Minnie Evans: Difference between revisions

| birth_place = [[Long Creek, [[Pender County, North Carolina]], [[United States]]U.S.

| death_place = [[Wilmington, North Carolina|Wilmington]], North Carolina, U.S.

'''Minnie Eva Evans''' (December 12, 1892 – December 16, 1987)<ref name="Oxford Art Online" /><ref name=":3" /> was an [[African -American]] [[artist]] who worked in the [[United States]] from the 1940s to the 1980s.<ref name="Oxford Art Online" /> Evans used different types of media in her work such as oils and graphite, but started with using [[wax]] and [[crayon]].<ref name="Oxford Art Online" /> She was inspired to start drawing due to visions and dreams that she had all throughout her life, starting when she was a young girl.<ref name="Oxford Art Online" /> She is known as a [[Southern United States|southern]] [[folk artist]] and [[outsider art]]ist, as well as a [[surrealist]] and [[visionary artist]].<ref name="Oxford Art Online" />

Evans (born Minnie Eva Jones) was born to Ella Jones on December 12, 1892 in [[Long Creek, [[Pender County, North Carolina]].<ref name="Oxford Art Online">{{cite web|title=Evans, Minnie|url=http://www.oxfordartonline.com:80/subscriber/article/grove/art/T2086867|date=2011|website=Oxford Art Online|series=The Grove Encyclopedia of American Art|publisher=Oxford University Press|doi=10.1093/gao/9781884446054.article.T2086867|isbn=9780195335798|accessdate=2020-05-09}}</ref><ref name=":3" /> Ella was only thirteen13 years old at the time. Evans' biological father, George Moore, left after she was born. AfterWhen Evans was only two months old, she and her mother moved to [[Wilmington, North Carolina|Wilmington]], North Carolina, to live with her maternal grandmother, Mary Croom Jones in 1893.<ref name="Painting Dreams">{{cite book|last1=Lyons|first1=Mary|title=Painting Dreams|year=1996|publisher=Houghton Mifflin Company|location=New York, NY|isbn=9780395720325}}</ref> Evans, like other children her age, had an active imagination at all hours of the day. In her case, the whimsical visions she received would keep her up throughout the night, making it so that she hardly ever got any rest. This lack of sleep, tiedtogether with her family’sfamily's need for her assistance, caused her schooling to end at the age of 13.<ref name="intuitiveeye.org">{{Cite web|title=Untitiled by Minnie Evans - intuitive eye|url=http://intuitiveeye.org/Untitiled-by-Minnie-Evans|access-date=2020-11-16|website=intuitiveeye.org}}</ref> Minnie Jones attended school until the sixth grade and in 1903, Minnie Jonesshe, Ella, and Mary Croom Jones moved to [[Wrightsville Beach, North Carolina|Wrightsville Sound]] which was, a town close to Wilmington.<ref name="Folk Art Messenger">{{cite journal|last1=Brennan|first1=Anne|title=Minnie Evans: Dreams in Color|journal=Folk Art Messenger|issue=Spring 2005}}</ref> SheMinnie attended St. Matthew African Methodist Episcopal Church in Wrightsville Beach, North Carolina.<ref name="Oxford Art Online" />

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 sixteen16 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. Her husbandHe 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 a [[Domesticdomestic 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, Sarah (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 fromfor Sadie Jones and now Henry Walters, on the [[Airlie Gardens|Airlie Estate]]. After Walters died, Sadie Jones decided to turnturned the Airlie Estate into gardens whichin the early 1900s and it 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 19471948 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" />

Evans began drawing on [[Good Friday]] 1935, wherewhen she finished two [[drawing]]sdrawings using pen and ink "dominated by concentric and semi-circles against a background of unidentifiable linear motifs".<ref>{{Cite web|url = http://americanart.si.edu/search/artist_bio.cfm?ID=1466|title = Minnie Evans|last = Smithsonian American Art Museum}}</ref> These two pieces were titled "My Very First" and "My Second,", respectively.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Minnie Evans|url=https://whitney.org/artists/406|access-date=2020-11-12|website=whitney.org|language=en}}</ref> From a young age, Minnie depicts her experiences of receiving visions and viewing mythical creatures that acquaintances could not.<ref>{{Cite web|title=The Angel That Stands By Me {{!}} Folkstreams|url=http://www.folkstreams.net/film-detail.php?id=71.|access-date=2020-11-11|website=www.folkstreams.net|language=en}}</ref> Inevitably, these visions circulated throughout her life as she started to hear and see more into her early adulthood. She heard a voice in her head that said: '"Why don't you draw or die?'"<ref name="Folk Art Messenger" /> After this, Evans did not resume drawing until 1940.<ref name="Folk Art Messenger" /> She started using [[pencil]] and wax on paper for her beginning works and she later worked with [[oil paint]]s and [[mixed media]] [[collage]]s.<ref name="Oxford Art Online" /> Her subject matter were usually either [[Bible|biblical]] scenes or scenes from nature. Often, it was a mixture of both.<ref>{{Cite web|title=The Tree of Life – NCMALearn|url=https://learn.ncartmuseum.org/artwork/the-tree-of-life/|access-date=2020-11-12|language=en-US}}</ref> Her influences included [[African culture|African]], [[Caribbean]], [[East India]], [[China|Chinese]], and [[Western cultures]].<ref name="Oxford Art Online" /> Since she held the position as gatekeeper at the [[Airlie Gardens]], she often used the gardens as her inspiration in her work to depict nature scenes.<ref name="Oxford Art Online" /> IfWhen she wasn’tnot taking tickets, Evans was always off painting another vision inspired by her floral surroundings.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Minnie Evans, Nick Cave and Lee Bau in Chelsea - artnet Magazine|url=http://www.artnet.com/magazineus/reviews/karlins/chelsea-nite-out-9-19-11.asp|access-date=2020-11-16|website=www.artnet.com}}</ref>

