Visiting With Tim & Lola Lewis, July 25, 2025

I had an interesting and fun visit with Appalachian Artist Tim Lewis and his wife Lola yesterday, July 25, 2025, in their home in Elliott County Kentucky. I have known Tim for a couple of years and known about his art for a bit longer than that. Tim is a cousin of the famed Minnie Adkins but his art work is his own and his reputation as an artist is perfectly capable of standing on its own two feet. Tim has primarly been a sculptor in stone for many years but also does wonderful carved and painted wooden birds. I am proud to say that I now have two of those Tim Lewis birds in my own collection. They are actually representations of the Evening Grosbeaks which visited our home for about two months nearly two years ago. Tim had recently completed those two birds for me and we had talked at the recent Minnie Adkins Day celebration in Sandy Hook. But we had also spoken about getting together sometime soon for a while and I decided to take a hot summer drive to Tim's house for a visit.

That drive to the visit was an adventure in itself. Tim's house is not easy to locate even for a person like me who has spent his life in the mountains of Eastern Kentucky and Southern West Virginia. It is located on a back road, up a sizeable hill, and situated in a tree shaded location where it is not possible to see it from the road. But I finally got there and it was worth the trip.

I had also taken a photograph of both grosebeaks together near a wall outlet in order to be able to show them as a pair and to give an indication of their size. This is that photograph.

While I was at Tim's house, he and Lola and I talked about a variety of topics including a lot of art, mostly art actually, and they also showed me several pieces of art from their collection including a small piece by the famed folk artist Howard Finster. They have an excellent carved and painted Native American Chief which Tim created many years ago, a nice little piece of a carved alabaster angel which was Lola said was the first piece Tim ever carved and gave to her when their relationship was young. The house is full of art, exhibition catalogues, and excellent memories. In a wonderful act of generosity, they gave me a copy of a catalogue from a series of traveling exhibitions of Tim's work from 2008 and 2009. Yes, they did have a few extra copies of that catalogue from the past. It contains a wonderful group of photographs of Tim's works from that time period, several very interesting and insightful articles about Tim and his work, and it is truly enlightening to study if you are into the stone carvings of Tim Lewis. It was a truly great visit!

"This Proud Heart" by Pearl Buck

On several occasions on this blog, I have written about the works of Pearl S. Buck, one of the small handul of American writers to receive a Nobel Prize in Literature and one of my favorite writers of all time. I have writte3n about "The Good Earth", her most famous novel, which I believe is also one of a very small group of the best novels in all of literature. She followed "The Good Earth" with two other novels in the "Good Earth" trilogy, They are "Sons" and "A House Divided". While either of those novels could have been a career best for many writers, they are not among Buck's best works. I read everything I come across by Buck and still have numerous of her books to be read. Fortunately, a year or so ago, I bought a large collection of books, actually 5 commercial peach boxes full, from the estate of a local school principal. This one we are discussing today I found in a small group of books I bought at a small "junk store" in Rowan county Kentucky which also included a unique first edition of Jack Kerouac's first novel, "The Town And The City", which was published under his legal name John Kerouac, the only one of his books to have been published that way. "This Proud Heart" is one of Buck's lesser known novels which is set in the United States with purely American characters for the most part. The protagnonist is a brilliant woman, Susan Gaylord, and begins when she is a high school student who has shown a great deal of talent in more than one area. She is the daughter of a professor father and a dedicated housewife mother, has one sister, Mary, several years younger and not really close to her older sister. Her father is a somewhat frustrated poet in addition to being a professor in a small college. He has chosen to devote his life to his familiy and his primary profession but does manage to write poetry and publish some of it in small magazines. Susan comes to understand her father's frustration with his life decision and vows to do more to control her own life and its outcomes. She is a talented artist and piano player as the book begins but chooses to marry her high school sweetheart, Mark, who is a totally devoted husband to her and works in the real estate business after they marry. But Susan finds herself interested in sculpture and uses a barn on the old farm they buy to create a piece in wood which is composed of a family of four, a husband, wife, and two children, a son and daughter. That piece is submitted to a contest for a piece to be placed in the lobby of a hospital financed by a very rich man in New York. The piece and her work in general is supported by a famous male sculptor, David Barnes, who has a house in the small New England town in which Susan and her family live. Barnes is a brusque, short spoken man who has strong opinions about Susan's talent and her inablility, as he sees it, to succeed as a sculptor in the United States. He strongly encourages her to come with him to Paris to study under another great sculptor and a man who teaches anatomy to sculptors. She refuses until the untimely death of her husband Mark due to typhoid fever. After his death, she packs up her children and their maid to travel to Paris to actually do what Barnes has suggested. During her time there, she meets another man, Blake Kincaid, who is also a sculptor of much less talent than Susan. They fall in love and she marries Blake which proves to be a less than perfect decision. They return to New York where he lives in considerable wealth and she grows more and more hampered by his efforts to control her, minimize her talent, and disparage her work as a sculptor. She comes to realize these things about Blake and rents a studio in the poor neighborhood near his ostentatious home where she meets and sculpts marble statues of some of the people in the neighborhood. David Barnes returns to the novel from Paris and assists Susan in getting her works into a gallery for an exhibition which confirms her talent and leaves her with a full understanding that she cannot succeed as a sculptor if she remains with Blake. She moves her family back to her hometown after the death of her father and decides to end her relationship with Blake. The novel leaves the whole situation somewhat in midair at the ending but we see that Susan has been able to understand that she must be independent in order to do her best work. The novel is also widely discussed as one of Buck's better works in support of feminism. Susan Gaylord is a strong, successful, competent, talented, and highly motivated woman. For the time in 1938 when the novel was published, she is an amazingly modern woman. I suspect that this novel is somewhat biographical with the sculpting being a substitute for Pearl Buck's writing and Blake being a character based on Buck's missionary first husband whom she divorced to marry her editor and publisher after her early work caused such a stir in the literary world. While I would not say this is one of Buck's best novels such as "The Good Earth", "Imperial Woman", or "The Living Reed", it is a fine novel and well worth reading.

