Walks to the Paradise Garden: A Lowdown Southern Odyssey - by Phillip March Jones (Hardcover)
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<p/><br></br><p><b> Book Synopsis </b></p></br></br><p><strong>A classic grand tour of Southern folk art, from Howard Finster to Lonnie Holley</strong></p><p>Walks to the Paradise Garden is the last unpublished manuscript of the late American poet, photographer, publisher, Black Mountain alumnus and bon viveur Jonathan Williams (1929-2008). This 352-page book chronicles Williams' road trips across the Southern United States with photographers Guy Mendes and Roger Manley in search of the most authentic and outlandish artists the South had to offer. Williams describes the project thus: The people and places in Walks to the Paradise Garden exist along the blue highways of America.... We have traveled many thousands of miles, together and separately, to document what tickled us, what moved us, and what (sometimes) appalled us. The majority of these road trips took place in the 1980s, a pivotal decade in the development of Southern yard shows, and many of the artists are now featured in major institutions. This book, however, chronicles them at the outset of their careers and provides essential context for their inclusion in the art historical canon. Taking its name from the famous artwork by Howard Finster, Walks to the Paradise Garden brings to light rare images and stories of Southern artists and creators who existed in near anonymity during the last half of the 20th century. Organized in chapters devoted to each artist, the book features Banner Blevins, Henry Dorsey, Sam Doyle, Howard Finster, Lonnie Holley, Ralph Eugene Meatyard, Sister Gertrude Morgan, William C. Owens, Vollis Simpson, Edgar Tolson and Jeff Williams, among many others.</p><p/><br></br><p><b> Review Quotes </b></p></br></br><br>The photographs, in these instances, offer crucial insights into the spiritual wellsprings of their aesthetic approaches and their artistic practice.--James Balestrieri "Antiques and The Arts Weekly"<br><br>[A] masterwork collection of rare stories and photos of now-famous Southern folk artists.--CJ Lotz "Garden and Gun"<br><br>[Walks to the Paradise Garden: A Lowdown Southern Odyssey is] a valuable--if unorthodox--addition to the history of self-taught art.--Anne Doran "ARTnews"<br><br>A journey begun without a map or a clear destination, the book stops along the way for places of good eating (Williams devotes a chapter to Ridgewood Barbecue in Bluff City, TN) and breaks up the wayward narrative with examples of yard or store signs seen or photographed along the road.--Richard B. Woodward "Collector Daily"<br><br>Along with a deep sense of religious wonder, there is a sense of urgency to the work featured in Walks to the Paradise Garden, a compulsion to make more and more of it until it covered the walls of their homes, crowded the hallways, and spilled onto the front lawn.--Will Matsuda "Topic"<br><br>The book contains much of the original wildness of the self-taught artists, photographers, and poet alike. Williams writes in a raucous free-form language alongside documentary photographs by Roger Manley and Guy Mendes.--Karen Tauches "Burnaway"<br><br>The book itself is both a substantive document and, in our no-attention-span Instagram era, a surprisingly performative one, too. Williams' language makes each entry a tease. As a prospector with a keen eye and a storyteller itching to please, he seemed determined to dig up something new with each encounter.--Edward M. Gómez "Hyperallergic"<br><br>This book is a delight, especially when you think it almost wasn't published. Williams' prose is as way-out as the artists, and he creatively and sometimes profanely chronicled his travels to find them. At its heart, though, this is a book of amazing photographs as unforgettable as their subjects -- proud Southern individualists for whom creating art was as much a part of life as breathing.--Tom Eblen "Lexington Herald Leader"<br><br>Tobie Mathew's magnificent book testifies to Russia's unrepeatable two years of free-ranging political satire.--Donald Rayfield "Literary Review"<br><br>Walks highlights images and stories of Southern artists and creators while they were still anonymous, before they were famous, or in some cases, infamous.-- "Ace Weekly"<br><br>Walks isn't merely a showcase for Way Out People Way Out There, but a living testimony of those who will always be drawn toward the raw imagination's anti-commercial hinterland-even if it happens to reside in a concrete caveman outside a filling station.--J.W. McCormack "BOMB"<br><br>Walks to the Paradise Garden: A Lowdown Southern Odyssey is a new book of historical importance in the outsider art field, the insights of which will help deepen our understanding of the social-cultural environment from which many remarkable creations by self-taught artists of the American South have emerged.-- "Raw Vision"<br><br>Williams' manuscript, now exhumed, provides a welcome catalyst for the reexamination of the discourse surrounding self taught artists, both in relation to the major museum efforts for inclusion and the shifting language used to place this work within a larger canon of art history.--Ryan Filchak "Seen"<br>
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