Spotlight on Good People by Robert of Philadelphia
This is your go-to source for inspiration, shining a light on the unsung heroes of Naples and Southwest Florida. From heartwarming stories to practical tips, we celebrate the people who make our slice of paradise more connected, compassionate, and kind. In a world full of noise, we’re here to uplift, inform, and inspire — one story at a time.
Spotlight on Good People by Robert of Philadelphia
The Artist Who Captured Naples’ Soul – Paul Arsenault’s Storybook Canvases 🖼️📖
A native of Montreal, Paul Arsenault grew up in Hingham, MA, where his love for the sea and travel emerged. After graduating from the Art Institute of Boston in 1973, he began a six-month stint as a deckhand on a research vessel. He signed off in Florida in 1974 and began his professional painting career. With Naples as his base, he has embarked on painting trips to the Caribbean, Central and South America, Asia, the South Pacific, Indonesia, Australia, Hawaii, Europe, and the Middle East.
Paul’s early exposure to and knowledge of working ports and exotic harbors, combined with his talent for zeroing in immediately on the essence of a place, have made him a popular choice for commissions requiring extensive yet efficient travel. Paintings from these trips hang in public places and private and corporate collections around the world.
Annual fundraising shows have been a hallmark of his career, and since l983, these have benefited a variety of non-profit organizations devoted to health, environmental protection, and historic preservation.
Paul’s vibrant and widely collected paintings reflect a rhythm and pattern that distinguish his easily recognizable style. His lifelong pursuit to paint contemporary life in coastal communities is enhanced by his passion for history and his natural storytelling ability.
Paul and his wife Eileen live in Naples, Florida. Arsenault Studio & Banyan Arts Gallery is located a stones-throw from their historic home and vintage cottages that are nestled under a grand banyan tree. The Banyan Arts Social and Pleasure Club, a publishing division of Arsenault Studios, was inspired by the artists, writers, musicians, and preservations who have stayed at their artful compound over its nearly one-hundred-year history.
Hello everybody and welcome to the Spotlight on Good People. We're on location today at a very special place. It's our special guest today, an artist whose work has captured the heart, the soul, and the spirit of communities around the world. Paul Arsenault, hopefully I said that right, the French version. For decades, Paul has been more than just a painter. He's a storyteller, a preservationist, and an ambassador for culture through his art. Known for his vibrant and detailed landscapes and seascapes, Paul's canvases are windows into the beauty of nature, history, and the people that make each place unique, including our beautiful Naples. Paul's artistic visions remind us all to truly slow down and take in the natural beauty around us. He's truly a pioneer. He got to Naples just a few years before our family. My father brought us down here when Naples was just a small little town with some great snook fishing and you could actually drive on the beach. It's such an honor for me to sit down and have a great conversation with Paul. In this conversation, we're going to explore the inspirations behind his work, his journey as an artist, and the legacy he hopes to leave behind. So grab a cup of coffee or an espresso like me and get ready to be inspired by the passion and artistry of Paul. Enjoy.
Paul Arsenault:Well, ever since I closed the gallery, everyone thinks I'm dead. So it's nice when someone bothers to look it up, which is all it is. And being in the first corner of Naples when it was first established, because The only reason to come to Naples in 1888 was the opening of the Naples Hotel, which was across the street on that corner. Oh, it was. That's where it was, across the street. It was across the street. And directly in front of it was the pier where the little trunk was. where your trunk was wheeled down from the dock of the pier to the lobby of the hotel.
Robert DiLella:Oh, because they would come here by boat.
Paul Arsenault:For 30 years, you couldn't come by car. You only could come by boat. So the first corner was where we've been living for the last 42 years. Oh,
Robert DiLella:wow.
Paul Arsenault:I
Robert DiLella:didn't even realize that. I'd heard it before, but I... Yeah, never put it together like
Paul Arsenault:that. And in fact, when there was an announcement of the family that built the place that was coming to town from up north, Philadelphia, the Sloans, the little newsletter that the hotel provided for the hotel was that, oh, the Sloans have come down from Philadelphia across the street on, it was known as Ocean View Junction, that intersection, because the cupola faced out over the pier. And so they- What is a cupola? A cupola is, in my book, the little box observation, you know, with a little roof on it, That's a cupola where people would be looking out. Here, I'll show you what it looks like. So this would present the vantage of the ocean view junction. So this was the intersection right here. We're across the street from it. So that's just... And
Robert DiLella:only by water for many years. Only
Paul Arsenault:by water, yeah, right, for many, many years because the road was just
Robert DiLella:a sandy
Paul Arsenault:path.
Robert DiLella:And the Sloans from Philadelphia, which I didn't know, would that be Sloan Kettering? No,
Paul Arsenault:no. The son was the first private real estate guy who, real estate office, which was a pump house moved to the alley of the property where you could pay your rent rolling down the window, going down the alley to AC Sloan, who was the first private real estate office. on the property. He was in, the Sloan senior was in silver mines and different things. And the name of the property was Tacopa named after the Indian chief in the proximity of where he hit the silver that paid for the property. And he built four or five homes in and around old Naples where we were. So anyway, that's just-
Robert DiLella:Didn't know that name in the history of Naples. Or that they're from Philly too, huh? Yeah, right. Back in the day, yeah. Yeah. So, well, I guess to give people a sense, if you could tell us your story. Tell my story?
Paul Arsenault:Sure. Well, I was raised in the South Shore of Boston and went to art school, Art Institute of Boston, two weeks after graduating, signed on as a deckhand on a research vessel out of Woods Hole Oceanographic. We worked up in New England for a while, and then they sent us to Florida. And in 73... November, we sailed into the Indian River Inlet at Fort Pierce and worked with the Smithsonian. And we were asked to collect marine samples from the Gulf Stream to the Indian River Lagoon, which was projecting a huge... population explosion. So they just wanted to assess where the marine life was in the region. And the Smithsonian were the ones taking that project. And we were gathering samples for them. And I came from a town that had an attitude about Florida. Why would anyone want to go to Florida? This is up in New England. There's no seasons. It's all flat, and it's where people go in their final chapter. Anyway, coming to Florida in November, leaving brown, cold, raw, gray New England, and rich, coconut-swaying... flowers blooming, pelicans gliding, mullet jumping. Oh my God, this was a beautiful place. And I fell in love with the community there. And then when I did discover Naples, I signed off the ship and that was back in January of 74. So as of this week, it was 51 years ago. So that's what brought me here.
Robert DiLella:Wow. So were you, did you have an interest in marine life or what got you on the ship to begin with and when did?
Paul Arsenault:Well, I was always drawn to the waterfront. My grandfather had lumber schooners. My father was a sailor. And I grew up in this picturesque harbor town, Hingham, in the south shore of Boston. And I could paint when I went to art school, but I didn't have much knowledge of life. So I thought it would be good to sign on a ship and have a little adventure. And I just let the chips fall as they may as a starting point. And it was a wonderful catapult that brought me to the tropical light, which is something I've been part of and one with ever since, while maintaining my New England appreciation and what Naples afforded was an opportunity for travel, world travel. And I was very fortunate to be able to take full advantage of that.