"Sacramental Spaces: The Salvaged World of Raymond Barnhart" by William Howard Cohen

The photo above is an official Alice Lloyd College yearbook photo of William Howard Cohen.  

William Howard Cohen was a college professor, poet, and mentor to many young, aspiring writers wherever he lived and worked, Kentucky, Florida, Illinois.  I have written about Bill Cohen and his poetry more than once on this blog and was very pleasantly surprised to see others who had been mentored by Bill Cohen respond very favorably to his writing and his encouragement and criticism of their writing.  William Howard Cohen was an internationally recognized expert on Haiku and served as the American Cultural Delegate in the area of poetry at the Mexico City Olympics in 1968. Cohen was also an outspoken and highly effective environmental advocate who fought bravely and well against strip mining in Appalachia.  If you read the comments section at the end of this blog post about William Howard Cohen, you will see that this man was not just a writer who spent his time sitting in a cloister somewhere writing.  He also spent a great deal of that time teaching, training, mentoring and encouraging young writers whom he met as a result of his books, teaching, poetry readings, and attendance at other events. 

 The photo above is William Howard Cohen and his wife, Delores Cohen, at Alice Lloyd College about 1968 or so.  

William Howard Cohen also made a conscious effort to constantly improve his knowledge of art in all its form and frequently attended exhibitions of painting and sculpture wherever he might be traveling.  The book we are discussing here, "Sacramental Spaces: The Salvaged World of Raymond Barnhart", contains twenty-one poems which Cohen produced and published after attending an exhibition somewhere of the work of Barnhart.  It is a very difficult piece of Cohen's work to locate on used book websites and was apparently issued as a small, self-published book, perhaps printed by Pippa Valley Printing in Knott County Kentucky  where Cohen was teaching at Alice Lloyd College at the time.  Amazingly, the one copy of the book which I have been able to locate is autographed by Raymond Barnhart himself and I found it at a used books and collectible store in California which sells items through one of the large used book clearinghouses online.  According to the blog "Litterata": 

 "In his youth, Raymond Barnhart worked as a riverboat deck-hand, carpenter, fruitpacker, and window designer before becoming an artist. A painter during the first half of his life, Barnhart received his MFA from Ohio State University, and he was an instructor at the University of Kentucky for 32 years before leaving and moving to California in 1958."  (Litterata Blog, available May 30, 2021, at 7:15am) 

That blog post, if you read it, will show you that the blogger was highly impressed by the assemblage sculptures which Barnhart produced as were many others including William Howard Cohen who most likely  saw and exhibition of Barhhart's work at the University of Kentucky where he he taught for several years before leaving for California where he died in 1996 at the age of 93.  My recent acquisition of William Howard Cohen's little book of poetry and the creation of this blog post are both quite timely since there is an ongoing exhibition of collage and assemblage which contains at least some pieces of the work of Raymond Barnhart at the University of Kentucky Art Museum at 405 Rose Street on the UK campus. I will attend that exhibition since it runs until July 10, 2021.  The museum website does state that they are operating under Covid 19 restrictions and do require hourly reservations for visitors.  But, admission is free.  I will be attending that exhibition and so should you, IF YOU ARE FULLY VACCINATED!  

