Selections from the Collection Inner Visions of Beverly Stearns Bernson '55 Selections from the Collection Inner Visions of Beverly Stearns Bernson '55

OCTOBER 12 - DECEMBER 10, 2017 The Bill and Sonja Carlson Davidow '56 Gallery Center for Art + Design Colby-Sawyer College New London, New Hampshire Introduction Joy can be hard to find. As I write this, in a precarious Most artists I know are studio nest builders. The environment colleagues in the Department of Fine and Performing Arts I would also like to thank Professor Craig Greenman, former time for the arts in America, I feel this more acutely. Yet it they create in their work spaces reflect and enhance for their support, and especially to Chairman and Professor chair of the Cultural Events Committee, and the committee is joy that most often compelled the creation of the works their efforts. The work embraces its surroundings and fits Jon Keenan, who has been instrumental in the realization members, for their support of the catalog’s production. Their in this exhibition, and joy that I felt when I first saw Beverly into an interior whole cloth. My only regret in mounting of our new facility. This catalog would not exist without ongoing engagement in the college’s cultural and artistic life Bernson’s amazing collection, which fills every wall, nook this exhibition is that we were unable to include the complete the stewardship of Professor Hilary Walrod, head of our is deeply appreciated. and cranny of her home. The expressive power of making has Bernson collection, which would have allowed viewers to Graphic Design Program. Her design acumen, organizational Most of all, I wish to express my heartfelt gratitude to Beverly driven the artists in her collection to create objects of wonder experience the relationships among all the works that Beverly skills and dedication have been essential to this publication. Bernson, whose passion and enthusiasm for the Inner Visions and mystery. Over the past 50 years, has become has acquired over the years. I have selected works that I Kimberly Swick Slover’s contributions as the catalog’s artwork is matched only by her kindness and generosity an integral part of the current highly charged and market- hope reflect her passion for and understanding of the artists writer and editor have been crucial, and her patience and of spirit. It has been one of my greatest joys as an artist and driven art world. As noted in Lorri Berenberg’s excellent whose work she has collected. Every time I visited her home thoroughness are greatly appreciated. John Sherman owner gallerist to work with her in constructing this exhibition. essay in this catalog, its history is fairly recent, although this I discovered another treasure and had to stifle the urge to of John Sherman Photography, Hartford, VT, superbly I have learned not only about art and artists engaged in this type of work has existed since our human ancestors adorned add yet another wonder to this exhibition. The interview I documented all the objects selected from the collection that “outsider” world, but also about how one can live a life of their caves. conducted with Beverly in April of 2017 serves to illustrate appear on these pages. commitment and dedication to the creative enterprise of her journey and enthusiasm for this work. I had the great good fortune to receive a wonderful education A principal mission of the college is to offer our students expressive making. Beverly Bernson lives that life, and we are in art and architecture. I am aware of art history and have It is fitting this inaugural exhibition in the The Bill and real-world opportunities to creatively apply their educational all deeply enriched by it. Thank you, Beverly, for sharing your been influenced by those who came before, as well as by my Sonja Carlson Davidow ‘56 Gallery of the new Center for Art experiences. Matthew Nosal ’17 researched and wrote the passion and your extraordinary collection with us. contemporaries, my colleagues and my students. Whether + Design should bring work to the campus and community first drafts of all the artist biographies in the catalog, and I driven by inner visions, inner voices, or inner demons, the that is “outside the box.” As educators we strive to engage our am grateful for his thoughtful insights and his patient work. works in this exhibition—through obsession, color, students in creative thinking and to examine and illuminate John Fownes’17, BFA Graphic Design, was selected to design assemblage, and often undefined techniques—express what the world outside of the academy. These works ask viewers to this catalog in his senior year. John has worked tirelessly to all of us academically trained artists hope to achieve: a challenge their notions of the beautiful and the sacred and to produce this excellent publication, and his talent and energy personal, undeniable truth. When I first encountered be open to the unexpected. are on full display in these pages. All of us in the Fine and Outsider Art I knew it was work impelled by internal forces Performing Arts are grateful for his professionalism and An exhibition of this nature has many moving parts and Bert Yarborough and the pleasure of making. It was not a matter of education, dedication to this project. comes together through the efforts of a host of talented people. Curator of the Exhibition in the traditional sense, or the desire to participate in the We are especially grateful to William and Sonja Carlson The exhibition program at Colby-Sawyer is student driven. professionally acknowledged art world; rather, it came from Director, Davidow for their tremendous support of the new Center for I am fortunate to work with talented and dedicated students “outside” of the mainstream, from a place of absolute necessity: The Bill and Sonja Carlson Davidow ‘56 Art + Design and for their generosity that allows us to name who assist in all aspects of exhibition management and fresh and unencumbered by pretense or artifice. The sad & Marian Graves Mugar Art Galleries the new art gallery in their honor. I am deeply grateful to installation through their enrollment in the Exhibitions reality is that many of these artists suffered from hard labor, the Office of Advancement and its former director, Kathy Foundation class offered each term. My gallery intern, Xu Sonja C. Davidow ‘56 Endowed Chair and poverty all their lives. Their art allowed them to Bonavist, and especially to former Gift Officer Allison Zou, has helped organize and train student workers and in the Fine & Performing Arts transcend their hardship and freely express their inner vision. Faccone, who introduced me to Beverly and shepherded provided invaluable assistance with all aspects of this project. Colby-Sawyer College this enterprise from the beginning. I am indebted to my Beverly Bernson When I opened my gallery of contemporary folk and self- as the world around them. They most often create in isolation, other found objects until they emerged as human forms, taught art in Boston, there was a question that I continually either by choice or circumstance, including limited education tall figures and faces with a powerful presence of their own. and Outsider Art encountered. It wasn’t the where, what, when and why that I and resources, rural lifestyles, institutionalization, religious Mose Tolliver painted with house paint on pieces of wood had expected. Instead, it was always some variation of, “Do callings, and physical or psychiatric illnesses. from old crates, discarded furniture and virtually any you know Beverly Bernson?,” as though self-taught art in abandoned object, developing his own iconography of figures, The majority of the artists in this exhibition did not identify Boston was synonymous with her name. I was introduced to animals, fruit, trees and erotica. James Castle, deaf from birth, themselves as artists or consider their creations to be works Beverly while attending the Outsider Art Fair in New York began making art at a young age and continued throughout of art. For others, their art served as a primary vehicle for in 1998. Beverly was working in the booth of New Orleans his life. Castle fashioned his own drawing implements from communication and connectedness with the world. Many of art dealer, Richard Gasperi. There she appeared completely sticks and found objects and used soot and spit as a medium the artists were highly prolific as the compulsion to create in her element, surrounded by the work of some of the most to create ephemeral images drawn from everyday life. was, for them, all-consuming. Reverend Howard Finster was renowned contemporary folk artists. It wasn’t until months repairing a bicycle when a vision of a face appeared on his The drawings, paintings, sculptures and ceramics in Beverly later, when I visited her home, that I realized how truly in paint-covered fingertip. He interpreted this as a command Bernson’s collection demonstrate the diversity of these her element she had been. Entering Beverly’s house was like to spread the word of God through his paintings, of which artists’ visions, ranging from the whimsical to the profound. stepping through the looking glass of folk and self-taught art. there are tens of thousands. Martin Ramirez spent more The images communicate with a power and directness that My eyes could not wander without encountering a magnificent than 32 years confined to state psychiatric hospitals. In the engage the viewer and invite them to experience a private work of art—on the walls, on the stairs, on the shelves, in last 15 years of his life he produced hundreds of drawings on world. Some of the artists represented are the superstars of the corners, beneath the tables—sculptures, paintings, prints, found paper bags and scraps of paper from examining tables. the genre, while others are less known. Yet all these works of found objects, textiles and ceramics. Bill Traylor, born into slavery in 1853, remained on the art hold equal importance to Beverly, a connoisseur with an The label historically used to identify much of the art in the plantation after the emancipation and labored most of his insatiable appetite who is guided by a discerning eye and a Bernson collection is “Outsider Art,” a term coined by British life as a sharecropper. It wasn’t until the age of 85 that he passion for collecting. art scholar Roger Cardinal in 1972 as a translation for art brut, began to draw and paint using simple tools on cardboard or raw art. Over the past few decades, Outsider Art has come while seated on the streets of Montgomery, . In just to serve as the umbrella term for many unique types and styles three years Traylor produced more than 1,800 drawings. of art, including contemporary folk, vernacular, self-taught, tToday each of these artists is represented in major museum visionary and intuitive art. However, now the label “outsider” and private collections. is considered by many to marginalize the very artists that the At times using only readily available or recycled materials, genre aimed to elevate. In today’s art world, the lines between these artists created distinctive works of art that are “outsider” and “insider” have become blurred to the point remarkably diverse in style, technique and subject matter. where these labels are no longer relevant. Visionary artist and sculptor Bessie Harvey communicated Untitled Lorri Berenberg Unknown Street Artist Often unaware of the conventions of the mainstream art with the spirits and voices that she found inhabiting gnarled Wood, Rubber, Paint and Nails world, the artists in the Bernson collection have produced rich, tree roots and branches. Harvey transformed these natural Owner and Director, 10" x 6" highly personal images that reflect their inner world as well objects by embellishing them with beads, jewels, cloth and Berenberg Gallery Date Unknown Beverly Stearns Bernson '55 Beverly Stearns Bernson is a 1955 graduate of Colby Junior College and attended the Vesper George School of Art in Boston and then attended the Massachusetts College of Art. She became a graphic artist and worked at Beth Israel Hospital and the now defunct Newton Times. Her civic engagement in the town of Newton included co-chairing the Newton Public Schools Creative Arts Program, and she was a founder of the New Art Center. All along the way, she was exposed to art and artists and dealers, curating shows and buying works. “I guess I’ve always collected art,” Beverly says about her favorite pastime. Selections from this “pastime” are now on display in this exhibition.