Robert DiLella:What was the time in your life where you knew that art was your calling? It was going to be what you were going to do and do?
Paul Arsenault:Well, it's one of those funny stories in life. When I was five and a half, it was Lincoln's birthday. It was way before kindergarten class. I turned on the TV to a show that you drew along with Captain Bob. It was Lincoln's birthday. So I drew along with Captain Bob the portrait of Abraham Lincoln. And when my mother came downstairs and I showed her the portrait of Lincoln, the blood left her face. She freaked and started running from room to room. Who's in my house? Who did this? And I'm just sitting there looking at her, freaking out, thinking someone else did this. And so it gave me a lot of confidence that with a paper and pencil, I could be... I could generate a lot of emotion. And it was something I was good at. And I just kind of kept it up.
Robert DiLella:Wow. Wow. So that impression at five is seeing the reaction of your mother of something that you created. You could see the emotion that what you did drew out of her. It just lit something inside you. It did. Yeah. And you were just... had a natural gift, obviously. Well,
Paul Arsenault:my grandmother was a painter, hobbyist, and my aunt was even more of a professional, but her true profession was nursing. But as a nurse up in Anchorage, her Christmas cards alternated every year between Inuit children and Eskimo children. And it was so... wonderful to see the adventure that she had while simply painting these kids that were so foreign to what we knew, what I knew. And she was able to use those note cards and postcards as fundraisers for the different nonprofits that helped these children. kids. And it was a nice little message that I've taken on myself, utilizing my art in a fundraising way and in a way to call attention to certain organizations that need to be known and their purpose needs to be told. So it's an excuse for that.
Robert DiLella:Yeah. You've always been affiliated in some form with a cause. Yeah. And Helen helped. Wow, that's amazing. So it also took, I think, some courage to just get on a boat and then get off a boat in the middle of Naples in 1974. Not much here. No,
Paul Arsenault:there was not. But the thing is, I'd saved a little money on the ship, and I was... I was eager to go as far as just to paint the scene because it was a beautiful place. And I didn't really think of an added concern. The first thing I did in the spring of 74, after my first season, was... Back where Campiella's outside dining is was Swan Court. Oh, yes. And Swan Court, I rented a couple of chicken wire screens from the Art Association, had a little art show. And my housemate was a photographer for the Naples Star, the alternative newspaper. And so he was easily... able to present a professional-looking press package when I had my art show at Swan Court. And the first person to come by was Elsie Upham. one of the founders of the Naples Art Association. She bought my first painting, which was a really nice nod because she would have been considered the grand dame of painters, of Naples in particular. And it was terrific to get her acknowledgement from what I learned about her afterwards. But I was able to... make a go of it enough. My paintings were extremely discounted, but that was okay. It was coming away with a fund that could keep things moving along until the next one. I never really bothered about the I don't know what you call it, but the concern I should have by just going for an art career without having any kind of regular income but I just felt confident that I'll make it work one way or another and I was hell bent and of course there was a lot of peanut butter and sardines you know to keep things going you know but it was Naples was a town that if they liked it they bought it you didn't have to go through the song and dance you would up in New England which is you know like pulling teeth to sell a painting or was at the time.
Robert DiLella:Yeah. Well, there's something about that because my father, in a similar fashion, when we packed up and left Philadelphia and came here in 77, which there wasn't a lot here, but it's the same thing. He didn't have a job before he got here. There was no nest egg. It was in our motor home that we lived in, but he was so in love with the area. And I guess in some ways, like you believed in what he did enough that he knew he'd make it work out. He didn't have any sort of a nest egg to rely on. He knew that once we got here, he had to start cutting hair right away and get to work. But I don't know, that takes something because there's something inside of, like I call it, pioneers, and I think you are, to do that because it wasn't like you... You got hired to come here. No,
Paul Arsenault:no. Well, you know, one of those crazy shows like on Merv Griffin or I don't know, one of those kind of daytime shows had a guy on and he basically said, listen, you don't have to be a powerful bodybuilder to be a confident person. and doing what you want to do, going out in this world, all you really have to do is to use your mind and to be quicker than the next guy. And if you can guide the conversation, and if you can guide the circumstance with just thinking about the comfort zone of moving towards your next goal, I ended up not having any nest egg myself, and I was required to move around a lot as far as painting or just shifting locations with... Boston, Cape Cod, where I was living, even down to Florida, back and forth. It required not only drive away cars when it came to, sometimes when I had to come to Florida or to go back to New England, but I hitchhiked. A lot. And as long as I could guide the conversation, I felt very confident that I could make my way without having to be dreading, oh my God, now what's going to happen to me? It never occurred to me. It's just guide the conversation and keep it moving forward.
Robert DiLella:Wow. I didn't realize you had that in your background too as well. Commuting back and forth, hitchhiking between... Well, and
Paul Arsenault:it's not like I did a regular... routine of of snowboarding, I did travel a lot that did require hitchhiking early on. And I had some wonderful experiences with just the early on days of exploring back when. And I learned early that in guiding the conversation, you can really learn a lot if you ask the right questions. And so I I would love the adventure that was to come in going a long distance in a hitchhiking situation to a certain degree. I mean, if it was, you know, raining and urban, you know, it was no fun. Yeah, yeah. But you just plan it and guide it and go.
Robert DiLella:Yeah, but all of that was a part of what, how do you be who you are and how do you create who you created? Uh-huh, right. So it was part of the journey that made it. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I think of, you know, what was it like or what would it be like? Were there time periods where you were up against, you know, I've got to make something happen here. I've got to get some income here. I've got to make the ends meet. Did you ever get to that blocking point where what do I create now that's going to that's gonna work so that I can feed myself? Or was there ever that juncture for you, or was it just always, it just always seemed to happen? You were, that creative side of you was always able to flow.
Paul Arsenault:Mm-hmm. Well, there was, you know, several times when things were lean. What I did do early on was, After I was affiliated with several of the galleries here in town, I realized being a resident of Naples and only getting a one-week exhibition and then maybe an extra week as a partial exhibition was not enough to maintain as a local artist. And anticipate a consistent income. It was just, I had to basically shake the bushes in a more far-reaching way. And one of my first fundraisers was working with the Heritage Foundation that had just refurbished the Depot back in 1980. And So I had an exhibition there, which was a fundraiser for the hurricane devastated Dominica, which was an island that I lived in down in the West Indies. And it had just been totally decimated. And we did a fundraiser for them. And it was utilizing... the organization, the Heritage Foundation, and it was just getting a network going that would be something beyond myself and the proprietor of the place. The next fundraiser happened with the Conservancy where I did three years in a row, a Conservancy exhibition. And that really brought about a wonderful introduction to the community where I had a huge number of people come to my exhibitions at the Conservancy. And it... And from that point on, I was an entity and a contender for nonprofit fundraising options. So it went from there to hospice and to the Alliance for the Mentally Ill and for a bunch of different organizations that were both humanitarian, environmental and preservation. So that's kind of been my way. Is
Robert DiLella:that when a sort of theme evolved for you or was
Paul Arsenault:there always a... certain situations with the Alliance for the Mentally Ill is a really great organization for someone who has bipolar people in their families where you really don't have many options. You just have to know what the options are. And I have family members, and it was something I could do with my art to acknowledge and to be a part of the story and what I could do for my own family members in that regard. So there was that. And I have, as I go, I do... find different situations that I can be helpful with. We're working on trying to transform the baggage car at the Naples Depot Museum into a black history museum. And it's a story that needs to be told, especially in this town. And the baggage car is most appropriate. That was the ticket to ride, so to speak, for the black population to get a job that had benefits. And that was a very important part of how to take things to the next level with the black community. Anyway, we're working on those kinds of things and it goes on and on with just as you go through life, things become important to you that once you learn the story, oh my God, what can I do? And I find art is a great vehicle for that kind of work. way of introducing the story, the idea, the image.
