History Mystery

The perplexing case of the prodigious preacher

Story and photo by Jennifer Crutchfield

It might be argued that Howard Finster was called to be a preacher at age 3, inspired by a vision of his sister’s spirit walking up the steps to heaven. This child from Alabama, the youngest in a family of 13, declared himself saved at 16 and began sharing his message, from revival tents to Baptist churches.
He was startled out of his pulpit one Sunday evening, when a congregant admitted he couldn’t remember the sermon Finster had delivered that very morning. Having spoken to audiences of believers as a pastor for 45 years, Reverend Howard Finster stepped away from the lectern and never preached a sermon again.
Instead, he took up a visual ministry through art designed to last—primitive but elaborate paintings woven through with evangelical messages. The new ministry he began caused him to be heralded as the “grandfather of American folk art.”
“Visual art is a great thing,” he explained. “It draws the attention of people. That’s what people’s work does. It preaches for them after they’re gone.”

Paradise found

Father of five children, faithful husband and servant of his Lord, Finster had created the Paradise Gardens Park in Summerville, Ga., in 1961. The four-acre plot of land in the Chattooga County seat boasts a maze of structures and sculptures, art in all forms created from all kinds of recycled materials. “I took the pieces you threw away and put them together by night and day, washed by rain and dried by sun a million pieces all in one,” he wrote.
His faith, and his vision for the park, were transformed 15 years later when he saw the image of a face in his own fingerprint and heard a mysterious voice telling him to create sacred art. He obeyed with characteristic fervor, immortalizing in words and form the messages that he wanted to share forever with the world.
Finster’s vision called him to create 5,000 works of sacred art, but his enthusiasm for this expression became so powerful that he had created more than 50,000 pieces before his death at 84. Messages wrought in vivid color and words in jigsawed images exist amid the jungle of berries, fruit and the vibrant green that is Paradise Gardens; there are thousands of structures and sculptures there, each with its own story, message and artistic identity.

Rock of ages

Howard Finster was an emotive man, so passionate about his role as a messenger for his Lord that he was often moved to tears sharing his ministry. He enjoyed the irony of the fact that the 26 Bible verses he wove into his cover art for the Talking Heads’ Little Creatures reached a million people in two and a half months. Celebrating his collaboration with rock stars like the Talking Heads and R.E.M., Finster appeared on “The Tonight Show” and was featured on the cover of Time magazine.
Iconic for his “outsider art,” he was an enthusiastic supporter of other artists who worked in found objects. He became a fan of and mentor to two Chattanooga men, Dennis Palmer and Bob Stagner, when he attended a concert in which the men played instruments created from found art. In their art, Finster heard a sound that struck a chord for him. He’d found allies, comrades and students in these men, who as founders of the Shaking Ray Levi Society had dedicated themselves to bringing innovative and collaborative music and art to their city.
The Shaking Ray Levi Society is a nonprofit that supports, produces and presents diverse genres of music, film and performance art through festivals, recordings and the Internet. It also offers music workshops and multi-disciplinary educational programs to Hamilton County schools. Since 1986 the SRLS has helped nurture the next generation of non-traditional artists and arts advocates who will continue to challenge Chattanooga audiences and enhance our city’s cultural growth.
Dennis Palmer and Bob Stagner share Reverend Howard Finster’s passionate spirit as they inspire children through their music and art. They teach with the same intensity with which Finster taught, preaching about personal strength and powerful art.

Learn more online:

ShakingRay.com
MySpace@TheShakingRayLevis
Finster.com
FinstersParadiseGardens.org

Writer’s note:

I did a double-take one evening when my mind was on the Reverend Howard Finster and my eyes made the unconscious connection between our family’s best piece of art, a cat rendered by our neighbor, Dennis Palmer, and the style of art made famous by the subject of this History Mystery. A phone call to Dennis later, the perplexing case of the passionate preacher had come full-circle, landing squarely in my living room.
Jennifer