (Listen here!) Today he is recognized as an artist of international preeminence; in September 1967, for this writer and about 400 other once-young men, he was a rookie faculty member taking over a visual arts program that was, quite frankly, on life support. Its transformation was swift and spectacular. And those of us fortunate to have been in Barry’s classes were transformed as well. Ever the iconoclast, he challenged every assumption any of us might have had about art, not to mention literature, music, psychology . . . all the while demanding that we see, not just look. Any student from his 15 years on the faculty will tell you that his were lessons for a lifetime.