Robert DiLella:Yeah. Well, I noticed that in talking to you before we started here, as you were describing some of the work that you've done, there's such a rich story behind each piece that I found so fascinating. There's this... It's not just, oh, I'm going to go paint that house. There's more to everything that you do. What goes into your... process of creating what you create, what's behind it? Do you just suddenly say, I'm going to do that, and here's why, or what happens inside you?
Paul Arsenault:Well, at this stage of the game, being this week my 51st year as a professional painter...
Robert DiLella:Congratulations. Wow,
Paul Arsenault:that's awesome. There is a certain... when you have that round number of 50 years to assess, well, okay, 50 years. So what's that mean? What is the significance of that? How can I make it something that's relevant and not just the fact that, you know, I'm an old white guy that's been doing it for 50 years? So basically it's... putting together these different 50-year retrospective shows. I have one going on right now at the Marco Museum. It's my 50-year retrospective. It'll be open until February 15th. It's been up until October 1st. And it's a great opportunity to show the example of 50 years of painting For instance, this painting right here of the old Marco Inn. I painted that in 1975. The invitation for my exhibition is the same building from the other side. And now here's a building from 1883. It happens to be condemned right now, but its history is remarkable. A beautiful old building. and well, it could be gone very soon. Anyway, my show is a show of paintings of 50 years in the region. The curator of the show didn't necessarily want to take my paintings from far afield, from anywhere else but South Florida. She wanted to make sure that people of South Florida could see my 50 years depicting our immediate region. So it incorporates places from Sarasota to Fort Pierce to Key West, but concentrating on, it's Marco-centric, Naples and Everglades City, Chokoloskee, and all in between.
Robert DiLella:Wow.
Paul Arsenault:So this can be seen- Yeah, you can go there right now and make sure you call ahead to make sure of the dates and the time. But I'm very proud of it because it was beautifully curated, beautifully hung, and it's very immersive. And I'm getting all these people that do bother to go from Naples to Marco saying, oh my God, Paul, not only thanks for introducing me to the museum, but Your paintings told such a story I had no idea. So the captions really have played a lot of the positive feedback because of the added dimension that the image didn't show. But oh my God, that's the story. And that's what's kind of fun about... my able, being able to put together a show that not only tells the story, but shows the story.
Robert DiLella:Yeah. I think that's so special, especially in our area here where, um, you know, so many people have migrated here over the years from 74 to now and in the last five years and the last 10 years, they just keep coming because it's, it's such a special place. I mean, Naples has got such a charm. It's so, uh, I feel so blessed to live here and, uh, to tell the story for anybody who's, uh, newer and newer could be 20 years to me or you know 20 25 30 years to still i'm i'm still learning about the area and these little hidden gems and these charming little places to go visit um you know what to do on a sunday you know you have so many uh little golden nuggets that you've captured in a way that we don't even know are amongst us or that we live live around so um what what are some of your favorites uh that you've captured from the area that you've
Paul Arsenault:Well, you know, there is, it's funny, you know, I came out with a book, My Journey as a Painter, right there. And it has paintings from all over the place, all over the world. And people came up to me when I first came out and said, Paul, you know, I had no idea you left Old Naples, you know, And it's because of the, and it's not like I wanted to be sentimental with old Naples or anything. It's just early on, I just love the idea of the little, the cottages, the alleys. And especially when early on, the little cottages that were built behind the main houses were, those little cottages were kind of sprinkled in the backyard, regardless of setbacks, so that sometimes you have this wonderful little charm of these nestled little cottages that kind of looks like the Bahamas because it's pre-setback and all that. And back during the Depression, the locals, to get by during the Depression would rent out their main house and slap up a little cottage in the back for their family to live in, and that was a lot of the motivation. So a lot of the... When you ask me what are the pockets that are left, there are... A lot of people love the little alleys and those little pockets of the... of the old neighborhood that are still there, that are quickly disappearing. When it comes to the beach, I love Wiggins Pass and Barefoot Beach because it's all native material. It's all... natural Florida fauna with the beach and the pass, looking across to Wiggins State Park from Barefoot. You know, it's my favorite beach you can go to without a boat, you know. And so there are just different little places that, you know, I don't want to... give up my favorite little getaway spots. But the fact of it is when you're at peace and you're looking hard and you're looking in the general scheme of things, we have a special place here with the weather, and with the proximity to nature. We've got the 10,000 islands, we've got the Gulf, we've got the Everglades. And when you learn it and when you can appreciate the specialness it can offer, we have a real jewel here. And so we just have to focus on that and the nourishment it gives us.
Robert DiLella:You mentioned Chokoloskee. Say more about that because many people don't know about Chokoloskee. Well,
Paul Arsenault:Chokoloskee is one of those little places that you couldn't drive there until 55 when they made the causeway using the shell mounds that were prevalent there from the Colussus, the early mound builders. The early Smallwoods store is there. It's a museum, frozen in time. It's not a Disney version. It's the real deal. That will lock you in to pioneer living in Florida, in Southwest Florida, in a big way. It's highly regarded as a... a jewel of historic pioneer structure. And...
Robert DiLella:How do you get there? Where is it? Oh, okay.
Paul Arsenault:Everglades City is five miles away. And you go to Everglades City coming off of the Tamiami Trail. And that's a few miles in from the trail is Everglades City. And that was the county seat. That's when Baron Collier, when he wanted to break off half of Lee County, he said, we'll let you have Collier County if you put in the road to Miami. So he built the Tamiami Trail, establishing Everglades City as the county seat and where he built his operation for the building of the trail. And then- you know, five miles south of that is Little Chokoloskee, which was a happening spot back in the day, pioneering days before. In fact, there was quite a colorful yet dark incident that happened with the desperado Ed Watson met his undoing right by the Smallwood store, he had been notorious for what was reputed to be his murders. And they finally found a body and the townspeople met him and did him in. Did justice right there. Well, when he raised his shotgun gun, um that gave that gave them the license and and they said that um um when they um When they did the autopsy, they got enough lead out of them to fill a coffee can.
Robert DiLella:The tea on Togolai, I didn't know this. I didn't know that. That's awesome. Yeah, it has some legendary connections there. Oh, yeah, it goes on and on. That's great. I didn't know that Everglades City was the county seat, too, at one time. Yeah,
Paul Arsenault:Hurricane Donna changed it. Oh, okay. So they brought it up here then. But, yeah, the old hospital was there. Really? Wow. Yeah. And there was the old Everglades Inn and, of course, the Rod
Robert DiLella:and Gun.
