Friday, January 20, 2012
The Electric Pencil
THE ELECTRIC PENCIL, the story of Outsider Artist James Edward Deeds Jr. Committed for Life at the tender age of 17 to Lunatic Asylum No.3, Nevada, MO in 1925. Heavily subjected to psychotropic drugs and electric shock treatment, his is a tale of the need to create, even in the most adverse conditions. Deeds executed an extraordinary album of drawings, acknowledged as masterpieces of Outsider Art.
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
The Future Of Salvation Mountain Uncertain | KPBS.org
The Future Of Salvation Mountain Uncertain | KPBS.org
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The Future Of Salvation Mountain Uncertain
Aired 12/20/11
The creator of a desert artwork known as Salvation Mountain has been placed in a long-term care facility in El Cajon. Now the future of the candy-colored mountain is unknown.
Above: Leonard Knight, outsider artist who spent years building Salvation Mountain out of adobe, straw and paint.
Above: The truck where outsider artist Leonard Knight sleeps. It's painted in the same style as his monumental work, Salvation Mountain.
Leonard Knight has been building Salvation Mountain out of adobe, straw, and paint for almost 30 years. The colorful, three-story mountain with the words "God Is Love" on its crest sits in the Imperial County desert, east of San Diego.
The 80-year-old Knight has lived at the mountain since 1985, sleeping in the back of a painted pick-up truck and caring for his life's work for hours every day. I made my first pilgrimage to Salvation Mountain in 2008 and wrote about it here (starring a terrifying swarm of flies).
Earlier this month, Knight was placed in a long-term care facility in El Cajon for dementia.
Preservation Challenges
Jo Hernandez is the executive director of Spaces, an organization that helps preserve outsider art. Spaces was instrumental in saving the Watts Towers in Los Angeles.
She has been working with Knight, both in documenting his project and trying to secure its long-term future. Hernandez says without Knight’s daily attention, Salvation Mountain is in jeopardy. "It's out in the middle of the desert and with the way it is formed and the kind of materials [Knight] uses, I just don’t see any possibility that in the end, it will be able to be 'saved.'"
Hernandez is referring to the over 100,000 gallons of paint Knight has used to adorn and layer the mountain. Much of that paint has been donated by the thousands of visitors who've wanted to support Knight's desert dream.
Without attention to deteriorating areas, sun, rain, and even earthquakes will have their way with this relatively fragile mountain. There's also the issue of protecting the mountain from vandals. As of now, a rotating group of volunteers are monitoring it.
Hernandez says it's heartbreaking, but this is a very difficult preservation case. "What we’re really hoping for is that it will be able to be maintained as long as possible so that people can come and enjoy it....But it’s an ephemeral piece and hopefully we can let it die gracefully. I hate to say that, but I'm just trying to be realistic."
Above: Paint cans are scattered all over the land surrounding Salvation Mountain.
Above: One of the interior shrines Knight built inside a portion of Salvation Mountain.
Hernandez says at her most optimistic, she thinks the mountain could be saved through a combination of financial support and non-profit oversight. She's working with some individuals who've helped care for Knight and the mountain over the years to establish a non-profit to work on the mountain's preservation.
The Land
One of the first steps in determining Salvation Mountain's future is figuring out who actually owns the land. One thing is certain, Knight has been officially trespassing since he began building his monument.
The parcel of desert land in the shadow of the Chocolate Mountains was first given to California by the federal government upon statehood in 1850. It was one of the "school lands," which were parcels in each township given to the state for the benefit of public education. Any proceeds from the sale of those lands would go to support public education.
The federal government took back this desert parcel during World War II for military use - resulting in the slabs that mark nearby Slab City - and it was then returned to the state in the 1960s. The distinct boundaries of what the state actually owns as of today are unknown.
Curtis Fossum is chief officer with the California State Lands Commission, which manages land for the state of California. Fossum says the state definitely owns the land neighboring Slab City is on, but he's not sure about Salvation Mountain. The state hasn't had the resources it would take to find out.
As Fossum points out, the Land Commission manages over four and a half million acres, and Salvation Mountain sits on less than one of those acres. "We are a small office. We don't have the ability to go down there and fence it off. We don't have the funding for it. But we'll be looking at those issues in the coming year."
Fossum says that if the mountain was designated a cultural resource and had to be preserved, "you'd have to have some responsible party to do it and as far as I know, no party has stepped forward to take responsibility of it and make sure it's not a problem."