In the early 1960s, Beverly started an antiques business, Any Old Thing, with Lorraine Altschuler, a friend since junior high. Sadly, after 29 years in the business, Lorraine passed away. “We did not have a shop; instead we traveled around New England and New York City, renting space at antique shows and, at times, other shops,” she says. “It was a wonderful life.” Beverly carried on, and, in all, Any Old Thing lasted 45 years.

Bev is currently involved in Gateway Arts, a workshop for adults with disabilities, where she sits on the advisory board and helps with fundraising. “The artists’ lives are changed profoundly—socially as well as artistically—and the interaction is a joy for all,” she says. “We have a store on Harvard Street in Brookline Village, where the artists sell their work. It is a truly wonderful place that gives the artists an opportunity to earn money for their work and a reason to be deeply proud of what they do.” Snake Elijah Pierce Painted Wood 4" x 14" x ½" Date Unknown Bert Yarborough, Gallery Director Bert Yarborough: What was so extraordinary was that John Ollman and BY: Perhaps speaking to the depth of that particular Richard Gasperi were as excited as I was. Richard had experience of being black in the south or being for the Would you describe your first encounter with and Curator, in conversation with just opened his gallery, which was exclusively an longest time a silent minority. outsider art, this work that you began to collect so outsider art gallery at that point. I would see John every Beverly Bernson '55, April 2017 enthusiastically? BB: Yes. spring after that when I went to Philadelphia as an Beverly Bernson: antique dealer. In between I was sent pictures of the art BY: That is a strong chord that runs through the work and from Richard or John, and I was buying by photograph. through your collection. I was walking down the street in Philadelphia and came upon the Janet Fleisher Gallery, and the window was BY: Were you selling outsider art in your business then? BB: Absolutely. At the same time, I was still buying other filled with Elijah Pierce’s sculptures. I went into the works because art was a major interest in my life. BB: No, not at all. I had been an antique dealer since the gallery and discovered it was five minutes before 5 p.m. I would go to every gallery, every museum show, no ’60s, and I was selling American folk art. Then by late John Ollman, then the gallery director, greeted me. matter what it was. ’70s I began buying things in England, bringing in I said, “When do you close?” He said, “Five.” I said, new kinds of work. All of a sudden, you realize there’s BY: Yes, certain works here are very contemporary, though “No, no, no. Don’t close!” I ended up staying there until a pattern in the things that you like that is raw and they are still a minority in terms of your real affinity. 7:30 and John introduced me to outsider art. The first untrained, whether it’s American folk art, primitives or And are you still looking? pieces I bought were two of Elijah Pierce’s and a piece these paintings, sculptures and drawings. All of these that’s in the show, “The Flying Annie Warners” by works had a great similarity. I never bought or sold any BB: I’m not! Lamont “Old Ironsides” Pry. for my business. BY: The house is full? BY: So what was it that compelled you? BY: So it’s a possible overlap because the folk art that you BB: The house is full. I’m in the process of donating and BB: I just looked at the work and got so excited. I had gone were attracted to crossed over into this category that we selling works not because I want to, but because of to art school, had bought contemporary Boston artists now call outsider or visionary art. my age. I’m pleased that some museums wanted them. mostly, clearly for not a lot of money. It was early in BB: No question that there is crossover. I sold primitives So I’m thrilled the works are going to be shown forever. my education and interest in art. There was something and antiques as well. At that time I didn’t have much about that window that electrified me. That was 1980. I did go to Cuba recently and was introduced to another background on any of these artists. The gallery owners whole world of art that was very exciting. BY: What happened after that? might or might not have known some of these people. What I noticed after a while was that I was clearly BY: How was that experience? I think you could draw some BB: I started looking for other dealers in the country and buying things that were done by black artists and black parallels with a group of artists who are working under there were only four. Shortly after I met John, I headed southern artists. Many, like Elijah Pierce, had migrated some extreme conditions in terms of their ability to Figure to New Orleans for a show and saw that Richard to the north. He was a barber in Columbus, Ohio. express themselves. Charlie Willeto Gasperi had a gallery there. I visited him in the French Carved and Painted Wood But there was this look and this feeling that—whether BB: Yes, right. Cuba itself was a unique situation. 18" x 4" x 4" Quarter and was blown away by his show. This was his they came from the north or the south—there was a It’s very poor and you didn’t see the very rich but, 1964 first show, and I bought a lot of work that time. common gesture or intent or a look that was clearly clearly, they’re there. southern and black. It’s a very nice place. You are surrounded by magnificent BY: Today outsider art has reached a position of prominence, through the artist Jean Dubuffet, who was exposed through a fine arts program and graduate studies. art embedded in the architecture. The buildings are especially in the fine arts community in the United to work by artists who lived in mental institutions. Of course, the academy has produced some incredible phenomenal, and fortunately, now that there’s money States. Many of these pieces are as highly prized and He started collecting the work and tried to find a place artists. There is a famous Picasso quote about how he there, some of their buildings are being brought back. priced as certain contemporary works. Do you find for it in France, but the government would not give spent years trying to draw like a child again. It’s one of We found a new art gallery that introduced us to a diminishment of artists who dwell in this place? him the space. the things that is so compelling about this exhibition. whole group of Cuban outsider artists, which was How has this whole scene changed? When you see it, you know it. The work wound up in The Art Brut Museum in spectacular. BB: This is my sense of what has happened. The first thing Lausanne, Switzerland, and through