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{{Short description|African American female painter (1892–1987)}}
{{for|the Potawatomi leader|Minnie Evans (Potawatomi leader)}}
{{Infobox artist
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| native_name_lang =
| birth_name = Minnie Eva Jones<!-- only use if different than name -->
| birth_date =
| birth_place = [[Long Creek
| death_date =
| death_place = [[Wilmington, North Carolina|Wilmington]], North Carolina, U.S.
| resting_place =
| resting_place_coordinates = <!-- {{Coord|LAT|LONG|type:landmark|display=inline}} -->
| occupation = Artist
| nationality = American
| education =
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| awards = <!-- {{awd|award|year|title|role|name}} (optional) -->
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}}
'''Minnie Eva Evans'''
== Personal life ==
Evans (born Minnie Eva Jones) was born to Ella Jones on December 12, 1892 in [[Long Creek
In Wrightsville, Ella Jones met her future husband, Joe Kelly, and they married in 1908.<ref name="Painting Dreams" /> During this time, Jones worked as a "sounder" selling shellfish door to door.<ref name="Aspects of Minnie Evans">{{cite journal|last1=Kerman|first1=Nathan|date=1997-07-01|title=Aspects of Minnie Evans|journal=On Paper: The Journal of Prints, Drawings, and Photography | issue = 6|volume=1|pages=12–16}}</ref> In 1908, one of Joe Kelly's daughter's from a previous marriage introduced Minnie Jones to Julius Caesar Evans.<ref name="Painting Dreams" /><ref name=":3">{{Cite book|last1=Smith|first1=Jessie Carney|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ssMBzqrUpjwC|title=Notable Black American Women, Book II|last2=Phelps|first2=Shirelle|publisher=Gale Research, Inc.|year=1992|isbn=9780810391772|location=Detroit, MI|pages=205–206|quote=December 12, 1892}}</ref> Minnie Jones, who was 16 years old at the time, married Julius (aged 19) that same year.<ref name="Folk Art Messenger" /> The couple had three sons, Elisha Dyer, David Barnes Evans, and George Sheldon Evans.<ref name="Folk Art Messenger" /> Though Evans had many supporters, her husband was not one of them. He would often tell her to stop making up visions and to focus on things to maintain the household. He believed her to be going crazy from the art she was creating.<ref>{{Cite web|title=The Angel That Stands By Me {{!}} Folkstreams|url=http://www.folkstreams.net/film-detail.php?id=71.|access-date=2020-11-16|website=www.folkstreams.net|language=en}}</ref>
Beginning in 1916, Minnie Evans was employed as [[Domestic worker|a domestic]] at the home of her husband's employer, Pembroke Jones, a wealthy industrialist.<ref name="Folk Art Messenger" /> The Evans family lived on Jones's hunting estate, "Pembroke Park," known today as the subdivision Landfall. Pembroke Jones died in 1919 and his wife, Sadie Jones remarried Henry Walters. The couple moved nearby to the Airlie Estate which was left to Sadie Jones from Pembroke Jones. Evans continued to work from Sadie Jones and now Henry Walters, on the Airlie Estate. After Walters died, Sadie Jones decided to turn the Airlie Estate into gardens which later became one of the most famous gardens of the south.<ref name="Painting Dreams" /> After Sadie Jones died, a man named Albert Corbet bought the property in 1947 and assigned Evans to be the [[gatekeeper]] and take admission from public visitors.<ref name="Painting Dreams" /> She held this position for the rest of her life.<ref name="Painting Dreams" /> She retired from her job as the gatekeeper when she was 82 years old in 1974.<ref name="Painting Dreams" />▼
▲Beginning in 1916, Minnie Evans was employed as a [[
==Career==
Evans began drawing on [[Good Friday]] 1935,
Evans first started selling her work at the Airlie Gardens by hanging her pieces on the front gate of the gardens.
In 1962,
From 1962
Many art critics have labelled Evans work as "[[Surrealism|surrealistic]]", "[[Visionary art|visionary]]", and "[[Psychedelic art|psychedelic]]".<ref name=":12" /> Religion played a vital role in Evans life, as well as in many of Evans paintings. Evans
[[File:Bottle Chapel.jpg|thumb|alt=a small house-like structure made of multicolored bottles|Minnie Evans Bottle Chapel designed and built by Virginia Wright-Frierson]]
Evans created "one of the most powerful works of art",<ref>{{Cite news|url=http://artanddesigninspiration.com/african-american-artist-minnie-evans-claims-art-inspired-by-god/|title=African American Artist Minnie Evans|date=2016-12-02|work=ArtandDesignInspiration|access-date=2017-04-11|language=en-US}}</ref> which was a [[self-portrait]] on the cover of a [[Scrapbooking|scrapbook]] in 1981.