Thousands of visitors come to Salvation Mountain every year. In 2002, Senator Barbara Boxer entered the mountain into the congressional record as a national treasure. PBS and the BBC have both made documentaries about Knight and his work. Even film director/actor Sean Penn featured Knight in his 2007 film “Into the Wild.”
Hernandez says groups with agendas are a threat to the mountain. Various church groups have approached Knight over the years, offering to adopt the mountain for their own missionary purposes. Knight's always refused, choosing the clarity and focus of one idea: "God is Love."
In the coming weeks, I'll be looking in to why Imperial County has not wanted to manage Salvation Mountain in the past and what the county's role will be in Salvation Mountain's future.
Friday, October 21, 2011
Buol Grotto to be saved by Kohler
Preservation Wins: Dubuque Yard Grotto to be Preserved
By Sarah Oltrogge
An eleventh-hour rescue to save a rare Dubuque "yard grotto" will ensure its future as a link to a larger regional tradition.
With a strong history for preserving grotto environments such as this, the Kohler Foundation, Inc., in Kohler, Wis., has stepped in and acquired the yard grotto created by Madeline Buol. The grotto will be moved to KFI's conservation studio and restored before moving to its final location, yet to be determined.
Madeline Buol (1902-1986), built her grotto, a conglomeration of embellished concrete typically with a religious theme, in her back yard on Garfield Street in Dubuque in the late 1940s and early 1950s. The home, which remained in the family until recently, was sold to new owners who were not interested in keeping the grotto.
Lisa Stone, curator with the Roger Brown Study Collection (The School of the Art Institute of Chicago) and author of Sacred Spaces and Other Places: A Guide to the Grottos and Sculptural Environments of the Upper Midwest (1993), came across the Buol grotto while conducting research. Upon learning of its impending fate, she began reaching out to colleagues in the hopes someone would take an interest in saving the work.
"(My co-author) Jim Zanzi and I felt the Buol grotto was historically and aesthetically significant in its own right and therefore very deserving of preservation," Stone said. "The grotto is somewhat, but not completely, unusual having been made by a woman. She developed an original style of surface embellishment and there are lovely details. But the structures were deteriorating and the site needed attention."
The first three major grottos in the region - Grotto of the Redemption (West Bend; blt. 1912-1954), Dickeyville Grotto (Dickeyville, Wis.; blt. 1925-1931) and Rudolph Grotto (Rudolph, Wis.; blt. 1919-1983) - were all built by priests with some help from mostly male parishioners. Women were involved in some of the "spin off" grottos, such as the Paul and Matilda Wegner Grotto (Cataract, Wis.; blt. 1929-1942), and Mollie Jenson's Art Exhibit (River Falls, Wis.; blt. 1938). It was easy to see why it should be preserved."We were made aware this existed through Jim Zanzi and Lisa Stone," said Terri Yoho, executive director of the Kohler Foundation. "We knew immediately the work should be preserved. Several museums have been contacted regarding a final home for the collection and we are confident that we will be able to place the work for long term care. For now, the sculptures are being moved to Wisconsin for conservation treatment and documentation over the next few months."
The main part of the Buol grotto is clearly a reference to Father Mathias Wernerus' famed Dickeyville Grotto, about 15 miles away. Buol flanked her Grotto (ostensibly to the Blessed Virgin) with beautifully embellished renditions of the American and Papal flags, and shells arching over flanking side shrines with the words "Religion" and "Patriotism." One of the striking aspects of the Dickeyville Grotto was the pairing of the American and Papal flags, which stated Catholics' loyalty to the country as well as to the Vatican, which was especially important in the post-war years, and Buol picked up on this bold expression while flanking her grotto with wonderfully precarious, tall concrete rosaries.
"The Buol yard grotto is an example of highly original work," Stone said. "Madeline Buol made a marvelous contribution to the genre, and her joy in translating her religious devotion into works of art is expressed clearly and with exuberance."
The Kohler Foundation, Inc. supports education, arts and preservation initiatives in Wisconsin. Since the late 1970s, the preservation of folk architecture, art environments and collections by self-taught artists has been the major focus of the Foundation.
Top photo: Dated 1952, Madeline Buol appears next to her grotto for this photo which appeared in the Dubuque Telegraph-Herald.
Bottom photo: Close of up Madeline Buol and her grotto shrine "Religion."
Tuesday, September 27, 2011
Detour Art in Park City, UT
"Iowa" by Melissa Polhamus, Virginia Beach, Va. Courtesy Collection of Kelly Ludwig
BY GLEN WARCHOL
First published Sep 23 2011 05:46PM
Updated Sep 23, 2011 11:20PM
For many humans, making art isn’t a profession; it’s an obsession.