Paul Arsenault:Is that the Rod and Gun? Okay, the Rod and Gun. Mick Jagger, Sean Connery, all that stuff. It's had a happening history.
Robert DiLella:Wow. Five presidents, too, on top of that. So this area, we were also talking about, well, actually where you live, was only accessible by boat. Yeah, for like 30
Paul Arsenault:years because it was just a badly rutted, sandy track that you couldn't comfortably drive consistently. So you took the boat.
Robert DiLella:And you have a... One of the paintings you showed me was the Colusa Indians, it looks like, coming to shore. What area was that in? That was
Paul Arsenault:on the Naples beach. And... What's kind of remarkable is that when you think of people from 800 years ago, 1200 years ago, living here in Florida, to have the wherewithal to dig a canal virtually from the beach to the bay to eliminate You know, the five-mile polling down and all those miles polling up into the oyster beds and, you know, up into the bay where they were after whatever they were after. they did a canal, which was known by the early pioneers as the ditch that went from virtually Ninth Avenue South across to kind of where Blue Provence is, the city dock. Oh, wow. Really? So it kind of cut across there. That was the canal. And what's kind of interesting is the painting that I did, to kind of illustrate what it would look like with the Colussus portaging their Cyprus canoes up the beach onto the canal to cut across to the bay. They used my painting on the front of the archaeological magazine of the quarterly, and it just came out this month. And so that they... gave me the nod in my academic vision that put me on the cover. So that
Robert DiLella:was a nice thing. Yeah. Beautiful how you've captured so much of the unknown of the area. I think you've really done a great job of keeping it alive for people. And it's fascinating for me to hear this, having lived here so many years of my life, not knowing so much of what you're sharing with me, which I think is really cool. You'd also talked about for people that... Don't know, as I didn't know either, that these, whether it was the wealthy or whoever could afford to come here, at the time they'd come here by boat, and the Naples Pier was there to tender the boats, I guess, as they came in, or the people came in. Well, it was
Paul Arsenault:a steamship line, and that was part of the Naples company. They had a steamship line, and when Haldeman bought the plot of Naples, he got a couple of steamers with it, and he got the hotel, right? and all the outbuildings, and I think it was for $50,000. And so, yeah, and the steamer came in from Fort Myers. Originally, it came in from Punta Gorda, but then Fort Myers became the port for the steamers to then come to Naples.
Robert DiLella:Okay, and they would bring the people into the hotel there. You were telling me how that... process worked for people because they couldn't get here any other way. They couldn't get here
Paul Arsenault:by... No, no, they couldn't. And then they would charter boats. They would charter guides to take them fishing because this town for the Louisville crowd that first established where Haldeman was from, he had the Louisville Courier, the publication that advertised out to the Midwest, what he deemed as Naples being the sportsman's paradise for endless game and fish, along with the incredibly warm weather and beautiful white sand beaches with swaying palms. And that's why when I first got here in 74, the only license plates I saw were Michigan, Ohio, and
Robert DiLella:Kentucky. Yes. Yeah.
Paul Arsenault:Yeah, it was
Robert DiLella:Midwest for the most part. Yeah.
Paul Arsenault:And then they had these wonderful old Florida waterfront families that provided the– the guide pool for these visitors from up north coming down to want to go sport fishing. You know, there was the tarpon, of course, which was the legendary silver king, but there was the snook and everything else that was just so bountiful that anyone just trying halfway would be successful.
Robert DiLella:Yeah, and that... That was clearly one of the reasons why I know my father chose Naples, because we moved to Florida in 77, not knowing where we'd end up. We were in a 30-foot motorhome living in it. We had sold everything back home and Anything as a 12-year-old that I had, I was told I had to sell at the garage sale because we were only living in this motorhome, which was a great adventure. He took us on a lot of fun and spent the summer driving up and down the west coast of Florida from down in the Keys where he really wanted to be was in the Keys because he thought the fishing was premier there. My mother said, no, there's no way we're raising the kids in the Keys. We've got to go somewhere else. So it was Sarasota, Naples, back and forth, and then it did end up, fortunately, in Naples. And it was fishing. that he was, you know, that was why he left Philadelphia, the weather, of course, but he wanted to fish and hunt and be able to have that around. And snook back in the day were a great challenge. They were plentiful, but also snook were always like a challenge, a challenge all the time. I knew your
Paul Arsenault:dad as a really good snook fisherman, so he was good at it.
Robert DiLella:Yeah, absolutely. In fact, you mentioned the star. And Zach, we have some of those the paper that he talked about that, uh, was one of his launching pads. And so we'll have to put those up too. Cause we have, I think in our boxes over there, we have some of the old articles out of the star. Um, and there's an article about his, uh, fishing and being a stylist and being a fisherman at the same time. There was two things that he, his, his real passion, but this area I didn't know was known for that. People came here to sport for the sport of, yeah, I know Tarpon was, uh, was big, but you know, and, and also I remember the, The mosquitoes were also a big thing then too. And I remember going to high school here and having the old DC-3 planes fly over and spray the area with the, I don't know, it was cool to see as a kid, but they're fumigating us. Yeah, DDT.
Paul Arsenault:Yeah, yeah, it was. And they only came out when kids were just standing, waiting for the
Robert DiLella:bus. That's what it was.
Paul Arsenault:Yeah, it was, they held. The health department and the school department weren't in sync there. And then there was, and if they didn't get you with the planes, the trucks came by. The trucks would come down the streets, yeah. And then just kind of hover in the corner there where the kids were.
Robert DiLella:Yeah, I remember that. I remember that. I could smell it right now, the fragrance of the, whatever they were spraying on us that, yeah. And it was just fascinating for me to see these, as a kid, seeing the planes fly over. Little did I know what was happening to our internal, what was happening to us. So, you know, my mother smoked during pregnancy. So back then smoking was, you know, acceptable too. So it was different. My mother and father, both were smokers. And I remember Dr. Spano, I don't know if you know the Spano. Okay. Yeah. Everybody knows the legendary Joe, Dr. Joe, who's still practicing now at this, this they were good friends and they had gone out to dinner together and they all had come from work and It was the Sextons, the Spanos, and my parents. And they left at the same time. And on Central and 8th, I'm not sure which one on Central, Dr. Spano and my mother both left, but they were going different routes in the two roads. My mother looked down for a minute. She was leaving. She looked down to check the lighter to light a cigarette. When she looked up, the light had changed, and she broadsided Joe, Dr. Spano. Put him in the hospital really bad. He was in... rough shape. And I remember her going to visit him often. He would still see her even after that. He would go visit him in the hospital. And they could smoke in the hospital. They were smoking, visiting Dr. Joe while he was in the hospital. And ever since that time, whenever they'd go out to dinner, the rest of them for the years after that, David Sexton would always say, I'm going to skip out a little early on everybody. He would leave dinner early just to avoid my mother. But the old ways of Naples and the community and, you know, the old stories. And you had talked about one of the other legends in the community, Mrs. Gaynor, who was one of my dad's first customers, who you knew her father, which I think is, you know, the Gaynors were... I don't know, instrumental or other pioneer legends in the community. The Norrises, yeah. Norris, was it? Yes, that's right. That's right. Norris family, which there's the Norris Center. And so how did you meet him? How did you get to know the...