that exposure that That’s why your collection is so profound. There’s a kind BY: Do you think there’s any chance that kind of work we should talk about is “outsider art.” The people who the art came to the States. The first Outsider Art Fair of spiritual spark that touches people. The works I’ve could come to the U.S. if someone tried to put a have been in the art world for the longest time try not was organized by Sanford L. Smith. I worked at that fair seen, and that our audience at the college will see, are show together? to use that terminology anymore. They’re calling it “self- for about 10 years with Richard Gasperi because I loved likely to touch them in that same way. They’ll have an taught art.” They’re trying to bring it into the realm of being there. understanding of where it comes from. BB: Yes, there’s a gallery in the south end of Boston showing just art, without a label. Cuban art. A lot of the artwork in Cuba is political, and BY: Of all the pieces that you’ve seen and collected, do you BB: I’m looking at two pieces right now. The artist, Justin some of it’s still underground. I did get to meet a lot of Certainly, the people who have risen to the top shouldn’t have any favorites? McCarthy, attended the University of Pennsylvania Law artists in their homes and studios who were showing us, have that label. Their circumstances were such that they School, and later he had a breakdown. The other thing BB: There are favorites in terms of quality of the work. A lot in the closet, what they haven’t been able to exhibit. were outside the realm of today’s reality, and that’s the that’s remarkable, as I look around, is that none of these of the pieces carry memories of where and how they thing that doesn’t happen anymore. people intended to grow up to be artists. They were There was also a workshop for artists with disabilities, were acquired, and I can look at each piece and have that working other jobs and doing artwork because they similar to Gateway Arts program that I’m involved in. Most of these artists really lived in rural areas. same experience again. When we talk about pure self- needed to. The workshop was two hours outside of Havana so They didn’t have access to theater or movies or television. expression, it reminds me of the Gateway Arts program we visited them. They have a print workshop and They might have had a magazine or two, but they were that Lorri Berenberg and I are involved in. There’s one And a lot of the pieces are created from and with it’s wonderful. working from their gut, from their love of what they girl there who just does things obsessively, either found objects. These artists weren’t given paints and were doing: pure self-expression. Now when you go to numbers or letters or whatever, over and over. A few paper and canvases, so that not only are there two- The gentleman who started it is a Cuban printmaker, an outsider art show, a lot of the work is pretending to years ago a newcomer sat beside her and started copying dimensional works, there are a lot of three-dimensional and I have a couple of prints by his daughter, who be naive. There’s too much exposure to the outside her work. This particular artist doesn’t speak at all, works. There are environments that were built by people has Down Syndrome. Ten years ago, he started world. but she got really upset that someone was copying her. who needed to be artistic and to have that pleasure in this workshop for children with disabilities, mostly their lives. They needed color, in the broadest sense. Down Syndrome. They are now adults who do BY: Right. Then you have somebody like Martin Ramirez I had to laugh because as I look at what’s out there in wonderful work with primitive printing presses. and others, who were institutionalized or incapable of the public sphere now, I see a lot of “outsiders” who are BY: Color, yes, and joy. Obviously, it’s brought you a lot We got to see a whole process; they made their own conducting “a normal life,” but nonetheless they were copying works from an earlier time who think they’re of joy, and we are truly grateful that we can exhibit costumes and danced for us. It was terrific. What is compelled to create work. going to be primitive artists. the work. It has been a privilege for me, and we all great about Cuba is that they are interested in looking forward to experiencing this amazing work BB: Right. Originally this was called art brut, which is how BY: I think every artist wants to tap into something pure education and the arts. and sharing it with a wider audience. the outsider world of art came to be known in Europe and unsullied, especially if you’re one who has gone BB: Well, thank you. It’s fun to share. Felipe Archuleta Felipe Benito Archuleta was born in the village of Santa Cruz Milton Avery Milton Avery was born in Altmar, New York, and he made in New Mexico, where he was exposed to the Spanish bulto a living by working in a series of manufacturing jobs and tradition of making wooden religious figures to use in shrines. then for an insurance company for the first half of his life. He left school early and worked as a line cook, stone mason He took a few art classes at the Art Society School and the and carpenter until in 1967, destitute and jobless, he prayed Connecticut League of Art Students, and in 1924, he moved to God to relieve his poverty and desperation. Archuleta was to New York City, where he met and married the illustrator commanded by God in a vision to devote his life to carving. Sally Michel. Avery depicted classical motifs and subject Working in a small adobe house in Tesuque, he began to matter in portraits, still life and coastal landscapes and used carve and paint farm and wild animals with distinctive simplified forms and flat applications of color. While his early personalities that range from funny and endearing to zany work was influenced by Impressionism, he later combined the and ferocious. Archuleta began to gain a reputation in the abstraction and figuration of American . In the late 1970s as a visionary artist, and he was one of the artists 1930s, philanthropist Roy Neuberger bought more than 100 featured in the ’s traveling “Self- of his paintings, allowing Avery to devote himself to refining Taught Genius” exhibit. Archuleta’s work has found its way his artistic style, which blurs the line between representation into folk art collections and museums across the U.S. and abstraction. Avery was a prolific painter, graphic artist and ceramist who won numerous awards from art institutions, but he only became famous after his death. He is seen today as an influential 20th-century American artist whose work was vital to the rise of abstraction in American painting.