Evans
Evans was the subject of the [[Documentary film|documentary]]
== Famous works ==
===Inspiration, style, and technique===
Evans began to [[Drawing|draw]] and [[Painting|paint]] at the age of 43, creating her first pieces of artwork on a scrap of paper bag. She was known to free-hand her drawings from left to right.<ref>{{Cite web|title=About the Artist: Minnie Evans {{!}} Folkstreams|url=https://www.folkstreams.net/film-context.php?id=120|access-date=2020-11-12|website=www.folkstreams.net|language=en}}</ref> Minnie Evans was notorious for drawing with anything on hand, including discarded window shades, book bindings, scrap paper. She also favored the use of Crayola crayons as she said “they are the best.”<ref>https://go.gale.com/ps/i.do?p=SCIC&u=unc_main&id=GALE%7CA176019558&v=2.1&it=r</ref> Five years later she decided to really dedicate herself to recording her dreams through art. Filled with Edens and heavens, the landscape of her dream world is principally free of the threat of hell.<ref>{{Cite web|last=Brennan|first=Lissa|date=2003-04-16|title=The Multi-colored dreams Of Minnie Evans|url=https://indyweek.com/api/content/f1c19053-ec57-5cf9-ad42-8864ead123ba/|access-date=2020-11-16|website=INDY Week|language=en-us}}</ref> She painted her early works on US Coast guard stationery and later worked with more precision, using ink, [[graphite]], [[Crayon|wax crayon]], [[Watercolor painting|watercolour]] and [[Oil painting|oil on canvas]], board and paper.<ref>''[http://www.rawvision.com/books/outsider-art-sourcebook Outsider Art Sourcebook]'', ed. John Maizels, Raw Vision, Watford, 2009, p.71</ref>
Evans
Her drawing became compulsive, and her friends and family became worried that she was losing her mind. Over time, however, they gained respect for her art and believed she had a gift.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Minnie Evans : Learn About The Artists : The Collection: The Anthony Petullo Collection of SELF-TAUGHT & OUTSIDER ART|url=http://www.petulloartcollection.org/the_collection/about_the_artists/artist.cfm?a_id=11|access-date=2020-11-12|website=www.petulloartcollection.org}}</ref> A friend of hers said: "I really feel like Minnie has powers that not many of us have. I'm sure she has."<ref name=":0" />
===Works===
Her first works, titled ''My Very First and My Second'', are ink on paper. The entire surface is filled with [[Abstract art|abstract]] designs and shapes with nature images and themes in both. These works are not in color.<ref name="Heavenly Visions">{{cite book|last1=Kahan|first1=Mitchell|title=Heavenly Visions: Art of Minnie Evans|date=1986|publisher=North Carolina Museum of Art|location=Raleigh, NC|isbn=0-88259-951-8}}</ref> After handing her these drawings to a mysterious prophet, Evans was told that they foreshadowed the current global conflict, World War II. Madame Tula later instructed Evans to make a new painting featuring the war's conclusion. Days later, Evans painted Invasion Picture, capturing total destruction, bombs, and a figure of [[Fu Manchu]].<ref name="intuitiveeye.org"/>
Another work titled ''"Design: Airlie Garden"'' depicts flowers, plants, and butterflies. The nature theme is shown here, but this piece is somewhat atypical due to the asymmetry of the painting.<ref name="Painting Dreams" />
Two other works, both untitled are more typical works by Evans. One, dated 1996, depicts a woman with a feathered headdress and a green bird. This piece has bold colors, symmetrical, and includes nature themes. The media used is graphite, ink, [[tempera]], and wax crayon on paper. The other is a female [[portrait]] including the theme of eyes, bold colors, and nature designs as well. The media used
Now recognized as one of the most important visionary folk artists of the 20th century, her work is highly collected by many museums and collectors all across the world.
A review of a 2017 exhibit notes the contrast between Evans' later works -- "increasingly sophisticated" faces and greater "familiarity with nature"—with her first drawings between 1935 and 1940, which "indicate her innate genius and awareness, in the raw and in transition."<ref>{{cite news|last1=Smith|first1=Roberta|title=What to See in New York Art Galleries This Week: Minnie Evans|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/16/arts/design/what-to-see-in-new-york-art-galleries-this-week.html|accessdate=9 March 2017|
== Publications ==
Art exhibition catalogues, in ascending order by date:
* {{Cite book|last=Starr|first=Nina Howell|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=n7DHvgEACAAJ
* {{Cite book|last=Kahan|first=Mitchell|url=https://books.google.com/books
* {{Cite book
*{{Cite book|
== References ==
{{
==Further reading==
*{{Cite journal|last=Starr|first=Nathan Comfort|date=March 1969|title=The Unique Folk Artist of Airlie
*John Walker Myers, "Minnie Evans: Off in the Garden to Talk With God." The Southern Quarterly. Volume 35, Number I, Fall 1996. pp.
*{{Cite book|last=Lyons|first=Mary E.|url=https://books.google.com/books
*{{Cite magazine|last=Kernan|first=Nathan|date=July 1997|title=Aspects of Minnie Evans
*{{Cite book|
*{{Cite book|last=Maizels|first=John|title=Outsider Art Sourcebook|publisher=Raw Vision Magazine|year=2009|isbn=978-0954339326|series=Raw Vision
==External links==
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Evans, Minnie}}
[[Category:
[[Category:1892 births]]
[[Category:1987 deaths]]
[[Category:20th-century African-American women]]
[[Category:20th-century American women artists]]
[[Category:African-American women artists]]
▲[[Category:Women outsider artists]]
[[Category:Artists from North Carolina]]
[[Category:People from New Hanover County, North Carolina]]▼
[[Category:People from Pender County, North Carolina]]
[[Category:
▲[[Category:People from New Hanover County, North Carolina]]
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