Fans of “Lord Love You: Works by R.A. Miller from the Mullis Collection” and “Amazing Grace: Self-Taught Artists from the Mullis Collection,” this article from the New York Times about another self-taught artists, Vollis Simpson, may be of interest.
Simpson, 91, of Lucama, N.C., is a retired farm-equipment repairman turned artist. Simpson received no formal training for his creations; he attended school through the 11th grade and then went on to join the U.S. Army Air Corps. It is easy to see how his sculptures evolved from his repair business, which, in turn seems to have grown from a childhood talent for fixing things that served him through his time in the armed services, after the war and now in his artistic expression.
At first Simpson did not consider what he was doing “art.” His son, Leonard Simpson, said, “He just did it for enjoyment.” Now his works are selling for thousands of dollars, and he is receiving recognition for his place in the genre of “American homemade art by self-taught practitioners.”
Rebecca Alban Hoffberger is one of Simpson’s supporters. Back in the mid-1990s she was forming the American Visionary Art Museum in Baltimore, and she decided that Simpson was the perfect artist to supply the museum with its signature piece. That piece is called “Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness,” and it is a 55-foot tall, 45-foot wide, 3-ton whirligig.
Simpson’s whirligigs bring back memories of the works of R.A. Miller, whose work was on exhibition last year at the Lyndon House Arts Center in a show organized by the Georgia Museum of Art.
Photos: Jeremy M. Lange for The New York Times
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