The most striking example of this primal and irrepressible urge is found among the so-called "outside" artists — amateurs who often are destitute, isolated, marginalized, mentally ill or even imprisoned. The only unifying factor between these folk artists is that they have no formal training in art production or history.
The phenomenon, which has created remarkable edifices, such as the Watts Towers in Los Angeles, Houston’s Beer Can House, and Salt Lake City’s Gilgal Garden, seems to be under-represented in the Intermountain West, and in Utah. Or at least yet undiscovered, according to two experts who spoke recently at the Kimball Art Center’s "Detour Art: Outsider, Folk Art, and Visionary Environments from Coast to Coast."
The Kimball exhibition is drawn from the outsider-art collection of Kansas City-based Kelly Ludwig, who travels America’s blue highways to find and document outside artists. The show presents the spectrum of the often primitive or childlike genre — from the graceful wood carvings of Kentucky’s Minnie Adkins that draw from the folk art of duck decoys, to the crude but powerful tin cut-outs of Betty Sue Matthews, plus the intuitive modernism of Thornton Dial.
Ludwig says outsider art is a "celebration of creativity." She labels the genre as "detour art" because it’s an escape from so-called fine arts, and usually requires driving into rural backwaters to find.
"These artists are thrifty," Ludwig says. "Nothing ever goes to waste. The best definition I can think of for outsider artist is: Ordinary people using the material they have at hand to make art."
In the exhibit’s "Indian Chief," Jimmy Lee Sudduth of Fayette, Ala., used dirt, Pepsi-Cola, and leftover house paint to create. Charlie Lucas, also of Alabama, used bicycle sprockets and a broken rake to make "Face."
Terms applied to the genre — including "folk art" and "outsider art" — are fuzzy and getting more so, as academics, collectors and media continue to discover outsider artists, says Duff Lindsay, a collector and dealer in the art form from Columbus, Ohio.
"I call it ‘contemporary self-taught,’" Lindsay says. "Outsider art is almost a historical term now." After all, can anyone be "outside" anymore, asks Lindsay, a former television producer, given the media saturation of the modern world.
It’s nearly impossible for folk artists — with the exception perhaps of the severely mentally ill — to be unaware of the greater world of art and the growing market (and upward-spiralling prices) for outsider art, Ludwig says. But she doesn’t think that scrutiny and study will destroy what’s sometimes labeled art brut; that is, works that grow out of an almost obsessive need to create with "whatever material at hand." "This art just transforms," Ludwig says. "It will evolve."
Ludwig and Lindsay ended a tour of the Kimball exhibit with a challenge to aficionados: Find outsider/folk/untrained artists in Utah.
"This art is everywhere you go," Ludwig says. "But I don’t know of any self-taught artists in Utah. But I know they are there."
gwarchol@sltrib.com
RIP Bob Cassilly - City Museum founder
| Bob Cassilly, founder of City Museum, found dead in bulldozer at his Cementland project |
| By Dale Singer, Beacon reporter |
| Updated 4:08 pm Mon., 9.26.11 |
Bob Cassilly, who turned a collection of unusual artifacts into City Museum, a top tourist attraction in downtown St. Louis, was found dead Monday morning at a former cement plant that was being turned into his next project, Cementland.
Cassilly, 61, was found in a bulldozer at Cementland, 9403 Riverview in north St. Louis. Police had no further details available immediately. Mayor Francis Slay said on Twitter shortly before noon that "The City has lost some of its wonder. RIP Bob Cassilly."
In a stark message, white type on a black background, the museum's website posted a message that said:
"City Musem is saddened by the loss of our founder and inspiration, Robert Cassilly. 1949-2011"
A spokesman for the St. Louis office of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration said it was investigating the scene of Cassilly's death to determine the cause and see whether any health or safety laws had been violated. He said the department has six months to complete a report on the matter and it was too soon to release any information about what its investigation has found.
As word of Cassilly's death spread, tributes to his work began to appear online.
READ MORE FROM THE BEACON
A Facebook page was set up to remember Cassilly and feature some of his other works, including Turtle Park. And the Regional Arts Commission established a similarpage, locating his various works of art throughout the area, including a bust of longtime alderman Red Villa and installations at the Zoo and the Butterfly House.
St. Louis Public Radio linked to an interview with Cassilly from 1999 when he appeared on the NPR program "Whad'ya Know?"
