The "An Accomplished Artist And Author Known As Lawrence Bohme" Story

It was an ordinary day.  Came across a very interesting post on the "WE ARE ST.MAARTEN" Facebook page that was posted by my friend Barbara.  She asks readers if anyone remembers a boutique owned by Lawrence Bohme back in the late seventies in St. Martin or St. Barths?  She didn't, but did know that he had drawn many pen and ink postcards of which she has a few.  The post cards were amazing and featured scenes from Sint Maarten/St. Martin.  I enjoyed them so much that I thought I would check out other sites to see if he had made pen and ink postcards of other islands where Carol and I had visited in the past.  On Barbara's original post, she did give a link which tells the story about Lawrence, but I also found a few other sites that told a bit more about the artist.  Lawrence Bohme, (originally spelled Böhme) was born in 1942 in London.  His father was a German war refugee while his mother was a Welsh woman.  The family emigrated to Vancouver, Canada as soon as WWII ended.  His mother was an abstract artist who decided to take her son with her on a series of adventures throughout Mexico, Jamaica and Greenwich Village, New York where Lawrence graduated from the Charles Evans Hughes High School.  Soon after, he became a student in Madrid, where he acquired the second name of "Lorenzo." He also studied at the Sorbonne in Paris as well as "the University of the World, Faculty of Life."  

Lawrence Bohme, click on images to enlarge them.

After a few years he set out on a 10-year exploration of South America and the Caribbean, setting up his one-man custom crafts boutique in various locations, St. Martin being one of those sites.  In 1981 he returned to Europe and became a translator for Unesco in Paris and eventually found his way to southern Spain where he settled in the olive-farming town of Montefrio.  Eventually his father bestowed on him part of a payment that had been granted to him by the German government years before.  He then traveled to Rio where he met his wife Paula and conceived a daughter named Nina.  Lawrence became not only an illustrator, specializing in pen-and-ink images, but an author who illustrated his own books for the next 30 years.  He did so on three different continents.  His original drawings have been sold in book and card shops in New York, Paris and Rio de Janeiro, as well as published in his own travel books.  

His postcards show a line across the bottom such as this one.

One of those books features over 100 postcards of the life and scenes of famous cities and little-known villages.  The book features drawings and how the artist's nomadic life led him to travel to it.  

His book which I recently purchased.

For the past ten years he has been working on his memoir, "Lorenzo, The Story of a Very Long Youth", and has thus far completed seven volumes "each one the length of a normal-sized novel", which are published separately on Amazon.   I found an Internet site that features his books which I can purchase for my Kindle!  "The Postcard Maker" is an art book reflecting the work of a self-taught "drawer" as Lawrence called himself, or as the free-wheeling adventure story of a curious and restless man who couldn't see enough of the world.  His other books feature tales of travel with many being illustrated with his artwork.  Google his name and you will find the site to order his books if you are so inclined.  It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.

Postcard illustrating Philipsburg, Sint Maarten. This card and
the following three are from the collection of Barbara. Click to enlarge them.

Postcard illustrating Town Hall in Philipsburg.

Postcard showing Marigot in St. Martin

Postcard illustrating Grand Case in St. Martin.