Two SnakesMid-20th centurySheet: 21 1/2 x 14 " (54.6 x 35.6 cm)
Frame: 28 x 19 1/4 x 2 " (71.1 x 48.9 x 5.1 cm)Ink on paperGift of Sam and Betsey Farber2007.14.101540902730P10.206P10.2000.62007.14.6Scottie WilsonDrawingsCopyright for this work is under review. 'SCOTTiE' lower rightLondonLondonEnglandCanadaWorks on PapereMuseum - Collection HighlightsLondonScottie Wilson, whose given name was Louis Freeman, began his working life in Glasgow at the age of 9, when he left school to become a street peddler. At the age of 16, he joined the Scottish Rifles and served in India and South Africa. Around 1931 Wilson immigrated to Toronto, where he operated a novelty and secondhand shop. One day while scrutinizing a fountain pen he had purchased for its gold nib, Wilson began to draw—compulsively. He displayed his ink drawings in his shop window and received considerable attention from local dealers and collectors. He later sold his shop and moved to Vancouver, where he covered the walls of his rented room with drawings. Although he was able to support himself through the sale of his drawings, he saw his art more as an expression of his identity than as a livelihood. In Canada and in Britain, where he returned in 1945, Wilson reluctantly allowed galleries to exhibit his work but preferred to show his drawings in movie theater foyers, in an old bus in Cardiff, Wales, and at the shore at Blackpool, England. He attracted audiences with a loudspeaker and charged admission to see his works.
Like many of Wilson’s works, Two Snakes encloses emblems of good and evil within an organic frame. Stylized natural forms, derived from his lifelong enthusiasm for animals, represent benevolent forces, while stacked faces of “greedies” or “evils” represent hardship. The symbolism of this work recalls his time in Vancouver, where he encountered totem poles and enjoyed watching diving ducks in Vancouver Park. Wilson’s signature hatchings, vibrating within a verdant green ground, and the rhythmic, imprecise symmetry of the frame emphasize the active interplay of good and evil.
Cheryl Rivers, "Two Snakes," in Stacy C. Hollander, American Anthem: Masterworks from the American Folk Art Museum (New York: Harry N. Abrams in association with American Folk Art Museum, 2001), 405Object information is a work in progress and may be updated with new research. Records are reviewed and revised, and the American Folk Art Museum welcomes additional information. To help improve this record, please email photoservices@folkartmuseum.orgWorks on paperScottie Wilson left school at the age of nine. He remained semiliterate, although later he would become a loquacious conversationalist. In World War I, he saw battle on the Western Front. He joined the notorious Black and Tan forces in Ireland, and then he made off to Canada, possibly as a deserter disgusted by the horrors that he had witnessed. In 1935, he was living in Toronto and dealing in junk. His art calling took root when he doodled with a pen on a table. During two days, he produced a surface teeming with weird faces, droll creatures, and ornamental patterns. Among his most famous pictured themes are sea birds, ducks, fishes, flowers, totem, and self-portraits. Wilson’s father was a skilled taxidermist, which might explain both his grotesque hybridization and omnipresent cross-hatching technique (with its tendon-like aesthetic) in his works. He described the male faces with large noses that he frequently depicted as “greedies,” corrupt and criminal destroyers of all goodness.Adapted by Valérie Rousseau from “Scottie Wilson” by Roger Cardinal in The Hidden Art (New York: Skira Rizzoli/American Folk Art Museum, 2017), 108–111. Exhibition label for Memory Palaces: Inside the Collection of Audrey B. Heckler. New York: American Folk Art Museum, 2020.P10.206P10.2000.62007.14.619301972 2007 14 1 Scottie Wilson, whose given name was Louis Freeman, began his working life in Glasgow at the age of 9, when he left school to become a street peddler. At the age of 16, he joined the Scottish Rifles and served in India and South Africa. Around 1931 Wilson immigrated to Toronto, where he operated a novelty and secondhand shop. One day while scrutinizing a fountain pen he had purchased for its gold nib, Wilson began to draw—compulsively. He displayed his ink drawings in his shop window and received considerable attention from local dealers and collectors. He later sold his shop and moved to Vancouver, where he covered the walls of his rented room with drawings. Although he was able to support himself through the sale of his drawings, he saw his art more as an expression of his identity than as a livelihood. In Canada and in Britain, where he returned in 1945, Wilson reluctantly allowed galleries to exhibit his work but preferred to show his drawings in movie theater foyers, in an old bus in Cardiff, Wales, and at the shore at Blackpool, England. He attracted audiences with a loudspeaker and charged admission to see his works.
Like many of Wilson’s works, Two Snakes encloses emblems of good and evil within an organic frame. Stylized natural forms, derived from his lifelong enthusiasm for animals, represent benevolent forces, while stacked faces of “greedies” or “evils” represent hardship. The symbolism of this work recalls his time in Vancouver, where he encountered totem poles and enjoyed watching diving ducks in Vancouver Park. Wilson’s signature hatchings, vibrating within a verdant green ground, and the rhythmic, imprecise symmetry of the frame emphasize the active interplay of good and evil.
Cheryl Rivers, "Two Snakes," in Stacy C. Hollander, American Anthem: Masterworks from the American Folk Art Museum (New York: Harry N. Abrams in association with American Folk Art Museum, 2001), 405Object information is a work in progress and may be updated with new research. Records are reviewed and revised, and the American Folk Art Museum welcomes additional information. To help improve this record, please email photoservices@folkartmuseum.orgWorks on paperScottie Wilson left school at the age of nine. He remained semiliterate, although later he would become a loquacious conversationalist. In World War I, he saw battle on the Western Front. He joined the notorious Black and Tan forces in Ireland, and then he made off to Canada, possibly as a deserter disgusted by the horrors that he had witnessed. In 1935, he was living in Toronto and dealing in junk. His art calling took root when he doodled with a pen on a table. During two days, he produced a surface teeming with weird faces, droll creatures, and ornamental patterns. Among his most famous pictured themes are sea birds, ducks, fishes, flowers, totem, and self-portraits. Wilson’s father was a skilled taxidermist, which might explain both his grotesque hybridization and omnipresent cross-hatching technique (with its tendon-like aesthetic) in his works. He described the male faces with large noses that he frequently depicted as “greedies,” corrupt and criminal destroyers of all goodness.Adapted by Valérie Rousseau from “Scottie Wilson” by Roger Cardinal in The Hidden Art (New York: Skira Rizzoli/American Folk Art Museum, 2017), 108–111. Exhibition label for Memory Palaces: Inside the Collection of Audrey B. Heckler. New York: American Folk Art Museum, 2020.