Paul Arsenault:Well, back in 76, I had wanted to hang out or I wanted to explore Key Waden Island. And so... I knew that if I wanted to go there and-
Robert DiLella:Were there houses on Key Waden then?
Paul Arsenault:There was a couple of little camps, but it was pretty, nothing was really happening. No one was out there in a regular way. And so I knew that if I wanted to go out there, it would be impossible to get permission to have a campfire and all that kind of thing. So a buddy of mine was visiting, a college buddy, and he was a writer. And I just want to do a series of watercolors. So a buddy of mine here dropped us off on a boat about four miles down from the club. And so we just wanted to go and hang out and not be bothered. So we didn't show our tents on the beach. We kind of covered them up so you couldn't see any indication if you looked hard. So for the first week, it was unbelievable. I did watercolors and it was just really a lot of fun. What time of
Robert DiLella:year was
Paul Arsenault:this? This was in 76. It was just before New Year's in 76. So it was December 75. I mean, yeah, 75. So after the first week, this is unbelievable. This is great. And we had a lot of rice and onions. But we were running out of the good stuff. But anyway, we thought, we can live another week out here, but we got to replenish our water. And so we decided to, at five in the morning, go to the pool house of the club, shower, shave, and get our jury cans full of water. And as we were leaving the pool house, this old timer with his placer with piping and a crest, and I swear he had a monocle on. He came in and we said, oh, good morning, as we're carrying our jugs out. Oh, and he just didn't know what he was seeing. My buddy had a blonde monocle. blonde ponytail down to his waist so he knew we weren't, you know, guests. So anyway, we just bug out and we're so psyched that we've got another week there. And just as we were saying, you know, God, it's just too bad we don't have a couple of girls here to share this with, we kind of hear this giggling and And we're just kind of sitting back on the beach in front of our campsite. And here come these two gals. And we say hello. And we had just graduated from college. They were college girls. They were visiting one of their grandmothers annually, invited each other down to come and spend two weeks for their vacation with grandma. And they were doing their annual walk to the pass from the club. And so we're talking to the girls. Where's your boat? We got dropped off. Where's your site? Well, we're hiding it. We don't want anybody to throw us off. I said, well, can we see it? I said, well, don't tell anybody. So we show them our site. I show them watercolors. And as we go out to the beach to send them off, all of a sudden this Marine patrol comes flying by and stops and comes right to the shore and points to the girl, get back. And the girls say, oh, no, we're going south. And he goes, get back, get back. And all of a sudden, a helicopter comes from behind the island over us. And so we're just saying, Jesus, these girls are a little too troublesome. So we're kind of backing into the woods. The girls decide or are obliged to go back to the club and not continue their walk. So we go through the week. We come back having to take the ferry back from the clubhouse to the shore. we are greeted by the manager of the club just at the beginning of the club property. And he starts screaming at us. We've seen you there with your campfire. You're going right to jail. The police will be waiting for you at the dock. And we said, hey, that's fine. We've had two wonderful weeks. Don't worry about it. And he was just very, very upset. And he just said, yeah, you're going to be in jail tonight. Just want you to know. Fine, fine. But we were just so blissed out. It was like no big deal. And he said, not only that, Mr. Norris wants to speak to you. So I said, okay, that's fine. We'll speak to Mr. Norris. Couldn't get a hold of him before, but... Anyway... So expecting this big burly guy, you know, proprietor, we opened the door and he's like Fred Astaire, you know. He said, well, boys, you know, you didn't have permission. Well, sir, we didn't figure we could get permission. We felt if we would, apology would be easier. And he goes, well, you got that right. He goes, well, what's in the portfolio? I said, oh, I was doing watercolors out there. Yeah, let's see them. Hey, these are pretty good. And then he took me over to show him some of his cartoons. He was a cartoonist for the Chicago Tribune. So he's just saying, oh my God, you know, this is great. And he basically told me a story. You know, when I married my wife, you know, she wasn't in line to, you know, inherit the chairman of the board ship. But when the one who was supposed to inherit it didn't, suddenly... I, the cartoonist, became that person. So, anyway, he goes, what were you guys eating out there anyway? So, well, as a matter of fact, there was a great run of those fighting conks, and we figured we'd get a couple of dozen each with every high tide. When you When you boiled them out, beat them with a stick and fried them with onions, they were pretty good. And we caught a fish once in a while. Oh, my God, here's 20 bucks a piece. Go to George and the Dragon and have a steak on me. And so that's what we did. So when we go outside, all of a sudden there's a group of people out there. And in the front of the group of people, there were two girls, the two girls that we had met. I said, what happened? And they took us to a site and said, well, as a matter of fact, the moment that the old man saw you in the pool house, there was a body that was turned up in Marco. And so there was suddenly an all points bulletin for any questionable people in the Marco, Naples, islands realm. And so... all of a sudden these girls are walking by these, what they could see were people on the island having campfires every night. So we were suspects. And so all of a sudden these two girls leaving the camp, Kiwain camp, were potentially in harm's way with an all point bulletin. Fortunately, by the time the girls were picked up, they had caught the guy. So we weren't routed out. So anyway, Lester Norris says, hey, I just met this artist, this watercolor artist that was out here and you gotta see his work. So that's how... Lyle Gaynor was introduced to me through her
Robert DiLella:father. Oh, that was his... Oh, my gosh. Wow, what an amazing story. That's incredible. That's awesome. Wow. It wasn't by... No, it wasn't at a cocktail party. That's great. That's even better. I love that. And the fact, I didn't know that that was his background as well, that he was a cartoonist. He was a
Paul Arsenault:cartoonist for Chicago Tribune. Yeah.
Unknown:Wow.
Paul Arsenault:And, you know, he had no intention of, you know, heading Texaco, but he ended up doing it. That was their, where
Robert DiLella:the fortune was from Texaco. Wow. Oh my gosh. That's incredible. All the years I knew her, I didn't know that. And to hear that story about her and their family there, you know, and the fact that he could, He could appreciate your work, too. He did. He could see and appreciate it. Wow. Yeah, that...
Paul Arsenault:And Lyle became a very nice collector, a very good collector. In fact, she gave me back a couple of really wonderful pieces that were terrific to have back. She knew that they would be important. So she was
Robert DiLella:terrific all the way around. Oh, yeah. A lot of special women, yeah. Very special. As one of my dad's first... customers and loyal till the very end. Loyal is the word. Yeah, it's just so special. Another one of those... pioneers or special people in our community and this is kind of neat what i think about having this opportunity to talk to you is kind of special because usually you just get little sound bites of people you don't get to really hear the full story of what um you know we talked about the media right now and the local media which you know we get to hear about what restaurants are opening or what restaurants are closing seems to be the headline of the day or um you know, a traffic accident, which usually gets a lot of clicks, I suppose, but not to really get to see. You talked about the star, you know, back in the day, the star was something that was special about that. Was it the way it featured the community and the people in the community in a special way?
Paul Arsenault:They did stories.
