Visual Harmony Melody, Words & Birds of Walter Anderson

You should not grow in one direction like an automobile, but in five like a star. - WIA

A RENAISSANCE MAN

A man of many skills, Walter Anderson inhabited a world of multiple facets that he saw as all related, and the interrelationship of these skills and facets portray his genius. He was an intelligent man who had been schooled from the ear-liest age to explore, to create and to practice, and he was tireless in his pursuit of these challenges. These qualities made him into a prolifie artist.

THE ARTIST

Within the field of art, Anderson worked in many media: painting in oil and watercolrors; painting largemurals;drawing in charcoal, pencil and ink; creating linoleum blocks and prints of unprecedented size; carving wood into both small and large sculptures; sculpting clay; and decorating ceramic plates and pots made by his brother, Peter. Not only did he try numerous processes, he mastered them.

He was a master of line, which is particularly evident in the ink drawings, and of the use of negative space in the watercolors. He had a strong sense of composition seen in the hun-dreds of designs in circles (for plates) and rec-tangles (for the block prints). His linoleum cuts and prints are the largest made in American art by the 1940s, and his bold adherence to nature places him squarely in the tradition of American nature painting with artists like John James Audubon. And yet, he did much more.

THE NATURALIST

Anderson listed 112 species of birds overa week’s time
on one of the barrier islands during the 1940s. Earlier in his career, he worked on a book of Birds in the Southeast before the Peterson Guides existed. But his paintings of birds go beyond mere patterns of feathers and skeletal structure to characteristic stance and movement — red winged black-birdsclamor in flocks, owls peer sleepily when awakened, and pelicans are recorded from birth to death in the mangroves on
the beach.

His ability to catch the essence of the very attitudeof an animal is evident in all that he paints.Butterflies are shown in migra-tion hanging on plants, as well as in a print series of different species withan accompanying verse for each one. Animals, insects, and even fish take on characteristic personality.

In order to realize the beauty of man, we must realize his relation to nature. – WIA

THE POET

Colorful images were captured in words as well as in paint. His breadth of vision extended into the landscapes of his mind as he sought the unity of all things, or as he discovered the quaint character of cats, of a rooster, or of the Mississippi River. He wrote
The duty of the poet is to give words to the bells. I’ve recognized the fact that poetry began with representing the space between one wave top the next. His words are often elegant, and always fresh and insightful. Hundreds ofpages of his writings (besides the Horn Island Logs) contain essays, aphorisms, fairy tales, short stories, poetry, and musings.

His library contained hundreds of books and he read Milton, Homer, Shakespeare, Cervantes, Darwin, epics of voyage and discovery, mysteries, mythology, history, poetry ( W. B. Yeat s was a favorite). He often recorded bits of story on the back of illustrative drawings he made while reading the books.

All poetry is an approach – Lyric poetry approaches music,
Epic poetry approaches life itself. – WIA

THE MUSICIAN

Although not a performing musician, Anderson took singing lessons at one time and studied music enough to be able to write examples of the staff, its pitches, and chords. He loved classical composers, such as Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms, Tchaikovsky, etc., as well as spirituals and music from earlier times. For many years, he organized his Sundays around listening to the New York Philharmonic on the radio, spent time listening to recordings, going to performances, whistling themes from the music while he worked, and dancing to audible or inaudible music.

His use of music, however, often extended into the mystical and at times, became a metaphor for nature. He refers to the unity of nature as a symphony in his poetry, and to a rooster as being a “tamed trumpeter.” But his use of music goes deeper. The very elements of rhythm, harmony, melody and balance of sound and silence are present in the watercolors and murals in the repetition of shapes, in the sweep of a coastline or in the harmonious color palettes unifying a com-position.

All movement is to invisible music although few people hear it. It comes from the sun and the windand the movement of water anda running rabbit and a crowing cock, And together it is part of a great symphony. – WIA

THE CRAFTSMAN

Anderson believed an artist should be able to createinteresting pieces of furniture, fabric, and fine design. When going to housekeeping in the early 1930s and later in the 1940s, he built tables and chairs,hooked rugs of his own pattern, created ceramic tiles, wooden animals, puppets for his children, and printed curtains, tablecloths and dresses from linoleum blocks. He designed wallpaper (although none seem to have been made) that developed into repetitive borders or birds with which you could cover a room.

Perhaps the most notable “decoration” was placed on ceramic vessels made in the family business, Shearwater Pottery. Such concern for making the useful things of our life beautiful stems from the Arts and Crafts movement that arose in England in the 19th century and emerged into a strong force in this country at the turn of the 20 th century.

Art is incredible not for itself, but in changing the artist’s relation to other things – perspective! – WIA

– P.P.