Dawn Woodcut Print 7⅛" x 9" 1952

Pig Carved & Painted Wood 12" x 21" x 7½" 1975 David Butler David Butler was born in Good Hope, Louisiana, to a missionary mother and a carpenter father. As a child, he drew pictures and whittled and sculpted colorful and fanciful objects. Butler left school early to care for his siblings while their parents worked. He later married and worked in various jobs until well into middle age, when he suffered a work- related injury at a saw mill that left him disabled. In the early 1960s, Butler and his wife moved to Patterson, where his creative pursuits became the focus of his life. His chosen medium was tin, which he would flatten with a hammer and cut into creatures like two-headed dragons, flying elephants or sea monsters, using shears and meat cleavers. Butler painted his creations with bright house paints and adorned them with buttons, bicycle reflectors, marbles, light bulbs or other found objects that he attached with metal wire. He also built kinetic sculptures and spinning whirligigs that moved with the wind. His house and yard were overrun with artworks, and he regularly sold his pieces only to make replacements. Butler’s inspiration came from his imagination as well as mythology, the Bible and his family’s religious beliefs. He became nationally known after his work appeared in a ground-breaking traveling exhibition in 1982, “Black Folk Art in America, 1930-1980,” organized by the Corcoran Gallery in Washington, D.C.

Whirligig Paint on Tin, Metal 51" x 34" x 160" 1985 James Castle The son of a midwife and a postmaster, James Castle was born premature and profoundly deaf in Garden Valley, Idaho. At an early age he began to draw and make things from discarded paper and cardboard that he scavenged from trash cans in his neighborhood. Castle turned sticks, apricot pits and broken fountain pen nibs into tools for his work and made his own ink by mixing his saliva with soot from the family wood stove. To add color to his creations, Castle squeezed pigment from saturated crepe paper. He explored many subjects and genres in his work, ranging from representational drawings of rural life, local buildings and human figures, to abstract landscape collages and explorations of letters, numbers, symbols and geometrical forms. Castle’s education consisted of five years at the Gooding School for the Deaf and Blind from age 10 to 15, where he learned the school’s oral method of communication and some sign language, but he rarely used these skills after he returned home. In the 1950s, his nephew, a college art student, showed some of his uncle’s work to his professors in Portland, Oregon, which led to solo and group exhibitions of Castle’s work in the Pacific Northwest for several decades until the family became overwhelmed and blocked access to the works for 20 years. In 1998, the artist’s work was reintroduced at an outsider art fair in 1998 in New York City. Subsequently, Castle’s work has been exhibited across the country and acquired by major museums.

Untitled (Chamber Pot) String, Found Paper, Soot, Spit 4½" x 7" Date Unknown William Dawson William Dawson was born and raised on his grandfather’s Thornton Dial Thornton Dial was born on a cotton plantation in farm in Madison, Alabama. After marrying and moving Emelle, Alabama, and he never learned to read or write. to , Illinois, he worked for 38 years for a wholesale He left school after third grade to work as a sharecropper. produce distributor, where he rose to a management position At age 13 Dial was sent to live with relatives in Bessemer, and became one of the first African American men to join an industrialized area, where he eventually became a the Teamsters’ Union. After retiring in the 1960s, Dawson metalworker, married and had children. Dial liked to make took a few painting classes, but he grew bored with painting complex assemblages from cast-off materials—bits of scrap and began to carve human figures, animals and totems from metal, fabric, rope, wood, wire, bones and toys—that he wood that he found in neighborhood alleys. His figures are didn’t recognize as art until he reached his 50s. His sculptures distinctly expressive, with strong features, prominent teeth and wall reliefs—often monumental in scale—are intricate and penetrating eyes, ranging in size from a few inches to and densely expressive works that explore themes of natural several feet tall. He painted his figures with acrylics and then disaster, war, racism, bigotry, terrorism and homelessness in sprayed them with shellac. Dawson made self-portraits and America. In 1987, Dial met William Arnett, an art collector modeled other figures on people he knew, politicians and and historian who brought his work to public attention. personalities from popular culture. His memories of farm life He told Arnett that his art was evidence of his freedom. “Art inspired many carvings and paintings of horses and dogs. is like a bright star up ahead in the darkness of the world,” Dawson’s work was popular in Chicago, and he achieved Dial said. Today Dial’s work can be found in the collections wider recognition through his participation in the 1982 of the Whitney Museum, Metropolitan Museum of Art, traveling exhibition, “Black Folk Art in America: 1930-1980,” Smithsonian American Art Museum, American Folk Art organized by the Corcoran Gallery in Washington, D.C. Museum, and in New York. In 1990 the Chicago Public Library Cultural Center hosted a major retrospective exhibition, “The Artwork of William Dawson,” featuring 250 of his sculptures and paintings.

The Man Built the Birdhouse Watercolor, Oil Pastel on Paper 11" x 8 ½" 1995

Totem Wood, Paint 28" x 3 ½" x 2 ½" Date Unknown Sam Doyle Sam Doyle was born and raised on St. Helena Island off the South Carolina coast in a community influenced by the African cultures of freed slaves who settled there after emancipation. Doyle attended school for a short time until family hardship forced his withdrawal. He worked odd jobs for many years until 1944, when he decided to establish himself as an artist. Using house paint on cast-off pieces of sheet metal or plywood, Doyle began to paint vivid portraits of influential local people and narrative depictions of historical events, including tributes to African American advancements around the world. His portraits were highly expressive, distilling the essence of his subjects’ personalities and mythologies, and he captured momentous events with poetic simplicity. Doyle often added his own creatively spelled words from the island’s unique Creolized Gullah language to enhance his paintings, which he exhibited in his front yard. Local legend tells of people sailing to the island from around the world to behold Doyle’s paintings. Selections from his works were included in the “Black Folk Art in America: 1930-1980” traveling exhibition.

