IF YOU GO The "Women's Work" exhibit will be on display until Wednesday at the Margaret S. Sugden Welcome Center on the campus of Florida Gulf Coast University. Admission is free. The gallery is open to the public from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Mondays through Fridays excluding university holidays. DELIVERING YOUR WORLD • Subscribe to The News-Press • Join our reader panel • Printer friendly version • Email this article

A man can work from sun to sun, but a woman's work is never done.

Jeffrey Scott Lewis had no idea how much truth the old saying held until tragedy thrust him into the world of cooking and housework and laundry and single parenthood.

Lewis, an artist and San Carlos Park resident, lost his wife Rhonda to a heart attack five years ago. She was 38, and she had suffered from a heart condition that had seemed manageable until the day Lewis rushed her to the hospital and never brought her home.

He became a 40-year-old widower, left to raise the couple's three children, who ranged in age from 19 to 5.

So Lewis, then a display designer for Disney, decided to do an unlikely thing: Go back to college and pursue his longtime career ambition — art.

The decision wasn't simply a salve for his own wounds. Lewis quickly discovered that he could not work a full-time job and give his children the kind of hands-on upbringing he and his wife had wanted for them.

"Their days were starting off stressful. It just wasn't worth it," Lewis said.

He moved the family from Orlando to San Carlos Park to be near his brother and enrolled in Florida Gulf Coast University as an art major. Between his classes, Lewis absorbed all of the tasks his stay-at-home wife once managed with her Martha Stewart-like precision.

"Once she passed away and I got these roles, I was blown away by how much she did," Lewis said.

Now a practicing artist, Lewis is paying homage to his wife — and to all women, for that matter. His exhibit "Women's Work" is on display at FGCU's Sugden Welcome Center.

"When you get married, you just assume that the wife will take care of the house and do the cooking, even if they work," Lewis said. "The thing that's difficult about women's roles is there's no time clock. You're never off."

The paintings are actually long strips of canvas that Lewis ripped by hand, painted vibrant colors on, and attached to 3-foot-square canvases in a basket-weave pattern. They remind him of quilts, which, in turn, remind him of his grandmother.

The monotony of ripping canvas struck him.

"This is like ironing or vacuuming. The things that you have to do to keep a house," he said. "Then it hit me that that's exactly why I'm doing this. This is what it's all about."

As he intertwined the strips, he also thought about how men and women weave themselves together in their relationships. The ends of his cloth strips, he noted, were frayed. Life does that to people, he said.

Housework must be done, but Lewis doesn't dwell on domestic drudgery. He instead ponders his role as caregiver and wonders if he can nurture his children in a way that their mother might have.

His intention, then, is to not only celebrate women but also to challenge traditional gender roles.

"Can I nurture my children sufficiently or do they require a feminine parental influence by nature?" he wrote in an artist's statement for the exhibit. "What is women's work and why is it assigned in such a way? Does women's work have to be accomplished by a woman in order to be effective?"

"He's the best dad in the world," declared 11-year-old David as if to respond.

David, a skinny boy with a shock of frizzy black hair, sat on the living room carpet playing with the family's Labrador retriever, Pink. David and his sister Chloe, 10, had finished gobbling down a spaghetti dinner served on paper plates at the dining room table. They gave their dad's cooking their stamp of approval, and ticked off a list of favorite dishes: steak, crab legs, spaghetti and chili. Not bad for someone who had once steered clear of the kitchen.

The kids are surrounded by artwork, stacks of it leaning against the walls or hanging in just about any bare place Lewis can find.

"He has such an imaginative way of doing things," said Melissa, their 24-year-old sister, who lives in an apartment nearby and attends FGCU. "I love that he takes issues that not only affect us but that are huge issues in society, and he makes them beautiful."

Family inspired one of his earlier exhibits, "Recycling Children," a series of paintings depicting children — mostly foster-care kids — awaiting adoption. The Lewises adopted both Chloe and David as infants; Melissa is Rhonda's daughter by birth. Lewis remembers distinctly looking at David for the first time in a hospital nursery wearing a paper T-shirt because no one had left any clothes for him.

"The first time I laid eyes on David, I knew I would protect him for the rest of his life," Lewis said.

He said when he and Rhonda decided to expand the family, they agreed that a parent should be at home with the children.

"I just want them to be good people and to be happy," Lewis said.

The family lives on Social Security survivor benefits and whatever art-related sales or work Lewis manages to secure. The house is tidy, if a little shabby. Money isn't central in this family's life.

Chloe and David said they appreciate having dad at home.

"He wouldn't be able to play games with me," Chloe said when asked what life would be like if Lewis worked.

"I'd have to walk home (from school)," added David, pouting playfully.

But life is may take a major turn for the family. Lewis is considering pursuing a master's degree in art and has applied to several colleges both in and out of state. He's also looking for full-time work opportunities.

He struggled with the idea of a lifestyle change for his family, but he thinks it's time to move into a new phase in their lives.

If nothing else, Lewis said, the move will teach the children about chasing dreams and setting goals. As of this week, Lewis is still waiting for acceptance letters and financial aid packages and news of other potential opportunities.

Melissa said she supports her dad's dreams — she said she's watched him go from bachelor with no ties to a family man who sacrifices much for his children. She was 9 when they married. But she's worried that his dreams will take him out of state.

"I don't want to be that far away from my brother and sister. And, I need my dad. I'm 24, but I'm still a daddy's girl," she said.

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