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| The Throne of God by Sister Gertrude Morgan |
Once folk art was just folk art. Somewhere, up in the hills, resourceful
matrons would gather to make quilts and gossip, or retired small town
cops would carve duck decoys or other, less identifiable things, but it
was all "normal," good, clean fun. But in the 1970s, another kind of
folk art became fashionable. It was variously dubbed "visionary" or
"outsider" art, terms that were a kind of code for art by people who
sometimes heard or saw things, often very strange things. Some were just
oddballs while others were on a mission from God to save souls with
their religious paintings. Local collector Richard Gasperi assembled
over 500 such works, much of it is on view at the Ogden, where it makes
for a great prelude to the expo of Jean-Michel Basquiat paintings
inspired by the South, upstairs, with which it shares much in
common.
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| Noah's Ark by David Butler |
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| Birds and Crosses by Willie White |
An entire gallery chamber is occupied by the works of David Butler, who in his retirement became a visionary conjurer of strange, benignly demonic avian and reptilian creatures painted in the rich colors and staccato patterns often associated with African art, but here mostly rendered in shaped corrugated tin panels. In real life he stayed close to his rustic home but his vision soared across time and space to encompasses local swamps and African jungles as well religious scenes like
Noah's Ark, above. Another retired gent with a similarly mesozoic visio, Willie White, sold felt marker landscapes like
Birds and Crosses, from his Central City front porch, but although Mose Tolliver, an elderly Alabama, also painted odd animals, his women were odder, at times resembling those obscene "Sheela-na-gig" female gargoyles that can be seen exposing themselves above strategic portals on ancient Irish cathedrals. But Sister Gertrude Morgan was all about piety, hers and ours, and here she reveals to us
The Throne of God, top, which clearly illustrates how she came to be considered something akin to a William Blake of the Lower 9th Ward. It's quite a contrast to Jack Zwirz's inexplicably beguiling portrait of an
Eleven Fingered Seamstress in an evening dress, below, or Rev. Howard Finster's colorfully inscribed painting illustrating how "millions of church folk drink Coca Cola and drive home safely." ~Bookhardt
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| Eleven Fingered Seamstress by Jack Zwirz |
Self-Taught, Outsider and Visionary Art from the Collection of Richard Gasperi, Through Feb. 22,
Ogden Museum of Southern Art, 925 Camp St., 539-9600