First Barber House Paint on Sheet Metal 39 ¾" x 25 ¾" 1980 Howard Finster Howard Finster was one of 13 children born and raised on Denzil Goodpastor Born in Deniston, Kentucky, Denzil Goodpaster began the family farm in Valley Head, Alabama. He gave his first carving after retiring from farming around 1970. He made sermon at age 16 and was later ordained as a Baptist minister. intricate and brightly painted walking canes featuring snakes, Finster hosted a radio prayer show in the late 1930s and early alligators and other animals, as well as humorous and risqué 1940s and also published religious songs and poetry in human figures such as bathing beauties, cheerleaders, local newspapers. Finster received a vision from God that cowboys and nudes. Goodpaster also carved small and instructed him to create sacred works of art, which led colorful sculptures of common domestic animals. During him to build an art park that became known as Paradise his lifetime he received artist fellowships from the Kentucky Garden on swamp land behind his house in Georgia. Arts Council and the Southern Arts Federation in . There he built walkways, architectural structures and Goodpaster’s flamboyant subject matter and use of color set sculptures made of cast-off pieces of metal and machinery. a new standard and continues to exert influence on the art of He also produced thousands of paintings with hand-written making American folk canes. biblical verses and subjects ranging from historical characters and popular culture icons like Elvis Presley to evangelistic fantasy landscapes and futuristic cities. Finster became a national celebrity after designing album covers for the bands R.E.M. and the Talking Heads. He has been called the grandfather of Southern folk art and the Andy Warhol of the South.

Visions of Great Mansions Seal Paint Paint on Wood 18" x 11" 35" 1987 Date Unknown William Haddad Born in the Middle East, William Haddad now lives in Northern California, where in 1986, he opened the Short Center North, an arts-based school for people with disabilities. Haddad took up painting soon after and quickly became a prolific artist who approaches his work with great energy and exuberance. His acrylic paintings on board, canvas and paper are direct and bold in their representations of flowers, trees, houses, animals and human figures. Snippets of Arabic writing, math equations and elements of architecture also enter his work. Haddad’s work was never seen outside of California until 1994, when it was included in the Outsider Art Fair in NYC. Since then he has exhibited his work in the American Visionary Museum in Baltimore and the MIA Gallery in Seattle, and his work has been added to the National Archives in Washington, D.C.

Flower and Chicken with Two Eggs Acrylic on Lucite 22" x 29" Date Unknown Bessie Harvey Bessie Harvey was born into abject poverty in Dallas, Georgia, the seventh of 13 children. Her education ended in fourth grade so that she could work as a domestic in private homes. Harvey first married at 14 and had two former husbands and 11 children by the time she was 35. Yet she was a deeply religious visionary who saw nature, herself and her artwork as endowed with the spirit of God. As a child she made dolls of twigs, roots, and other found materials. Later in life she made sculpture and mixed media pieces, which she adorned with paints, beads, shells, cloth and other scraps. Many of her pieces are rooted in biblical stories or aspects of her African American heritage. In 1977, Harvey began to work at Blount Memorial Hospital in Maryville, Tennessee, and she had her first chance to exhibit her artwork in the annual show there. The raw emotive power of her work attracted great attention and gallery representation, and today Harvey’s work is included in major museum collections worldwide.

Mask Found Wood, Beads, Knobs, Sequins, Buckle and Paint 21" x 6" Date Unknown William Hawkins William Hawkins grew up on a farm in northern Kentucky. O. W. "Pappy" Kitchens Oscar William “Pappy” Kitchens was born in Crystal Springs, Although he only attended school until third grade, he was Mississippi, and he lived in Jackson for most of his life. always drawing horses, often from studying photographs His paintings, drawings and sketches are direct depictions and engravings of his grandfather’s horses. At age 21, of events and people from his life, as well as personal Hawkins moved to Columbus, Ohio, where he began to commentary on contemporary social issues such as the paint fantastical cityscapes and animals on scavenged Vietnam War, the Women’s Liberation Movement, and the pieces of board. He expanded his subjects in the 1930s to population explosion. Kitchens used humor and narrative include landscapes and icons of architecture and popular in his work, along with descriptive titles. His works are culture, using inexpensive enamel paints and a single brush included in the collections of the Smithsonian American on Masonite. His paintings were bold and expressive, Art Museum, the New Orleans and Mississippi Museums combining vibrant colors and abstracted figures and of Art, and the Old Capital Museum of Mississippi History. geometric forms. In his later works, he occasionally used cornmeal to build up forms, in a sculptural manner, from the surface on which he was painting. Hawkins supported himself by working in various trades, including trapping, farming, horse-breaking and truck-driving until 1979, when his paintings were discovered by Lee Garrett, a neighboring artist. This discovery led Hawkins to gain national attention for his intuitive and audacious approach to painting and enabled him to devote himself fully to his artwork. His work has since been exhibited and acquired by private collectors and museums around the world.

Woman with Collie (Version of Red Dog Running) Oil on Formica 25" x 40" 1980

Mississippi Oil on Cardboard 19" x 15 ½" Date Unknown John Landry A native of New Orleans, John Landry was captivated at a young age by the exuberant colors and buoyant life of the floats that paraded by him each year at Mardi Gras time. Only in retirement did he find time to express his joy and adoration by creating elaborate mobile miniature replicas of those Mardi Gras floats. Landry carefully planned and designed his works on graph paper, based on photographs and illustrations from newspapers and magazines of the King’s, Queen’s, Zulu and other floats. Using wire, plastic, and glass beads, he captured the gorgeous spectacle of floating dragons, butterflies, kings and Mardi Gras Indians on a smaller and yet equally exquisite scale.

Mardi Gras Float Assembled Beads 12" x 14 ½" x 7 ¼" Date Unknown Alex Maldonado Alex Maldonado was born in the Pacific Coast city of Mazatlán in Sinaloa, Mexico, but with the outbreak of revolution in 1910, he moved with his family to San Francisco at age 10. Throughout his life he worked as a riveter at a shipyard, as an undefeated professional boxer, and as a production worker in a factory. After his retirement in 1961, Maldonado began to paint, exploring themes of interstellar travel, mass communications and pollution. Drawing on his fascination with astronomy and futuristic technologies, he created energetic scenes with rocket-powered vehicles and fantastical architecture, often with signage to guide travelers and viewers alike. Maldonado’s work was discovered by the San Francisco public television station KQED in 1973, catapulting him from total obscurity to international recognition. Today his artwork is represented in private and public collections including The National Museum of American Art and The in Washington, D.C.; The Museum of Folk Art in New York City; and three museums in the San Francisco Bay area.

Museum of American Folk Art Oil on Canvas and Wood 21" x 25" Date Unknown Justin McCarthy Unlike most outsider artists, Justin McCarthy was born into a wealthy family as the son of a newspaper publisher and gentleman farmer in Weatherly, Pennsylvania. The family’s reversal of fortune began when McCarthy’s younger brother died of pneumonia in 1907, and his father died just a year later. Then in 1915, two years into his studies at the University of Pennsylvania Law School, McCarthy suffered a nervous breakdown. While living in a state psychiatric hospital, he began to draw and paint. After his release five years later, he returned to the family’s decaying mansion and took menial jobs to support himself and his passion for painting. McCarthy was eclectic in his approach to making art. He painted pop culture icons, biblical scenes, pretty women, animals and everyday life on cardboard, file folders, Masonite and canvas. He experimented with crayons, pens, oils, acrylics and watercolor, and while his style varied from highly detailed to extremely abstract, his work always featured bold lines and vibrant colors. McCarthy completed thousands of paintings in his 32-year career as an artist. His work went largely unnoticed until 1960, when he was discovered by art collectors Sterling and Dorothy Strauser. With their support, his work was exhibited at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Museum of American Folk Art and the Museum of Modern Art. Today McCarthy is considered one of the more enigmatic folk artists of the mid-20th century.