Robert DiLella:Yeah. Yeah. And to be able to hear your story, because I truly was, when I heard that I was going to have an opportunity to talk to you, I thought... how honored I am to have you, to get to talk to you, because there are a select group of pioneers, and I call them pioneers, that were here back in the day, and you were certainly one of those people. But you've been all over the world. You've been in so many places, and places I didn't even realize in researching you, and when you're showing me the book, and how many parts of the world you've been in, and even that you lived in Hana. Right? He lived in Hana, which is that...
Paul Arsenault:Yeah, no, and it's kind of nice. I have an eight-foot painting over the front desk of the Hana Hotel. Really? Yeah. Oh, wow. And the only way I could do that painting was to present my case to the elders there, the Hawaiians. It's a Hawaiian community. And, you know, there's Hawaii... And there's tourism, but there's Hawaii, the island, the culture, the native situation. That is, they really got screwed when their island was just taken over. It was absolutely an illegal takeover. Even our president said it was illegal at the time. But So there is a certain frustration, especially when all the land is owned by non-natives, a lot of it is. And so there is, but fortunately I had a dear friend who was Hawaiian, who did the ceremonial hollies, the structures, whether they were for living or ceremonial. And... when there was a big event, a big ceremony, and he had a special holly that he had just done, he would want me to go and paint it, which was an honor to be included. And when his Hawaiian friends, what's the holly doing here? You know, the non-Hawaiian. Well, he might be a Haole, but he paints like a Hawaiian, so that's what he's doing
Robert DiLella:here. So I got
Paul Arsenault:access to a lot of stuff that was really, really special. So it really enhanced my experience and my connect to the place.
Robert DiLella:For anybody who doesn't know, Hana, it's on the island of Maui, right? And to get there is... They have a
Paul Arsenault:bumper sticker that says, I survived the road to Hana. It's a rainforest on a hairpin road, coastal road that is very high up on cliffs. And when it rains, massive trees fall down. So it's a Jurassic Park experience without the critters, but the drama is there when when the weather kicks up.
Robert DiLella:Yeah. I drove it, and it's exactly, as you say, it's what I felt like I was in a Jurassic world, like another world completely, and in a Jeep on some of those roads, and they're not really roads, some areas of it. It didn't feel like a road. It was like a
Paul Arsenault:creek
Robert DiLella:bed. Yeah. It's so beautiful. Very beautiful. And to live there, I can only imagine, or to be there for a period of time, because ours was just to drive in, eat, drive out. Right, right. Well,
Paul Arsenault:it was a great gift to have that chapter. It was terrific.
Robert DiLella:Yeah, you've had some... You've also been in the Caribbean, other islands in the Caribbean that you've lived there, stayed there.
Paul Arsenault:Yeah. I mentioned the fundraiser I did for Dominica. at the depot. When I arrived there in 78, I guess it was January 78, it was eight months before independence was going to be declared there. And I had just been living six months in St. Barts, which was a very different kind of West Indies Island. It had a certain... glamour and a certain special quality that was not necessarily West Indies oriented, but it was a circumstance of a unique island that was French and- St. Bart's. St.
Robert DiLella:Bart's. What time period was this?
Paul Arsenault:I got there in 77. Oh, okay.
Robert DiLella:So that was before it became the Island of the Stars? Well,
Paul Arsenault:it was burgeoning with that. In fact, that's the cover of my book here. That's
Robert DiLella:Gustavia. Oh, I love that spot. That's one of my wife and I's favorite area. I didn't realize
Paul Arsenault:that. Yeah, so that's what it looked like back in 77. Wow. Oh, my gosh. So it was a glam factor for sure, but... I
Robert DiLella:got chills. That is one of our favorites. That's where she wants to go for her... She's got a big birthday coming up in May. That's where she wants to go. There's a restaurant back there. Shopping there is great and the restaurants are great. No, no.
Paul Arsenault:And to get there back in 77 was unbelievable because it was... Well, even to get there now on that little... I can't imagine that. But the core group of people there, the players, were all interesting. I got a telegram sent to me In fact, it was by that guy, that writer friend from Key Waden. He sent me a telegram, a blonde American painter. And that was the address. And it got to me immediately. Yeah, so, yeah. So, but when I got to Dominica, So you were here first? I was here first for six months, and then I went to Dominica because I really wanted to paint the West Indies, the real island life.
Robert DiLella:Dominica was a French island too?
Paul Arsenault:Actually, it was an English island between two French islands, which gave it a certain isolation, a certain... And it wasn't known for its beaches. It didn't have a golf course, but it was the most West Indies of the islands of the Caribbean. That was the idea, the point. And the fact that I arrived there eight months before Independence gave me the determination, you know what, I've got to do something for this special island. So I started an art cooperative there. So knowing that they need to show the art of this island when Independence came. And so I did that. And it was very special. to get to know this island. It's spectacular. It's called the Nature Island of the West Indies. And so I was there, and then I was called back to the States with a family emergency back the month after independence. And as it happens, my... My wife was so sick of me telling stories of my favorite island of the West Indies as Dominica, and I'm not taking her there. We finally went last February, which was very special. And we went there and loved it. Now her complaint was, why couldn't you have taken me here when I was 40? Because it's a hiking island. Oh, is it really? Well, yeah. I mean, there's cloud forests above the rainforests and boiling lakes and just a remarkably rich culture. A
Robert DiLella:lot different than St. Barts because St. Barts seemed to be rockier, volcanic almost.
Paul Arsenault:Yeah, yeah. There's waterfalls and parrots here. Yeah, and the biggest parrot in the world is there. Really? On the Dominican flag that was raised from the British back in 78. So in going back there, it was interesting. I had a... And it was wonderful that... one of the ministers of culture that was there became a dear friend. He put a painting of mine of Trafalgar Falls in the kiosk of Trafalgar Falls with all these photographs of the years that falls changed. There was only one painting. And that was my painting that was put there by Alwyn Bulley. And we were there three days after carnival when there was a memoriam, float at Carnival. One a tribute to Alwyn Bully, the other to Earl Etienne, the first student that became part of my co-op for Independence. Oh, isn't that amazing? So anyway, for not having as direct a consistent time there, I was able to set up a program where I did a talk. The money I got from the talk has gone to coral restoration of Dominica. And so that's what I've set up there for my return gift to the island.
Robert DiLella:So anyway, you do what you can do. Yeah, that's a beautiful thing. You've left your... You touched them in a way that lived on even after you left the area. That's what was
Paul Arsenault:nice because it's a very, very special island.
Robert DiLella:What would you say... I notice in this industry a lot—now, I'm not a stylist myself, even though I'm in the business, but I see so many young students, kids, who love to do hair or they're passionate about hair. It's an expression. It's an art expression. They just use a different canvas. And they often have to struggle with their parents who— have a college fund set up for them to go to get some type of four-year degree, but this art is inside them that they just have to always fight against, it seems like, to be able to turn it into the passion, to have their passion be what they do as a career. What would you say... to that. There's this budding artist in them that the parents and society has this four-year degree pathway for them that you need to go do this. And I see it all the time where, you know, sometimes they'll end up, you know, doing what the parents wish for them and go to a year or two, three, sometimes complete college, but it's really just not in their soul. It's just not in them. And this incredible artist is there. What would you say And that's how I equate it anyway to our business because there's a form of art there too. But for any art form at all, what advice would you give to somebody who's in that space?
