Artist and teacher Stephen J. Toomey of Worcester and Provincetown died on Feb. 5, 2025 at the UMass-Memorial Medical Center in Worcester. The cause was complications from a stroke he had suffered on Feb. 1. He was 80.
The son of the late John A. and Irene E. (Foley) Toomey, Stephen was born on July 12, 1944 in Worcester. His interest in art was evident from an early age. “He would never let a piece of paper stay blank,” said his brother Joe. “And his attention to detail was extraordinary.
“When he was about five years old,” Joe added, “our mom woke up to find his fingers in her mouth. ‘What are you doing?’ she asked. ‘I’m counting your teeth,’ Stephen said, ‘because I’m drawing a picture of you. I want to make sure I get it right.’ ”
Throughout his school years, he drew caricatures, historical figures, and comics depicting daily events as a visual diary.
Stephen graduated from Worcester’s Blessed Sacrament Grammar School in 1958, St. John’s High School in Shrewsbury in 1962, and Merrimack College in 1966, majoring in liberal arts. After college, he immersed himself in painting, having spent many hours at the Worcester Art Museum as a student copying pieces from its collection.
He began his formal training in realism at the Fenway Studios in Boston, for which he was well prepared: his work included spending time at the Museum of Fine Arts copying masterpieces. He worked hard to hone his skills, financing his training with odd jobs ranging from parking attendant to courtroom sketch artist for two local television stations.
In the late 1970s, Stephen moved to New York City to join the artistic staff at Marvel Comics, working under Stan Lee as the first artist in the production process. He penciled in the initial illustrations, revising until the images were approved to go on to the inker, then the colorist, and finally the calligrapher to add the dialogue.
According to his brother Joe, Stephen did not enjoy what he called assembly-line art; he was more ambitious and wanted to get things right on his own. After six months at Marvel, he was offered a teaching position in the art department at Assumption University, which he readily accepted.
Early in his time at Assumption, Stephen wrote to Provincetown’s Henry Hensche, who invited him to study at his Cape School of Art in the summer in a handwritten note that also offered advice on work and accommodations (“students arrange these things themselves,” Hensche wrote). For the rest of Stephen’s life, until the 2020 pandemic, he spent May to September in Provincetown and his winters in Worcester, painting in his Randolph Road studio.
Financing his summer sojourns with work at Sal’s Place, initially as a dishwasher, then as a sous chef, Stephen rented an apartment in a converted outbuilding at Wendy Everett’s house on Commercial Street. “She was like a second mother to him,” Joe said. “He helped care for her as she got older.”
At one point — Joe does not recall the year — Stephen painted an 8-by-30-foot mural of a waterfront scene with fishing boats and cargo on the pier for the Provincetown Heritage Museum in what is now the town library. When the museum was renovated, the mural was taken down but could not later be returned to its place, Joe said. It remains missing.
After he retired from teaching, Stephen continued to split his time between Worcester and Provincetown. When Sal’s Place closed, he found summer work at one of the campgrounds in Truro. Always a social person, he enjoyed solving the world’s problems over drinks at local watering holes, including the Beachcombers Club, where he was a member.
“Stephen did not paint to sell his work,” Joe said. “He painted because he loved to paint.”
His last project was to produce copies of several of the paintings stolen from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston in 1990. The copies were to be used as props in The Art Thief, an independent film produced by his friend, gallery owner Arthur Egeli — a project it seems that Stephen had been preparing for almost all his life.
He did, however, alter one element of his approach to making these copies. “Stephen said that he made a few changes to the paintings,” said Joe, “so that he would never be accused of forgery.”
Stephen is survived by his brothers, Daniel S. Toomey and wife Patricia M. Burke Toomey of Worcester and Joseph M. Toomey and wife Gayle Perkins Toomey of Worcester; three sisters, Sister Maureen Toomey of the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur in Windsor, Conn., Sister Cathleen Toomey of the Sisters of Mercy in North Smithfield, R.I., and Clare J. Toomey Sullivan and husband Barry R. Sullivan of Worcester; seven nieces; 12 nephews; 34 grandnieces and grandnephews; and five great-grandnieces and great-grandnephews.
He was predeceased by his sisters Anne I. Toomey Cahill and Margaret M. Toomey Bennett, his brother James E. Toomey, and his nephews Thomas P. Sullivan and Christopher Toomey.
A Funeral Mass was celebrated on Feb. 15 in the Chapel of the Holy Spirit at Assumption University in Worcester. Burial was at St. John’s Cemetery in Worcester.
In lieu of flowers, memorial donations may be made to St. John’s High School, 378 Main St., Shrewsbury 01545.