Ice Capades Mixed Media on Paper 15 ½" x 12" 1965 Todd McKie Todd McKie is a Boston-based fine artist whose paintings, prints, sculptures and drawings are bold, childlike and colorful. Although he earned a B.F.A. in painting at the Rhode Island School of Design, McKie’s work is deceptively simple and clearly influenced by Outsider Art. While he draws on his own experiences, he is also inspired by the art of African, pre-Columbian and Eskimo cultures, and that of children and people with mental illnesses. As they bumble through the everyday absurdities of modern life, McKie’s stick-figure subjects spark affection and laughter. His works are popular and recognizable around New England and are held in many private and public collections. McKie hopes his art looks spontaneous, but he admits it is not always easy to be simple. In his artist statement, he seems to speak for all artists: “I try to make the most beautiful, mysterious, funniest, and truest things I can.”

Bird Monoprint 15" x 19 ½" Date Unknown Sister Gertrude Morgan Gertrude Morgan was born in Lafayette, Alabama, and Elijah Pierce Elijah Pierce was born to former slaves on a small farm raised as an active member of the Southern Baptist Church. in Mississippi, where his uncle taught him to carve small She moved to Columbus, Georgia, when she was 17, to work farm animals from wood. Pierce left the farm in his teens to as a nurse maid in a private home. In 1938, after she received a pursue training and employment as a barber. He later received revelation from God, Morgan traveled and eventually settled his preacher’s license and worked as a traveling carnival in New Orleans. There she met Mother Margaret Parker and preacher in the Midwest and South. In the late 1920s, Pierce Sister Cora Williams, and together they founded a Christian began carving in earnest; each carving had its own story, mission and orphanage. Morgan had another revelation in and he used his simple but bold compositions of animals, 1956 urging her to use her paintings as visual aids to enhance African-American heroes, pop culture icons and characters her music, sermons and religious teachings. In her artwork from the Bible to convey his personal story and religious she presents human figures in simple flat forms and uses beliefs and to chronicle the African American experience. acrylics, pens, watercolors, crayons and pencils to paint on In 1951, Pierce opened his own barbershop, where his paper, toilet rolls, scrap wood, lampshades and paper fans. carvings were discovered by Boris Gruenwald, a sculptor and Her work combines passages from the Bible with expressive graduate student at Ohio State University. Gruenwald images of its stories. A voice in another vision in 1957 organized several exhibitions of Pierce’s work, and within a revealed Morgan to be a bride of Christ. A recurring motif few years, Pierce became internationally known in the world in her work depicts her as a bride dressed in white, flying in of folk art. In 1982, the National Endowment for the Arts an airplane with Jesus. Around 1960 art dealer Larry awarded Pierce a National Heritage Fellowship as one of 15 Borenstein invited Morgan to exhibit her work in his gallery, master traditional artists. Pierce’s work has been showcased and he promoted her work to celebrities and other art dealers. around the world for his superb woodcarving skills and the His efforts led to decades of exhibitions of Morgan’s work power of his artistic vision. around the country and growing recognition of her importance as an American folk artist.

Just a Closer Walk with Thee Crayon, Ink & Pencil on Paper 9" x 12" 1967

Movie Star (Lena Horne) Enamel on Wood Relief 14" x 8 ½" Date Unknown Mary Proctor Mary Proctor was born in Jefferson County, Florida, to an Lamont "Old Ironsides" Pry Lamont Pry was born in Mauch Chunk, Pennsylvania and left 11-year-old girl and was raised by her grandparents. She left home at 17 to join the circus. He spent many years working school in ninth grade and moved to Tallahassee at age 17, as a clown before enlisting in the Army Air Corps in 1941 where she worked as a nurse’s aide for several years. Proctor during World War II. Pry was severely injured in the crash then created her own store, Noah’s Ark Flea Market, for of a bomber plane, and a nurse—astounded by his rapid which she collected and sold scavenged objects. After her recovery—gave him the nickname “Old Ironsides.” Pry took grandmother, aunt and uncle died in a tragic house fire, up painting as a hobby in the 1970s while living in a home for Proctor received a vision of God telling her “to get a door the aged and indigent. Painting on cardboard, he used house and paint.” She immediately went to work painting doors paint and enamel and metallic paints to depict lively scenes of with images, objects and text that tell the stories of her life, circus animals and performers. Other favorite subjects were biblical tales and practical messages that seek to inspire and vintage planes, farm scenes, flowers and birds, and cowboys give hope to those who are lost and in pain, as she once was. and Indians. Pry’s work was discovered by artist and collector “I kept painting until I filled the yard up,” she says. “And my Sterling Strauser in 1974, and he bought art supplies for Pry spirit was relieved of pain.” Proctor uses doors ranging in size and entered his work into local art competitions. Pry won from cabinet to double garage doors, on which she applies some ribbons and gained recognition during his lifetime, paints and three-dimensional collages made with cloth, and today his 150 paintings are part of private and museum buttons and other found materials. She thinks of herself more collections around the country. as a missionary than an artist. “I’m just a messenger,” she says, “and they (those who buy her work) are the deliverers.”

The Flying Annie Warners Paint on Cardboard 22" x 27 ½" Date Unknown

My Grandma Old Blue Willow Plates Paint and China Shards 22" x 18" Date Unknown Martin Ramirez Martin Ramirez was born in Jalisco, Mexico and migrated to the around 1915, where he worked as a miner and railroad laborer to support his family back in Mexico. He eventually lost his job and was found sick and destitute in Northern California. Ramirez was diagnosed with catatonic schizophrenia and spent the rest of his life in mental institutions. While living in a state hospital in California he began to make drawings and collages with pencils, crayons and watercolor on found materials such as brown paper bags, examining-table paper and book pages that he glued together with a paste made of potatoes and spit. Ramirez’s works feature levitating Madonnas, trains moving in and out of tunnels, and Spanish gentlemen on horseback in subdued reds, yellows and blues. Many of the images are framed by concentric circles or series of vertical, horizontal or curved lines. His work gained exposure when it was discovered by Dr. Tarmo Pasto, a psychologist who arranged for Ramirez’s work to be exhibited at various museums and university galleries. Ramirez created about 300 works, and since his death in 1963, he has gained recognition as one of the premier outsider artists of the 20th century.

