Long-time Princeton High School art teacher John Kavalos died Jan. 11 after undergoing heart bypass surgery. His passing loosed a flood of emotion and memories from two decades of PHS students who had taken classes with him.
Kavalos wrote on Facebook on Dec. 30: “Very odd time for me this—final week before surgery. Lots of interaction with the hospital staff for pre-operative procedures etc… And then walking (if able) out to the car and home. It’s as if the inevitability of the seriousness of what I’ll be going through has yet to hit me (or given my past brush with surgical mortality) I just don’t give a shit.
Please forgive me the lateness of telling you all this—I’m still kind of reeling from your expressions of kindness and support.
You shame me by your love.”
Amanda Shaffer, PHS Class of 2009, reflected on what Kavalos meant to her.
“Jesus Christ, take those drawings down—they’re nauseating!”
I found this quote written down in my ’08–’09 assignment book, where I had a habit of jotting down funny or interesting things I heard in school. John Kavalos had said this to my senior year art class when we hung up our animal skull drawings for a critique.
To someone who didn’t know him, this may seem like a harsh thing to say to a bunch of teenagers. To me it exemplifies Kavalos’ sense of humor and respect for his students. He expected the best from us and wouldn’t shy away from giving us an honest opinion. He treated us as equals, not children. When asked if he liked teaching, he’d say he was just there for the money and wished he could leave to paint instead. We all knew, though, that he always put his students first.
I’ve been drawing since I could hold a pencil, so all through high school I knew I’d want to go to college to study art. When my junior year came around, I wasn’t able to take an art class because it conflicted with Studio Band, PHS’s most prestigious jazz band. I signed up for Kavalos’ AP Art History class just to have any art at all in my schedule.
This turned out to be one of the best decisions I ever made; Kavalos taught me more about art history than any professor, and the 10-page research paper he had us write more than prepared me for college.vAt the end of the school year, when it was time to set up the next year’s schedules, I talked to him about the possibility of being let into the senior level art class even though I’d missed a year. Instead of dismissing me, he told me he’d fight for me to get into that class.
Besides getting to know me through his art history class, he’d seen my artwork freshman and sophomore year (because despite constantly complaining about underclassmen, he sat in on almost all of their art classes). He knew I’d only missed out on the class because it was at the same time as Studio Band, and he understood the ridiculous amount of commitment and work involved with that—he’d been close friends with Dr. Biancosino, the former band director who’d passed away in 2003 and brother of one of the band directors at the time, Joe Downey. He respected my enthusiasm for art and agreed that I should be put in a class with equally serious students.
When it came to choosing a college, Kavalos was always willing to discuss which art schools were great and which weren’t worth our time. I first heard him talk about his alma mater, Syracuse University, when I was a sophomore. I ended up visiting it that year on his advice. When it was time to apply to colleges, I applied to all art schools and one university: Syracuse.
Kavalos pretended not to care too much when he wrote me a recommendation letter, but I’m sure his letter helped me to get in. When I told him I’d been accepted and decided to go there for illustration, though, he was happier than I’d ever seen him. After the initial surprise wore off, he immediately made fun of me for choosing to major in a commercial art rather than a fine art. Despite his initial teasing, for the rest of the school year I could always tell when he saw me in the hallway because I’d hear him bellow over the crowds, “SU!”
It had been a while since I’d last seen him, about 5 years since the last “SU!” when I’d visited him during college. It doesn’t seem like that long, though. He’s always been there in my conversations with my friends from high school. He’s always been online, switching facebook profiles every couple of years, posting the strangest collection of art and thoughts, and wishing me an annual all-caps “HAPPY BIRTHDAY AMANDA!!!” Most importantly, though, the lessons he taught me have always been and will always be there to push me to question the norm, to treat everyone as an equal, and to make drawings that wouldn’t nauseate him.
Amanda Shaffer graduated summa cum laude from Syracuse University with a bachelor degree in illustration. She is a marketing design associate for Open Road Integrated Media and lives in the Astoria section of Queens, New York.