Paul Arsenault:Well, you know, when I first came here in Naples, there was a real surprise gallery, the Harmon Gallery. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And it was Foster Harmon set up that gallery. And in fact, I think it was... when Julius Fleischmann bought Third Street to create a certain tone and tenor for the commercial street of Third Street. He gave Foster Harmon, who was based out of Sarasota at the time with the gallery, two years free rent to bring his high end museum caliber gallery to Naples. That was the first. And so, well, I mean, it wasn't the first gallery, but it was the first move to take things up a notch. And so Foster was, he was a very wise and cultured guy. And I had gone to art school, but it wasn't one of the accredited big gun art schools, not one of the schools that with an affiliation with that got me instant entree to museum situations. They gave you the fundamentals, you had to work it out. And that's what I did. But what Foster said was, Listen, Paul, pick 10 of your favorite artists of the age and ask and send a self-addressed envelope to them, to their studios, and get a 15-minute interview with any of them you can. Just talk with an artist that you appreciate, admire, and if at all possible, spend time, apprentice, but that kind of an education, taking it personally, to the next level would be much more valuable to you than going to some university at this stage of the game. You're a capable painter, but you need mentoring in the ways of the artist's sensibility. So I wrote out 10 of my favorite artists, with a self-addressed envelope and did all the homework I could with my limited means. And so I wanted that. I saw the wisdom of that, speaking with, talking to, being advised by someone who is where I want to be. However, I didn't get one response. In fact, when I was up in Captiva, about 20 years ago or so, 25 years ago, Rauschenberg, Robert Rauschenberg, went buying his bike. And then he kind of twirled around and said, you mind if I take a shot and use it? I said, yeah, sure. You can take a shot and use it. And so he takes the shot. And I said, so Robert, back 30 years ago, when I first came to town, to Naples, I realized that I needed to talk to some artists of the day that I wanted to talk to about taking things another step, the next step. And so I sent you and nine other guys, nine other artists, a letter saying, with a self-addressed letter. And basically he said, oh yeah, 30 years ago, huh? What happened? I said, well, not one of you guys sent the letter back. So he just kind of reached over, pinched me in the ass and said, you should have sent a picture and then took off on the bike.
Robert DiLella:That's great. Yeah. Love that. Yeah, I think back to my father talking about when he was becoming a stylist, or wanted to become the best stylist that he could be. It was a similar situation where he went to a school that was you know, uh, got him what he needed to get the license and, uh, and to go work. The recommendation at the time was to go work with somebody who, even if it's for free, who's going to teach you the ropes and, and, and mentor you or be your mentor, uh, for it. So he, uh, found this guy in the inner city of Philadelphia, which is about a 30 minute drive from where he was that he went to work with. And the guy was, um, and I don't remember the name. I know my sister would know who he was because in the day he was, this was pre-Vidal Sassoon. This was early, late 60s when women were still doing the roller sets and they do 20 or 30 roller sets a day. And before Vidal Sassoon came in and kind of transformed the industry and turned it into like this geometric haircut where they didn't need to put rollers in at all, get rid of the rollers. And he went to work with this guy who really was, drilled him, worked him really hard, but, but gave him the foundation of what she loved was, was great haircutting. And then, um, I remember in, um, after we had moved here and the money was in the roller sets, cause the women would come in once a week, you know, sometimes twice a week and get the roller sets and you do 20 or 30 of those a day. And you had this repeat person who'd come in a hundred times a year for 50 times a year, at least roller sets was the bread and butter. And, um, we, uh, at that time I had been working with him in the eighties and he, he, he never liked the look of the roller cause it was the same look all the time. And at the time he started to say, that's an old lady look and people don't, women don't want to look like an old lady. So he had this, uh, he said, but we're doing a lot of the old lady look and people are going to figure out that that's, uh, you know, somebody says, where do you get your hair done? They say, Robert of Philadelphia. Well, that's, do you want the old lady look? So he, he had this vision of, or this idea that, We can't do them anymore. We're going to have a burn the roller party, and we're never going to do them anymore. The
Paul Arsenault:juice can. Didn't they have orange juice cans with the rollers? Yeah,
Robert DiLella:it was just this... You know, we had so many of them. I remember all over the salon, we used to use them as, we used to take a wiffle ball bat and hit them with them. And upset a lot of people because he just made this declaration that we're not going to do them anymore. And a lot of people were really upset about it. And I was worried because I was working in the back of the house with the finance part of it. And I was worried we were going to lose a lot of money because, you know, that was kind of the bread and butter point. And there were a lot of upset husbands who were like, you're upsetting my wife and she wants this done. And he said, well, you know, this is the look we want. a look we want to create and probably which most people want, don't even know that they want it. And, uh, he had the foresight to say, we're going to get rid of those. And yeah. And, uh, the same way, um, in like, had I known as a kid, I didn't know cause feeding me was his problem, not mine as a kid, you know, I didn't have to worry about it, but he wasn't worried about it. My mother was on the other hand, worried about how we're going to eat, but he always knew that he could at least fish if nothing else, we'd eat out that anyway. Um, I have some rapid fire. You know, you've been, this has been so fascinating for me because I've learned so much and didn't even need to ask any generic questions because you're just, you're just so insightful as to what I really wanted to capture for the community, for this, this area. These kind of rapid fire questions, especially as an artist. So do you have a favorite color?
Paul Arsenault:Well, you know, when I first came to Florida on the ship, I was asked to be designated as the crew member that had to get certified as a diver. So it was up to me to get certified. And one of my dives for certification was at Penny Camp down in Key Largo. Oh, yeah. You can go to Key West or you can go to the Keys and you can see the color of the water and it can be very nice and it can be average and it can be spectacular, then it can be average. Well, the day I went the first time to the Keys, the color was spectacular. And the moment I saw that emerald green, it just became one with the love of not only the color, but the feeling, the emotion, and the geography.
Robert DiLella:Yeah. Yeah, there is something. Now that you mentioned that, because we would spend summers in the Keys, and there's nothing like that water there. It is something to see. And the shade sometimes, and the depths of the water, and you'd see it. Yeah, just when you get on that seven-mile bridge, we used to stay at a long, there was a campground there, on Long Key, right before one of the bridges. And it was just the summers we'd spend there and that water, that clear, beautiful water, and just seeing the barracuda and the parrotfish and the beautiful colors. It just reminds me so much. And it's still that way. That's what I love because the water is still, it's still just so special. And that's a good one. I never even... consider that in the palette of color, but I think that really is just, it reminds me of that, the days there, because it was a big part of my youth growing up here. The Keys we go to. That'd be fun. Yeah, lobstering. It's not America anymore. Yeah, not at all, yeah. How about a favorite artist or most inspiring artist
Paul Arsenault:for you? Well, you know, one of my favorite artists that is living now is David Hockney, a Brit, who just has had a wonderful career and has evolved beautifully and has been a great example for an artist who has, on his quest for his creative process, has tackled, mastered, and tackled more and more different ways of creativity with his art, with his painting, with theater, with stage sets, with photography. He's just a brilliant inspiration and he's an artist that's living today. He's great. As far as a favorite painter, Of all times, there's not just one. It's just kind of you wake up one day and it's, oh, God, I love the wonderful spirit of Toulouse-Lautrec, of Paris, in that day and age. I love some of the... classicist artists, Delacroix, and some of the impressionists, post-impressionists, Gauguin. I've been very lucky to have had a wonderful appreciation and different periods of loving this direction of where the art goes and the painting goes, or this direction. So it's... It's been fun to have so many great minds to kind of pull from as I go through life collecting favorite books people, our creations, our images that have been done through history. And it's a great life when you're living and breathing it to have to take things and assess things going forward, because there's so much wonderful talent to consider and to muster in yourself, okay, what's the next important thing to do?
