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Friendship and Family Bring Lancaster’s Art to Greeneville

In many ways, the art world is really a small town. Collectors know other collectors, artists know other artists, and people of similar tastes find kindred spirits with whom to share their enthusiasms. Quite often a career in art is made gradually, over years, making up in quality and persistance what it may lack in flashiness. There are many celebrated artists who are spared the burden of mass celebrity but are appreciated by enthusiasts of their artistic style. Recently, the opportunity arose for a Nashville area, Tennessee artist to make himself better known in Greeneville. It happened because of a confluence of friendship, family, and the talent of artist Paul Lancaster. Greeneville’s regional gallery, directed by its namesake James-Ben Stockton, began in Middle Tennessee, where many mutually respectful artistic friendships were formed. One of these was with Jean Anderson, a fine artist in her own right, due in no small part to her friendship with Paul Lancaster. Anderson’s daughter, Greeneville resident Susan Strauss, recently made her late mother’s collection of Paul Lancaster works available through James-Ben, at Mrs. Anderson’s request. “I was quite touched,” says Stockton. “Mrs. Anderson considered using a Chicago gallery for some of her other pieces but specifically wanted me to deal with the Lancasters.” As a result, one of Tennessee’s most celebrated, museum-recognized artists has come to Greeneville.

There is a certain irony that Paul Lancaster has made his reputation and attracted the attention of collectors within the genre described as naive or primitive art. You can see for yourself from the accompanying images that his work is quite sophisticated. He is categorized for his lack of formal training rather than for his technique, design, and style. The source of his skill is found in his personal story. Born in Lobelville, Tennessee, Lancaster moved to Nashville, where he still lives, as a child with the rest of his family. Of Native American descent, with a grandfather and great-grandfather who were Cherokee, Lancaster absorbed his intense love of forests and fields from their farms where he played in the 1940’s and ‘50’s. He began painting in Colorado, while training as an Army medic on his first sojourn away from home but remembers earlier efforts just after high school, when he illustrated a book of his own poetry. Although he returned to Tennessee after leaving military service, Lancaster found the inspiration to approach art seriously from the western beauty of Colorado. 

His earlier works, which are well-represented among the pieces entrusted to James-Ben: Studio and Gallery Art Center, reflect the earth tones of that initial experience. Another contributor to Lancaster’s development as an artist was his work as a framer for one of Nashville’s best known galleries, Lyzons. In addition to gaining expertise in presenting art for display, he got ample opportunity to use his drawing and painting skill as well as developing his reputation in the bargain. Prints of his images appeared within the frames available for sale and sales staff got into the habit of casually referring to “Lancaster” as though he was already an established artist. It was prophecy that became reality. After retiring as a framer in 1995, Lancaster slipped easily into the role of successful, full-time, independent artist. Some of the hand-colored etchings he produced early on to fill frames are among his more sought-after collectibles today. Art critics, in seeking to understand the technical skill and brilliant design of this “primitive” artist, have found it in part in Lancaster’s long immersion in the gallery environment. An exhibit catalog from the Frist Center for the Visual Arts compared him to naive painter Henri Rousseau, an intimate of Gaugin, Degas, and Picasso, and suggested that exposure to a sophisticated and varied environment provided the training not acquired in formal study. But most aspects of Lancaster paintings reflect the unique perspective and obsessive attention to detail of the artist himself. The catalog for the Frist exhibit, “Art of Tennessee” noted that Lancaster’s work was “dictated by a very private muse.” Nashville arts writer Susan Knowles in Raw Vision magazine, described Lancaster’s studio as “an aquarium drained of its water. It is another world, a sort of sacred space, where he spends as many as ten hours daily, immersed in the intricate ritual of painting his own imaginary world.”  The output of that magical studio can be found in the Parrish and Nicholas Roerich museums in New York, and in the Smithsonian. A Lancaster-painted Easter egg was exhibited at the White House in 1985.

The deep focus of Lancaster’s work is, in part, an attribute of his Native American ancestry, arising from an almost meditative state. “Mom considered Paul a true Native-American shaman, as he painted from dreams and visions,” says Susan Strauss. With Native American art work among the most sought after by collectors, this feature of Lancaster’s personal world is attractive more than just visually. “The Cherokee heritage bonded Mom and Paul,” says Strauss. Anderson owned and operated a small gallery near Nashville’s Cheekwood Fine Arts Center and Lancaster was one of the artists she befriended and took under her wing. “Our home was a haven for artists too,” says Strauss. “Mom would supply them with paints, canvases, brushes - she didn’t worry about the cost but wanted to make sure they had what they needed to paint.” She also recalls Lancaster’ gentle guidance to her mother’s own art. After laboring long and hard over the painting of a violet, Jean Anderson turned to Lancaster, who commented, “Well, you sure did that the hard way.” “Mom said Paul picked up a brush and in just a few minutes painted an absolutely beautiful violet,” says Strauss.
 
For his part, James-Ben Stockton was thrilled that Jean Anderson knew he would appreciate her Lancaster collection. “Our Tennessee artists have always been my primary focus in what I like to share with patrons,” he says. “They are our living treasures!” The Paul Lancaster collection of Jean Anderson is shown with great respect and affection, and available locally at James-Ben: Studio and Gallery Art Center.