Record Details
Man and Snake
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This is one of at least two versions on this theme by the North Carolina artist Edgar Alexander McKillop. Man and Snake may refer to snake handling during religious ceremonies, an esoteric fundamentalist Christian practice based on two texts from the King James Bible: "And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues; They shall take up serpents" (Mark 16:17–18) and "Behold, I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy: and nothing shall by any means hurt you" (Luke 10:19). However, the imagery may relate to the serpent in the Garden of Eden or simply the presence of snakes in a rural environment. McKillop carved for approximately ten years beginning in the late 1920s, when a neighbor offered him several black walnut trees if he cleared them himself. At some point he took his carvings on the road in the back of a pickup truck and also displayed them in a tent on the main highway. McKillop was a jack-of-all-trades and worked variously as a farmer, cooper, logger, mill mechanic, and blacksmith. In the late 1930s he bartered all his carvings for a small farm, where he spent his remaining years.
Stacy C. Hollander, "Man and Snake," exhibition label for Jubilation|Rumination: Life, Real and Imagined. Stacy C. Hollander, curator. New York: American Folk Art Museum, 2012.
Edgar Alexander McKillop was a true jack-of-all-trades who produced a remarkable menagerie of outsize animals, human figures, and imaginary creatures during the late 1920s and early ’30s. Mostly made of black walnut trees donated by a neighbor, his sculptures show a carefully finished and stained surface. The figures, which reveal the artist’s talent for dramatization, are striking for their expressive quality and engaging in their humor, intensity, and directness, as seen in Man and Snake, which is carved from a log. In this piece we see a naked man clutching the head of a thick snake that encircles his body, with incised details that include hair, teeth, and toes. The hypnotic and demonic-looking man has the same yellow glass eyes as the snake. The latter is not shown to be surrounding the Tree of Knowledge, as in the Book of Genesis, but is overtaking Adam. The theme of this sculpture also recalls a religious ritual known as serpent handling, which began in the early twentieth century and continues to be performed in some Pentecostal churches associated with the Holiness movement. For its practitioners, snake handling is evidence of salvation.
Valérie Rousseau, "Man and Snake," exhibition label for Self-Taught Genius: Treasures from the American Folk Art Museum. Stacy C. Hollander and Valérie Rousseau, curators. New York: American Folk Art Museum, 2014.
