Charlie Lucas (Tin Man)
Struggling with the Ancestors
Proposal for Vision and Vernacular Eight African American Artists in Venice Presented by American Folk Art Museum at Fondaco dei Tedeschi, June 2011
Artist Statement
I create beauty from trash. I prefer hard metal from fencing, car parts and bicycles, like wheels, springs, mufflers, motors, rods. I use welding equipment to make individual sculptures that are over-sized variations of humans and animals. When I am looking for materials in scrap metal yards, the ones I choose have spoken to me, showing me their inner potential for me to use which emerges from my soul and mind. I take something a little bit further than what you could see. I like keeping things pretty raw and natural. I don’t prettify because society isn’t pretty.
My process is the same one I had as a kid. My art environment at Pink Lily, AL is my backyard where I am playing with all these materials, making it up as I go along. I may make a piece in one go, or I will work on it for 20 years. I am making toys, and I can make anything I want. I teach children they can do the same, and in this way I am finding a better way to grow up myself.
Through my art I tell stories from my life. Sometimes I include personal things that represent something I am going through, When I use an acetylene torch to draw lines in metal, I am looking through the eyes of my great grandfather, a blacksmith, and my father, an auto mechanic, or when I weave bands of metal, I am honoring my grandmother who made baskets and quilts.
I make art to keep my mind free because I was denied an education.
Although I am self-taught, I have the discipline of the Artist, to take one idea out of many and work it to the end and not get distracted by the others. I live with honesty and discipline all the time which is needed to be an Artist. Regardless of the labels applied to my sculpture, Folk Art, Naïve, Outsider, whatever, I am a Sculptor and an Artist just like those artists who went to art school.
Proposal Statement
I plan to create an environment of many sculptures that are variations of humans and animals. The idea is to show peoples coming together in harmony. I wish to share my vision of working within the spirit and of living inside my art. I hope this will convey compassion for mankind and other meaningful messages.
Project Description
After a couple of days finding my materials in a scrap metal yard near Venice, I will create a unique environment for the Fondaco dei Tedeschi of individual welded metal sculptures of animals, humans, giants, dinosaurs and anything else that reveals itself to me while I am working with the metal. Car rims are heavy objects which will ground the sculptures from tipping over. Long metal rods will achieve the height inherent in the Fondaco’s space.
As told to Martha V. Henry, Curator
Charlie Lucas (Tin Man)
Struggling with the Ancestors
Proposal for Vision and Vernacular Eight African American Artists in Venice Presented by American Folk Art Museum at Fondaco dei Tedeschi, June 2011
Artist Statement
I create beauty from trash. I prefer hard metal from fencing, car parts and bicycles, like wheels, springs, mufflers, motors, rods. I use welding equipment to make individual sculptures that are over-sized variations of humans and animals. When I am looking for materials in scrap metal yards, the ones I choose have spoken to me, showing me their inner potential for me to use which emerges from my soul and mind. I take something a little bit further than what you could see. I like keeping things pretty raw and natural. I don’t prettify because society isn’t pretty.
My process is the same one I had as a kid. My art environment at Pink Lily, AL is my backyard where I am playing with all these materials, making it up as I go along. I may make a piece in one go, or I will work on it for 20 years. I am making toys, and I can make anything I want. I teach children they can do the same, and in this way I am finding a better way to grow up myself.
Through my art I tell stories from my life. Sometimes I include personal things that represent something I am going through, When I use an acetylene torch to draw lines in metal, I am looking through the eyes of my great grandfather, a blacksmith, and my father, an auto mechanic, or when I weave bands of metal, I am honoring my grandmother who made baskets and quilts.
I make art to keep my mind free because I was denied an education.
Although I am self-taught, I have the discipline of the Artist, to take one idea out of many and work it to the end and not get distracted by the others. I live with honesty and discipline all the time which is needed to be an Artist. Regardless of the labels applied to my sculpture, Folk Art, Naïve, Outsider, whatever, I am a Sculptor and an Artist just like those artists who went to art school.
Proposal Statement
I plan to create an environment of many sculptures that are variations of humans and animals. The idea is to show peoples coming together in harmony. I wish to share my vision of working within the spirit and of living inside my art. I hope this will convey compassion for mankind and other meaningful messages.
Project Description
After a couple of days finding my materials in a scrap metal yard near Venice, I will create a unique environment for the Fondaco dei Tedeschi of individual welded metal sculptures of animals, humans, giants, dinosaurs and anything else that reveals itself to me while I am working with the metal. Car rims are heavy objects which will ground the sculptures from tipping over. Long metal rods will achieve the height inherent in the Fondaco’s space.
As told to Martha V. Henry, Curator