Untitled (Caballero) Crayon, Pencil on Paper 24 ½" x 23" 1953 Ernest Reed Ernest “Popeye” Reed was born in Jackson, Ohio, in Nellie Mae Rowe Nellie Mae Rowe was one of 10 children who grew up in Appalachian hill country to a family of Irish and Native a farming community in Fayetteville, Georgia. She left American heritage. He began carving figures from wood as school after fourth grade to work on a farm, and she later a child and left home at age 14, supporting himself with odd ran away due to the extreme difficulty of the work. Rowe jobs until he learned the trade of furniture-making. Reed married young, and her first husband died when she was 36. continued to carve figures and scenes of American Indians, Her second husband died when she was 48, leaving her alone mythological and biblical characters, and imaginary beasts, in the house they had built together. Rowe called this house and sold them to tourists at roadside stands, flea markets her “playhouse” and turned it into a constantly evolving and festivals. By 1968, Reed was making a decent living art-object. Her signature style is one of flattened images in from his artwork. He earned the nickname “Popeye” for the which harmonious colors and composition suggest movement. bulging arm muscles he developed from handling the heavy Rowe’s works include drawings, collages, altered photographs, pieces of scavenged wood, limestone and sandstone that he hand-sewn dolls and installations that explore themes of turned into sculptures, which range in size from less than one race, gender, domesticity, African American folklore and to five feet tall. Reed made his own carving tools, and with spiritual traditions. them invented his own mythology, from the winged sphinx to the flying mermaid with butterfly wings. Although Reed never achieved his dream of a major museum show, his work is included in several major museum collections, including that of the American Folk Art Museum in New York.

Mermaid Woman in Striped Dress Marble Sculpture Crayon 8 ½" x 13" 11" x 8 ½" 1988 Date Unknown Geneviève Seillé Geneviève Seillé was born in France and worked as a primary school teacher while studying psychology at Toulouse University. In the late 1970s, she moved to England to study art at Stafford College and Wolverhampton Polytechnic. In response to feeling isolated in England, Seillé sought solace and new forms of expression through her artwork. Her work features a bold mix of writing, numbers and images that she organizes in a mysterious geometry of her own. Seillé once wrote that “there is a need to reinvent the world, to create your own world,” and the quasi-architectural structures in many of her drawings are her way of making order from chaos. In 1985, Seillé began to draw compulsively, describing her work as “calligraphic landscapes” that progressed into biomorphic, anatomical and architectural drawings. Her interest in line and form, letters and numbers, expresses a mixture of language, colors and textures that resembles graffiti. Seillé gave up teaching in 1993 to focus on her artwork and now lives in France with her husband, a jazz musician. Her artwork has been featured in exhibitions around the world.

Polygraph IX Mixed Media on Paper 9 ½" x 17" 1995 Mary T. Smith Mary Tillman Smith was one of 13 children born to sharecroppers in Copiah County, Mississippi. She had a serious hearing impairment that made it difficult for others to understand her speech and thus isolated her; in response, she drew prodigiously. Smith learned to read and write before leaving school after fifth grade. She worked as a gardener and domestic servant and was married and divorced twice. After her retirement in 1970, Smith transformed her one- acre property into a sculpture garden of her paintings on plywood, corrugated tin and other found objects. Using bold colors and recurring patterns of shapes and circles, Smith documented and celebrated her world, both religious and secular, declaring her salvation through Jesus and conveying the state of relations with images of her family, friends and neighbors accompanied by cryptic bits of text. One of her self-portraits—cut from tin life-sized with arms raised and painted in bright blue on a yellow background—proclaim her fierce independence, pride and strength. While Smith was viewed skeptically by some of her townsfolk, she was able to sell some of her work and was recognized as an important folk artist in her lifetime. Her work is included in most major folk collections.

Woman Paint on Tin 21" x 14 ¼" Date Unknown Alfred Taplet Louisiana native Alfred “Big Al” Taplet ran a shoe-shine stand at Jackson Square in New Orleans for many years until an idea struck him around 1980 for how to bring in more customers. Taplet began to scavenge slabs of slate roofing that had fallen off old buildings and paint colorful images and catchy slogans on them to promote his business. To his surprise, his handmade “slates” attracted more French Quarter tourists who wanted to buy a sign rather than a shoe shine. Taplet found he could sell slates for much more than he charged for a shoe-shine, and soon local art dealers offered to exhibit and promote his artwork. He continued to shine shoes and expanded his art work to include local themes such as images of grits with the message, “No money, No grits.” Taplet could now afford to build a workshop by the Sixth Ward home that he shared with his twin brother, Alvin “Little Al” Taplet. When Hurricane Katrina struck in 2005, the Taplet property was destroyed, and the brothers were evacuated to Houston, Texas. They settled in Houston, where Big Al continues to make and exhibit his artwork, and the Black Head Woman with Hair, Beads brothers shine shoes on the side. Taplet has been featured in Gumbo Clay, Paint, Glasses Gumbo Clay, Paint 6 ½" x 5" x 4" 6 ½" x 5" x 4" two books: Contemporary American Folk Art: A Collector’s Guide James "Son Ford" Thomas 1979 1979 and Self-Taught, Outsider, and Folk Art.

James “Son” Thomas was born in Eden, Mississippi and raised Southern Culture at the University of Mississippi, chronicled Boat The Fisherman Metal, Paint by his maternal grandparents. At age 8 or 9, he began to make Thomas’s life in a book and documentary series, “Blues from 7" x 16" sculptures of animals and trucks after watching his uncle Joe the Delta,” which celebrated his work as musician and folk Date Unknown Cooper sculpt objects from local clay. To scare his skittish artist. His later works of unfired sculpture include busts of grandfather, Thomas sculpted his first skull, which would prominent people, animals, skulls and coffins, which were become his most popular subject. His uncle also taught him sought after by art collectors and galleries. A set of Thomas’s the basics of Delta Blues style guitar, which became another of clay skulls, fitted with human teeth, were part of the “Black Thomas’s lifelong passions. Thomas performed in blues bands Folk Art in America, 1930-1980” exhibition by the Corcoran around the region, but for most of his life, he made a living as Gallery in Washington, D.C. As Thomas often said, “We all a gravedigger. In the late 1960s, William Ferris, director of end up in the clay.” Moses Tolliver Moses Tolliver was one of 12 children born to a family of Bill Traylor Bill Traylor was born a slave in Lowndes County, Alabama sharecroppers in a small town near Montgomery, Alabama. and worked as a sharecropper for a cotton grower for most Tolliver worked a number of jobs throughout his life, of his life, even after emancipation. He moved to including as a gardener, house painter, carpenter, plumber Montgomery at age 75, where he held a job at a shoe factory and handyman. In the late 1960s, while he was sweeping for several years until rheumatism impeded his ability to work. in a furniture factory, a forklift dropped a load of marble In 1939, homeless and destitute at age 85, Traylor began his on him, crushing his legs. Suffering from a lack of mobility career as an artist. He drew the people, plants, animals and and boredom, Tolliver later turned to painting. Using softly local landmarks he observed from his perch on the sidewalks colored house paint on plywood, he made playful and of Monroe Avenue, the center of Montgomery’s African erotic representations of people, animals and plants. American community. Traylor used pencil and scraps of His self-portraits feature the crutches that he used to get cardboard until artist Charles Shannon noticed his remarkable around. Tolliver exhibited his artwork on his front porch, talent and began to supply him with paints, brushes and where it caught the attention of a former gallery director at drawing paper. Traylor’s works are flat, bold and expressive, the Montgomery Museum of Art. The museum then hosted evoking the modernist milieu. Not until the late 1970s — a solo exhibition of Tolliver’s work, which led to his later after his work was categorized by Shannon and Traylor’s inclusion in the “Black Folk Art in America: 1930-1980” wife — was he discovered by the art world, which considers traveling exhibition. Today Tolliver’s paintings are part of Traylor a significant figure in the history of modernism and museum collections around the world. art created by self-taught artists. In 2018-19, the Smithsonian Museum of American Art will host the largest exhibition of Traylor’s work to date and the first retrospective show for an artist born into slavery.