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 confessed she wasn't sure of the meanings behind her paintings, stating,: "whenWhen I get through with them I have to look at them like everybody else. They are just as strange to me as they are to anybody else."<ref name=":12" />

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 died in Wilmington, North Carolina on December 16, 1987 at age 95,<ref name="Oxford Art Online" /> leaving more than 400 artworks to the St. Johns Museum of Art (now the [[Cameron Art Museum]]) in Wilmington. After Evans' death, artist Virginia Wright-Frierson designed and built the ''Minnie Evans Bottle Chapel'' at Airlie Gardens in her memory. Made almost entirely from reused glass bottles, the Bottle Chapel was created as a tribute to folk artist Minnie Evans and featured works from many other artists. When looking at a top view of the chapel, it resembles a flower with a leaf on each side. Along the path, colored cement has pressed flowers and plants that Evans used in her paintings. Children’s art that Evans inspired was transformed into 95 stepping stones, each for a year of her life. The chapel itself contains stained glass with many faces and figures that resemble one's Evans used.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Minnie Evans Sculpture Garden - YouTube|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sV4d8VY0v2k|access-date=2020-11-16|website=www.youtube.com}}</ref> "Minnie Evans" day was proclaimed on May 14, 1994 in [[Greenville, North Carolina|Greenville]], North Carolina.<ref name="Painting Dreams" />

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>{{Cite web|title=UNC Chapel Hill Libraries|url=https://auth.lib.unc.edu/ezproxy_auth.php?url=https://go.gale.com/ps/i.do?p=SCIC&u=unc_main&id=GALE%7CA176019558&v=2.1&it=r&sid=SCIC&asid=0ff633e7|access-date=2020-11-16|language=en-US}}</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 drawings were inspired by her dreams and filled with many colors inspired by her work at Airlie Gardens. Her designs are complex, with elements recalling the art of [[China]] and the [[Caribbean]] combined with more Western themes. The central [[Motif (visual arts)|motif]] in many pieces is a human face surrounded by plant and animal forms. The eyes, which Evans equated with God's omniscience, are central to each figure, often three eyes were depicted and frontal faces with concealed lips. Symmetry was also a common theme in Evans' work<ref name="Folk Art Messenger" /> In addition, [[God]] is sometimes depicted with [[wing]]s and a multicolored collar and [[Halo (religious iconography)|halo]] and shown surrounded by all manner of creatures.

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" />

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’swar's conclusion. Days later, Evans painted Invasion Picture, capturing total destruction, bombs, and a figure of [[Fu Manchu]].<ref name="intuitiveeye.org"/>

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. Despite her prolific and long career, her works do not come up for sale often. When they do, there is always strong competition.{{Citation needed|reason=Sounds like an opinion and reads like an absolute statement|date=March 2017}} Her work can be viewed at the [[Museum of Modern Art]], the [[Smithsonian Institution]], the [[Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Museum]], the [[American Folk Art Museum]], the [[Whitney Museum of American Art]], the [[Pérez Art Museum Miami]],<ref>{{Cite web |title=What Carried Us Over: Gifts from the Gordon W. Bailey Collection • Pérez Art Museum Miami |url=https://www.pamm.org/en/exhibition/what-carried-us-over-gifts-from-the-gordon-w-bailey-collection/ |access-date=2023-09-28 |website=Pérez Art Museum Miami |language=en-US}}</ref> the [[Ogden Museum of Southern Art]], and the [[High Museum of Art]].

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|worknewspaper=The New York Times|date=February 17, 2017|page=C22}}</ref>

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*John Walker Myers, "Minnie Evans: Off in the Garden to Talk With God." The Southern Quarterly. Volume 35, Number I, Fall 1996. pp.&nbsp;74–83.

[[Category:OutsiderAmerican outsider artists]]

[[Category:20th-centuryWomen American womenoutsider artists]]