Robert DiLella:Your book, which I now realize would be so great to have in each of our salons, because we're coming up on our 45th anniversary. Mom and Dad opened it in 1980, so we're not far behind you. But your book captures a lot of so much. I think it's a great table book that should be in every home in Naples, really. Can we get that? Well,
Paul Arsenault:you can buy it from me. I don't think there's any place that sells it anymore.
Robert DiLella:Online? Online, yeah. From you? From me, yeah. Just
Paul Arsenault:call and come over. I have a charming old floor Florida property that's old cottages and it's under the big banyan tree right by the pier. So it's a fun place to visit. I have that book. I did another collaboration with a couple, the Lairs, and that was the beach cottage book. And that was the provenance of the beach... homes of Naples and their story. And it was quite a successful book. In fact, it went through three printings and the Historical Society was the beneficiary of it. Unfortunately, it was on every coffee table of every beach house in Naples and when Hurricane Ian came, so everybody lost their book. And unfortunately, it was so popular that it's $400 now. So it's really a sought after book. It's a lot of money. And as it happens, my wife and I are coming out with a new book We've been somewhat stalled and delayed with COVID, with Ian, and with a couple of other surprises that have kind of held us back from production, but we're now slated to come out with it for next fall. It's a centennial book, Centennial of Naples, but it coincides with my 50th year of being in Naples. We're using old engravings and postcards. and photographs and my paintings and my stories. So it moves away from the standard canned history of Naples. But as you can tell with my interview, I've had a unique entree into the scene here and to be able to tell with my paintings and images the story along with the other part of the story that is important, but it's my history. that I choose to pivot from. It's the one that I think would be most interesting to people who are just looking for a breezy but profound image, story, history. Yeah. So that'll be coming up
Robert DiLella:next year. Oh, I'm looking forward to that. Okay, next year. Okay, so we're going to... stay tuned and communicate to people as that comes around, because we'd love to, um, not only see it, but share it with people too, because I think it's really fascinating for people to, uh, uh, you, you've, you are so full of so much of what people, uh, can appreciate about what this charm of this area and you've preserved it so well and you've spoken it so well. And not only this area, but so many beautiful parts of the world too, you know, which I think is so fascinating. And I, um, Certainly appreciate you taking time for us and sharing what you've done and what you've created. Oh, there's also a calendar. So it's the beginning of the year. It's 2025, the beginning of the year. So we have to make sure people are... Now, where can people get that too? Because I think that's great. It's a great way to start the year. Sure, sure.
Paul Arsenault:We have it at... Paper Merchant.
Robert DiLella:Oh, okay. Another long timer. Right, right. Yeah, great.
Paul Arsenault:The Georges. And Bruno's and Regatta, I think, and a couple of other places downtown. And again, my house. So just giving me a call. And yeah. Yeah, yeah. This could be our last year. I'm not sure. And, for instance, this happens to be the alley between 12th Avenue South and Broad. This is the new Annex Museum to Palm Cottage that is opening in February this coming month. So 12th
Robert DiLella:and Broad, so that is Broad is east-west. Yeah. So 12th would be the street before the... What's the...
Paul Arsenault:12th is where the pier... 12th goes into the pier.
Robert DiLella:Into the pier. Okay, gotcha. That's 12th and Brock. 12th and
Paul Arsenault:Brock, okay. And basically, since they did this, they put this hedge all the way up and a fence, and you can't see this anymore. So it's... It's just kind of, I'm trying to catch things as things evolve. For instance, my last year's calendar was Broad Avenue South. The three cottages on Broad were the most intact architectural series of homes from the beach. Thinking that who knows what's gonna happen with these beautiful cottages. Well, I guess in September, they tore down the middle cottage. So as I go along, I'm just kind of painting the scene as it evolves. And
Robert DiLella:yeah. And you mentioned your home and people going there or calling you to stop by there. Where is that? Because I think that's a charming little- Well, it's
Paul Arsenault:a corner of 12th and Gordon Drive. And so- It's under the banyan tree. And so just giving a call to make sure we're there. And usually we are. So that's, you know, we're happy to oblige.
Robert DiLella:Yeah. That's really special. I mean, to have that, because it is such, it is, my wife and I drove by it this past August. And of course, looking at all the changes in the area, because you could go away for a week and come back in a week and not recognize Naples so quickly. That's right. How much things are changing. But the charming quaintness and the... It just, to me, embodies what I remember of Naples so much. Well, right. And
Paul Arsenault:right after the hurricane happened and we were so devastated, people... people drove by and they would come up to say, are you gonna save it? Oh yeah. But they would say so much is gone, so much is devastated. The first place we wanted to look at to see if it was gonna still be there was our place. So it was like, they were just touching a part of what they loved about their home and to make sure that was still intact. And so that's what's, it's an, caretakers of this very special property. That's what's important for us to do what we can to make sure that is available and accessible to generations to come. So that's a big responsibility that we're working on right now.
Robert DiLella:Yeah, that's a beautiful thing. I didn't think of it in that way, that it does preserve for so many what we know of this area. It just keeps it in our hearts like that's it right there in your heart. upholding that special place that we have. I loved, and I really appreciate this, the story about your mom seeing your portrait of Lincoln and the emotion that you saw in her. And I really, that just kind of brings it full circle because I, as me having the privilege to work with artists every day. And, you know, they think from an artist's side of the brain, you know, they talk about the left brain and right brain and they just to watch their reaction. My father used to always say the gift or the payment was the was the love and the gratitude that somebody would express when they looked at themselves in the mirror after he was done creating what he created. And that was what gave him his fulfillment in everything. And you seeing that as a five-year-old, seeing the impact it had on your mom, what you, this out-of-body human that nobody knew what you were doing living there. And here you created this incredible piece that, moved your mother in a way and that's what this industry is and I'm grateful for it and I'm so honored that I got a chance to spend time with you and get to know you and the history and what you've provided for us in the community so one of the True legends and pioneers of our community. I can't thank you enough for spending time with us this morning. And we owe you a haircut, too. You've got great hair, so that's on us next time.
Paul Arsenault:Terrific. Good. I'll save myself. Thank you, Robert. It's been a great pleasure. Yeah, honored to have
Robert DiLella:you. Thanks again, man. Appreciate it.
