“Days of our Lives” Actors Enjoy Visit to Museum

It’s great when our famous works get to meet famous people. Actors Bill and Susan Hayes [1] made sure that they had time to visit the Cleveland Museum of Art during their media tour on October 20. Married for 35 years, the couple has played Doug and Julie Williams on NBC’s “Days of our Lives [2]” for almost as long. The couple was in Cleveland to promote the show and their book Like Sands Through the Hourglass and support WKYC-TV3’s 4th Annual Heroes Help Northeast Ohio.

Susan first visited the museum back in May 1979 when she was in town with her mother during a promotional visit. She went back home to her California church and talked about a carving of Jesus Christ she saw during her visit to the CMA . During Susan and Bill’s 2011 visit, they enjoyed viewing Winslow Homer’s [3] Early Morning After a Storm at Sea [4]. Susan, who paints watercolors in her spare time, sees the work as an “education in color.” A true Homer fan, she donated a copy of a Winslow Homer painting to hang in the vestibule of her church. Bill often ponders how artists detail texture and color in their portraits. “I’m always fascinated with how artists paint skin,” he said as he viewed The Portrait of Dora Wheeler [5] by William Merritt Chase [6]. As longtime art lovers, sketches by Rodin [7] and Durand [8] are among their personal art collection. “The museum has a knockout collection,” Susan said. “I wanted to be sure to spend an afternoon here while we were in town. It seems like there is three times as much here as when I visited all those years ago. I’m looking forward to seeing as much as I can.” She was intent in taking as many memories of our collection home with her as she could. At the time of this interview, her digital camera had already captured 100 images of their visit. -- Kesha Williams [9]