A LIFE IN TECHNICOLOR

The Headley Whitney Museum hosting a retrospective exhibit commemorating the 100th birthday of the late Henry Faulkner, a Kentucky artist, poet, and unapologetic bohemian.

Written by Bridget Williams / Photos courtesy of Headley Whitney Museum / M S Rezny Studio

During his prolific career, Henry Lawrence Faulkner, born in South Central Kentucky in 1924, created more than 5,000 works of art as colorful as his character. Orphaned at age two, Faulkner studied art at the University of Louisville and Los Angeles County Art Institute, followed by a period of prolonged travel around the United States. During a brief commitment in Washington, DC's St. Elizabeth Psychiatric Hospital at age 25, he befriended fellow patient and poet Ezra Pound. Shortly after, he settled in Lexington and exhibited his works more frequently, with critics comparing his vivid paintings to his contemporaries in the Surrealist and Colorist movements.

Faulkner's big break came in the spring of 1957, with his first sale to The Collectors of American Art co-op. Even though he culled inspiration from his travels around the globe, including Paris, Italy, San Francisco, Key West, and Palm Beach, where the artist introduced himself to a gallerist via letter writing, "My name is Henry Faulkner, and I have the gift of color." Faulkner's most endearing and popular pieces hearken back to the Bluegrass. His 1965 Still Life with Golden Slippers is in the Morris Museum of Art collection in Augusta, Georgia, the first museum dedicated to the collection and exhibition of art and artists of the American South, and his painting of Ernest Hemingway hangs in the Hemingway Museum in Key West. Celebrities of his era who acquired his paintings included Vincent Price and Bette Davis, who gifted animal-loving Faulkner with a Siamese cast that he named "Miss Davis."

As he gained ground as an artist, Faulkner also blazed a trail as an openly gay icon in 1950s Lexington. Whether he was playing the part of a cross-dressing blues singer, writing poetry, or bringing Alice a bourbon-swilling nanny goat to parties and art shows, in the words of painter and musician Rodney Hatfield, "Henry Faulkner's greatest work of art may have been being Henry."

By the 1970s, Faulkner's art and personality garnered wide acclaim, and his exhibitions became more theatrical. "He presented a folksy persona and exuberant behavior, all the while deftly navigating the gallery scene and elite social socials, befriending famous artists, writers, and dramatists," writes fine art photographer John S. Hockensmith for the exhibition’s curatorial boards. Faulkner died in a car accident in Lexington on December 3, 1981, and is buried in Allen County beside his mother.

Opening on September 8 and running through November 12, HENRY FAULKNER: One Hundredth Birthday Exhibition at the Headley Whitney Museum will feature 100 paintings and drawings on loan from private collections. "My attraction to and appreciation for Faulkner's work goes back more than twenty years," says Christina Bell, Executive Director and Curator for the Headley Whitney Museum. "The Headley Whitney Museum is celebrating its 55th year, and it has been my goal for the past five years to honor Kentucky artists with retrospectives of their life's work. Henry is certainly an iconic Kentucky-born artist, and his one-hundredth birthday is a fitting time to honor his prolific career."

Bell said she was curious how people would react to lending their Faulkner works for the exhibition. "A fun part of this adventure has been hearing the stories about Henry or ways the painting came to them, including an original drawing for a ballet poster traded for a dozen cases of cat food," explained Bell. "Their remembrances of him portray his exuberant and irresistible personality."

Premiering on September 7 at the Kentucky Theatre, the Museum has collaborated with FBN Motion Pictures to produce the 30-minute documentary Henry Faulkner: Poetry in Paint The film, which will play at the Headley Whitney Museum throughout the Faulkner exhibition, features interviews by some of those who knew Faulkner best, including artists Hatfield and Sheldon Tapley, John S. Hockensmith, and Kentucky's Poet Laureate, Silas House.

Special events related to the exhibition include a Happy Birthday Henry celebration from 5-7 pm on September 22 and a luncheon and talk about Faulkner led by John Hockensmith on Tuesday, October 3, from 11:30 am-1:30 pm. For more information, visit Headley-Whitney.org.

"Kentucky has an amazing wealth of creative talent living and working among us as well as those, like Henry, who are no longer with us but living on through the rich legacy of their work," said Bell. "It is important to me both personally and as a goal of the Museum, to honor them for their life's work and share it to foster a sense of community and appreciation for our artistic roots." sl

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