Howard Finster Vintage Wipe Rag Outsider Folk Art Painting. An ultimate conversation piece- rare- one of a kind. Approximately 8 x 14. Signed by Howard Finster. Good condition for its age. Date: January 31,1989 10,084 since 1976. Howard Finsters wipe rag -I wipe my paint brushes. Sales of these rags support Paradise Gardens. This is a colorful, Rev. Howard Finster painting done on an original wipe rag, used by Rev. The painted rag is nailed onto an original wooden cabinet door. It is the actual cloth rag Rev. Finster used to wipe his fingers and his paint brushes, as he painted the many works of art that he created. As a result, the rag has many colors from the enamel tractor paint he used and many designs and shapes naturally built-in. Finster examined this rag until he saw images of faces and heads on the rag. He then used a black Sharpie marker to outline the visionary images that he saw. There are many interconnected heads and faces on this piece. The front of the piece features Finster’s hallmark cloud faces, with script. On the reverse is incribed, 10,000. 084 works since 1976 God bless you all. After which it is signed and dated by Finster. Provenance: In the late 1980’s I visit Howard at Paradise Gardens and photoed him and his environment. These wipe rag paintings are unique and hard to find, as Rev. A limited amount of rags that he used while painting. Orn into a lumberjack’s family of thirteen childr. Young Howard had his. First vision at the age of three. While looking for his mother in the family’s vegetable garden, he saw his dead sister wearing a white robe, descending from heaven. Howard once said: I get my inspiration from God. I’ve been having visions ever since I was a small kid. In the mid -1970’s, Howard saw a human face in his own fingerprint. The face spoke and told him to paint sacred art. Howard interpreted this as a sign from God that he should create works of art in order to spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Abandoned his career as a preacher and, at the age of sixty-one and without any artistic training, began to paint toward his initial goal of 5,000 works of art. From then until his death, Howard Finster painted almost non-stop. He slept very little and painted detailed accounts of his visions and dreams. Howard claimed to have regular visions of God and Elvis. He supposedly once told a crowd at Ol Miss College. I turned around and looked up and saw Elviss face. Only thing I could think of to say to him. Was, Elvis, can you stay a while with me? Replied, Howard, you know that Im on a tight schedule’. Finster produced some 48,000 works. Howard Finster usually wrote on the back of each piece that he created, numbering each piece, with the date of the creation and often prophetic words by the legendary outsider artist. Some of words scrawled on the fronts and backs of his creations. Your soul is really all you own- Keep it! If a shoe fits, wear it! Angry is backed by Devils. Dont put your soul off. Give it a chance for Eternal life. Howard Finster passed away on October 22nd, 2001. I plan to list more Folk Art in the future. These works include log houses, water mills, squirrels, and other mages. Vintage paintings with his mud and spinach juice renderings are hard to come by. There also are more early Tollivers and a large number of strong Sybil Gibsons etheral dusty, muted pastel paintings on grocery bags. Some great abstract works by Willie White, and Roy Ferdinand urban ghetto memory paintings. A few pieces by Mary T Smith, and a number of Calvin Livingston’s African hammered tin cutouts. Many of his paintings hang prominently in New Orleans House of Blues.. New Orelanian Welmon Sharlhorne who is known for his brilliant detailed line drawings done during his long stint at Angola Prison. Also retablos and dramatic yarn shields as well as beaded masks made by the indigenous Huichol Indians of Mexicos remote Sierra Madre mountains. Other self-taught artists such as Mose Tolliver. The strength his work is his lack of self-consciousness as to what his art is or should be. It was his sheer impulse to create, and therein lies its power. Her clapboard and tin two-room shack was nestled in the middle of a cow pasture fenced in by barbed wire. Her porch was filled with strange sculptures. There were human, animal, and vessel forms of cracking clay embedded with mule and cow bones, teeth, fossil shells, glass, Spanish moss, and coffee grounds. The item “Howard Finster Folk Art Outsider Rare Wipe Rag” is in sale since Saturday, January 2, 2021. This item is in the category “Art\Folk Art & Indigenous Art”. The seller is “deepsouthc” and is located in Montgomery, Alabama. This item can be shipped worldwide.
- Region of Origin: US-Southeast
- Artist: Howard Finster
- Style: Folk Art
- Listed By: Dealer or Reseller
- Material: wood and canvas
- Quantity Type: Single-Piece Work
- Date of Creation: 1990-1999
- Type: Harley motorcycle tank hand painted
- Original/Reproduction: Original
- Features: Signed
- Signed?: Signed
- Size Type/Largest Dimension: Medium (Up to 30″)
- Color: Blue
- Subject: Wipe rag faces
- Original/ Reproduction: original
- Size Type/ Largest Dimension: MEDIUM
- OUTSIDER ART: FOLK ART
- Originality: Original