Painter Everhart still working for Peanuts

Kimberley McGee

Friday, Jan. 25, 2002 | 8:39 a.m.

A friendship bound by the funnies has lifted Tom Everhart to serious status in the arts world, and has seen him through a life-threatening disease.

The U.S. gallery premiere of Everhart's exhibit "Fifty Ways to Laugh," featuring the late cartoonist Charles M. Schulz's Peanuts characters, is on display through Feb. 28 at Entertainment Galleries in the Grand Canal Shoppes at The Venetian.

The exhibit's 50 paintings on paper feature Everhart's interpretations of Snoopy and Co. in playful poses.

From his studio in Venice Beach, Calif., Everhart, 48, said the Peanuts characters have been an inspiration to him since he met Schulz in 1980.

Soon after their chance encounter at a business meeting they became fast friends, Everhart said. They talked weekly by phone, discussing art techniques, concepts and comic strips.

Under Schulz's tutoring, Everhart became an expert at duplicating his friend's characters on paper and canvas.

In 1990 Everhart was given legal rights by Schulz to reproduce the cartoonist's characters.

"I didn't understand why he did that at the time, but he said to me, 'You never know, the players change so often,' " Everhart said. "He didn't want someone to come along and tell me I couldn't (duplicate his characters). That would have broken my heart."

Everhart's canvases have appeared in museums around the world, including the Louvre in Paris and the Museum of Osaka in Japan.

The "Fifty Ways to Laugh" collection is the latest and probably most personal endeavor, Everhart said.

Produced after the Sept. 11 attacks, the 50 images -- one for each state -- are a reminder that we all need to laugh through hardship, he said.

"We need some sort of way to recover or we will nose dive," Everhart said. "I've found laughter has been the best way to recover."

He speaks from experience.

In 1988 Everhart was diagnosed with liver and colon cancer. After two 10-hour surgeries, he was placed on chemotherapy. Each day that he sat in a chair to receive the treatment, he drew abstract landscapes in a sketchbook and often spoke to Schulz by telephone.

In 1990 he returned to drawing posters and magazine covers for Schulz, who occasionally hired artists to assist him in drawing ads featuring Peanuts characters.

With Schulz's blessing Everhart began to paint the Peanuts characters on canvas.

"He was very supportive," Everhart said of Schulz, who died last February.

Everhart has since delved deeper into the moods and mayhem of the Peanuts characters. "Snooze Alarm Boogie," a lithograph featuring Snoopy and Linus in restful slumber before the buzz of an alarm, and "Dancing in the Rain," a black-and-white image of a sad Snoopy, are two new lithographs included in the exhibit at The Venetian.

"One of the things that got me through my recovery was laughter," Everhart said. "It's hard to be upset with a 12-foot Snoopy head (on canvas) looking at you.