City Museum, whose slogan was "Where the imagination runs wild!," opened in 1997 in a 600,000-square-foot warehouse that formerly housed the International Shoe Company on 15th Street near Washington Avenue. It quickly became a top draw, with abandoned airplanes, elevated walkways and other items that the museum's website terms "an eclectic mixture of children's playground, funhouse, surrealistic pavilion, and architectural marvel made out of unique found objects ... the very stuff of the city."
LIVING ST. LOUIS
The Nine Network of Public Media
Bob Cassilly appeared on a segment of Living St. Louis in 2005.
Cassilly, described on the site as a "classically trained sculptor and serial entrepreneur," worked with a team of artisans to create what he boasted had "urban roots deeper than any other institutions'."
In typical fashion, he said on the website:
"City Museum makes you want to know. The point is not to learn every fact, but to say, 'Wow, that's wonderful.' And if it's wonderful, it's worth preserving."
Cassilly’s latest venture, Cementland -- which has been several years in the making and was running behind schedule -- is a 54-acre site at the old Missouri Portland Cement plant that a New York Times article described in a headline in 2007 as “one part cement, two parts whimsy, one odd park.”
The story depicted Cassilly’s vision this way:
“Imagine a park peppered with Mr. Cassilly’s lively animal sculptures, but also with obsolete cement-making machinery grinding away, industrial silos and other remnants of the 54-acre former factory. Then add navigable waterways, waterfalls and beaches atop dirt hills.”
It added:
“Pointing south, he rhapsodized about how downtown St. Louis would look from Cementland: ‘In the afternoon, when the sun shines on the city, you get this nice reflection. You don’t see all the trash and stuff. It’s the best view of the city.”
Panoramic photos of the ongoing work at Cementland can be found here and here; a Twitter feed from "cassilly crew," who describe themselves as "the personal build monkeys of creator Bob Cassilly," linked to them earlier this month.
File photo by Christian Losciale | Beacon Intern
The City Museum's roof opened to visitors in 2009.
City Museum is a regular stop for those seeking an offbeat experience in St. Louis amid more traditional fare like the Arch, the Cardinals, the Botanical Garden and the Zoo. It appeals to all ages with its variety - an aquarium, a funhouse, salvaged materials, a mega slide and MonstroCity, a huge outdoor jungle gym.
In a story about Cassilly and the museum on its 10th anniversary, the Post-Dispatch wrote that Cassilly "admits that he struggles to maintain his passion for City Museum and makes no promises about its future. 'You shouldn't assume things are going to last forever,' Cassilly said. 'It would be great if it all collapsed onto itself like Camelot. We would have had this brief shining ah-moment. But that's just the romantic in me.'"
Actually, City Museum almost collapsed, not under the weight of lack of interest but from a much more prosaic cause: divorce and other legal wrangling.
In 2002, after protracted, bitter proceedings between Cassilly and his former wife, Gail Cassilly, the board of directors at City Museum agreed to sell the attraction to Cassilly, who had guaranteed $1.6 million of the museum's debt, according to a story in the St. Louis Business Journal.
Gail Cassilly had been dismissed the previous year in a dispute over what direction the museum should take, the story said, and Cassilly had expressed displeasure over the museum's non-profit status.
As the couple's divorce dragged on, the museum had problems raising money. Cassilly eventually stopped working there, though he later returned and moved into an apartment in the building.
Despite the acrimony, Gail Cassilly expressed admiration for her ex-husband and pride in what they had built, telling the Post-Dispatch:
"I knew he was the master builder, and he knew I was the master organizer. I don't think it would have opened without that partnership. We really set the mark for fun."
The museum was the subject of other non-fun stories as well. In 2006, a jury awarded $100,000 to a woman who lost two fingers when she put her hand in the "Puking Pig," a metal tank that dumps about 150 gallons of water every 90 seconds or so. The jury said the woman was largely responsible for her injuries.
Last year, the family of a 10-year-old Kansas boy who fractured his skull after he fell 13 feet from the museum's outdoor jungle gym settled its case out of court; terms of the settlement were kept confidential.
Cassilly earned both bachelor's and master's degree in sculpture from Fontbonne after attending the Cleveland Institute of Art. Besides his many works in St. Louis, he created fiberglass hippos for Central Park in New York City; a giant giraffe for the Dallas Zoo; four bronze lions for Busch Gardens in San Diego; and a recreation of ancient stone ruins at Busch Gardens in Williamsburg, Va.
Cassilly's Cementland, in the Riverview neighborhood of St. Louis
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