Round Box with Snakes Paint, Wood 15" x 5" Date Unknown

Woman with Blue Skirt Pencil & Paint on Paper 7" x 11" Date Unknown Charlie Willeto Charlie Willeto was a Navajo medicine man and sheepherder who lived in the remote high desert of New Mexico. In the last four years of his life, he began carving wooden sculptures, which he used to barter for food and other goods at the local trading post. Willeto created more than 400 figures, ranging from a few inches to five feet tall, which have made him one of the best known Native American artists. His work draws on the Navajo tradition of making illness dolls, which are spirit figures used in healing rituals to ward off illness and suffering. Like the illness dolls, Willeto’s figures were endowed with spirit and attached to stories and mystical practices. Most of his sculptures are modeled on Navajo men and women in traditional roles of warrior, weaver, sheepherder, and medicine man, but he also made figures of eagles, owls, snakes and other animals.

Untitled (Skunk) Polychrome Carved Pine 4" x 19 ¾" x 3 ½" c. 1960 - 1964 Philo Levi "Chief" Willey Born in Falls Village, Connecticut, Philo Levi Willey left the family farm at age 12 and traveled across the country, working odd jobs until he settled in New Orleans in 1931. He was employed by the local sewage and water board and worked his way up to chief of security, which led his co-workers to nick-name him “Chief.” After retirement in 1965, Willey painted as a hobby and sought to capture the vitality of life in New Orleans and convey his love of animals. His early works were in watercolor, color pencil and crayons, and he later turned to acrylic paints on Masonite to achieve more vibrant colors. His works were mostly representational, with some elements of fantasy and abstraction. After his death, Willey’s work was exhibited at the State University of New York and in other museums and collections throughout the country, including the DeCordova Museum in Lincoln, Massachusetts. In his 15 years as an artist, Willey created more than 1,800 works.

Artists Sign The Oldest Art in History... Ink on Cardboard 8 ½" x 16 ½" Date Unknown Sanford Winslow A lifelong resident of Newton, Massachusetts, Sanford Winslow was a versatile and prolific artist whose favorite mediums were scratchboards, painting and photography. In his junior year at Boston University, Winslow suffered a schizophrenic episode that led to years of residence in psychiatric hospitals and halfway houses. Through medication and creating art, Winslow was able to manage his illness and live independently. His works in black and white scratchboards were his most complex and innovative. He created geometric structures with rulers and protractors, which he populated with recurring images of rock musicians, religious figures, skeletons and mythological creatures, along with quotes that expressed his philosophy. Winslow approached painting more playfully; he often lined up a few canvasses and worked on them simultaneously, painting a single image and a one-liner on each with bright fluorescent paints and glitter. A prolific photographer, Winslow made insightful portraits of people he encountered in his daily life, capturing their individuality and style. His work has been exhibited widely in the Northeast, at the Outsider Fair in New York City, and the American Visionary Art Museum in Baltimore.

Dance Marathon Scratchboard 20 ½" x 24 ½" Date Unknown Lorri Berenberg Lorri Berenberg was the owner and director of the Berenberg Inner Visions: Selections from the Collection Gallery, from 1999 - 2009. The Berenberg Gallery was the of Beverly Stearns Bernson ’55 was produced first and only gallery in Boston exclusively dedicated to through the Exhibition Program of the showcasing the work of contemporary folk and self-taught Department of Fine and Performing Arts, artists, specializing in the work of artists with disabilities. Colby-Sawyer College, 541 Main Street New London, NH, 03257 Prior to opening the gallery, Ms. Berenberg worked at the Curated by Bert Yarborough, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston for over twenty years where she Sonja C. Davidow ’56 Chair in the served as the Associate Director for Outreach in Division of Fine and Performing Arts; Education and Public Programs. Berenberg is currently serves Director, The Bill and Sonja Carlson Davidow ‘56 on the Board of Trustees of the deCordova Sculpture Park and Marian Graves Mugar Art Galleries and Museum in Lincoln, MA. She is the Chairperson of the Advisory Committee for Gateway Arts a studio program for Designed by John Fownes ’17, artists with disabilities in Brookline, MA. She is a member BFA Graphic Design, of the Arlington Public Art Committee (a volunteer Town Colby-Sawyer College

Committee) and serves on their steering committee for major Edited by Kimberly Swick Slover, public art initiatives. She is a former member of the Board Wilmot, NH of Trustees at VSA Arts, Massachusetts where she currently serves on their Gallery Committee. Photographs by John Sherman, John Sherman Photography, Berenberg has guest curated exhibitions at The Arsenal Hartford, VT Center for the Arts in Watertown, MA; The Groton School in Groton, MA; VSA Arts in Boston, MA, Gateway Arts Printed by R.C Brayshaw & Co., Warner, NH, in Brookline, MA; Art Rocks Spy Pond in Arlington, MA on 100# Endurance Silk Text with Cover of 100# and most recently co-curated an exhibition at Concord Art in Royal Sundance 100% post-consumer White Felt Concord, MA. Front and rear cover image detail from: Howard Finster, Visions of Great Mansions, Acrylic on Panel, 18” x 11”, 1987

Front and rear inside cover image detail from: Genvieve Seille, Polygraph IX, Mixed Media on Cuna Man Paper, 9 ½” x 17”, date unknown Artist Unknown Carved and Painted Wood Typeset in Adobe Caslon Pro and OSP-DIN 6 ½" x 2 ½" x 2" Date Unkown 68 pages; 37 color reproductions