Patricia Graham
The victim of a fatal car crash is remembered for her art and grace.
From her paintings to the clothes she sewed and the dinners she cooked, Patricia Graham never failed to see and bring out the wonder of the world with her creative, gentle personality, her daughter said.
“She made everything beautiful,” Lisa Brock said as she recalled her mother, an artist and former Milwaukee Public Schools teacher who died Friday when another driver fleeing police crashed into her minivan.
“She was elegant, she had a hearty laugh, a gentle and reassuring presence . ... This is a time of so much sorrow — more sorrow than I’ve ever experienced.” Graham, of Wauwatosa, was 85. According to a criminal complaint filed Wednesday: Near West North Avenue and North 82nd Street, Graham was hit head-on in her minivan by Marcedes D. Craigs, 23, who authorities said had been driving erratically when he veered into opposing traffic while he was fleeing a police officer in a squad.
The Milwaukee County District Attorney’s Office charged Craigs with one count of fleeing an officer that resulted in the death of another; another count of second-degree reckless homicide; and a third count of knowingly operating a motor vehicle while suspended and causing death.
If convicted of all counts, he would face a maximum penalty of 40 years in prison.
According to the complaint, Wisconsin records show Craigs had been driving with a suspended license.
Graham was still avidly painting and contributing to Milwaukee and the country’s art scene, her daughter said.
Graham had moved to Milwaukee from her farm in Wisconsin Rapids to attend college and study art. The move, Brock said, also began a 31-year teaching career and more than 25 years of showing her work in studios and galleries in Milwaukee and across the country.
“Art was life,” Brock said, “the rest was just details.”
Brock said many of Graham’s students considered her a lifetime mentor once they had a class with her because of her genuine caring nature, as well as teaching techniques often considered “unorthodox.”
“In her classroom, she would serve tea and play classical music,” Brock recalled with a laugh. “She really told the truth about life to students — some were broken or lost, and she always helped them.”
Linda Goehre, a fellow artist and friend of Graham’s, said she was struck by Graham immediately.
“I was taken by her work the moment I went into her gallery,” Goehre recalled. “I felt such a connection. We became friends and confidantes immediately, and I really admired her artwork.”
Brock said her mother was also a voracious reader, loved music and was active in her community, volunteering with the Daughters of the American Revolution and at Wauwatosa United Methodist Church.
Graham cared about all around her deeply, most of all her children and her grandchildren, Brock said, and that’s what her family will miss most about her.
“She felt she could learn so much from children,” Brock said. “And they learned, too.”
Goehre said she and the art community as a whole will miss Graham.
“She wasn’t done,” she said. “She had a lot of art yet to create.”