The phot above is William Howard Cohen, far right with beard, Kenneth Baldridge, and four unknown Alice Lloyd College students. 

Now that we know who Raymond Barnhart is, let's actually address the primary reason for this blog post, the poetry of William Howard Cohen which is contained in his ode to Raymond Barnhart.  This collection contains 21 poems all of which were inspired by the art of Raymond Barnhart.  Each of the poems appears to have been motivated by a single work by Barnhart although it is possible one or two could have been inspired by an overall exhibition of the artists work.  Barnhart created his assemblage pieces by using found objects and, if we refer once again to the "Litterata" blog piece about him we learn that: 

"While teaching a design and wood sculpture class in Mill Valley, and from his contacts with the Bauhaus novement, Barnhart found his true medium: assemblage. His assemblage work is classical in the sense of composition, aesthetics, and design. From the Conceptualists, he incorporated the use of found objects. And he made a just marriage of it.  But whereas Conceptualists diverged, exploring man's alienation in society, Barnhart's work is full of hope and compassion: it reflects the linear sentiments of art, beauty, balance, harmony; it transmorgifies limitation as set in stone by various art movements: it remains unswerving in its devotion to the aesthetics of art.  Wind-blasted, sun-bleached, and burnt materials juxtaposed against man-made rusted and tarnished discards become the poetry of deserted places. Fellow Sonoma County artist John Kessel said, "Raymond Barnhart assembles diverse, objects to create visual poems that evoke either man's place in nature—or man in contemplation before nature. Some pieces tell a story, and all are poems which convey an impact. This is an art of redemption and reconciliation." Litterata Blog, Available May 30, 2021, at 7:15am)

Both William Barnhart and William Howard Cohen believed that nothing should be wasted.  In the 1960's when I knew Bill Cohen, he was already involved in the very early effort to save the earth, the natural environment, and wasted nothing of value.  Barnhart created his art from the things others had thrown away.  It was no surprise that William Howard Cohen would have been inspired by the works of Barnhart and would have written a little book of poetry to commemorate that work.  These 21 poems are all short and, as a person who has read and studied much, if not most, of the work of William Howard Cohen, this little book contains some of the best of his short poems.  As an internationally respected expert on Haiku, William Howard Cohen practiced economy of language.  He wasted few words in his poetry and this poetry is a fine example of that economy of language.  One of my favorite poems is called 

      "Monument" 

The burnt pylons of time

Rise Heavenward-

The skeletal heart

Rides the air midway

      Suspended

Between the finite

     and the infinite. (William Howard Cohen, "Sacramental Spaces...")

That poem paints a myriad of pictures in our minds as we read it.  We see images left by old fires rising into the air. are they burnt timbers or are they really old highway pylons used in a Barnhart assemblage?  This brief poem, only seven lines, twenty-one words, a minimal amount of utterances on the keys of typewriter are what economy of language is all about.  There are only four more words in that poem than in a traditional Haiku and, while the poem is not Haiku, it is reminiscent of some of the best of Haiku.  It is William Howard Cohen at his best.   

Another of my favorite poems from the book is "World Of Raymond Barnhart" which contains only sixteen words, one less than in a traditional Haiku: 

"World Of Raymond Barnhart"

From the broken shards of time

Rainbows of eternity; 

From the charred shells of earth

Universes.  (William Howard Cohen, "Sacramental Spaces...")

It is always a pleasure to read the work of William Howard Cohen and this little book is an especial pleasure since it has also led me to learn about the work of a man artist whom my old friend and mentor, Bill Cohen, admired.  I hope you can locate a copy of "Sacramental Spaces: The Salvaged World Of Raymond Barnhart".  You will enjoy it.  If you cannot locate a copy of this apparently small edition collection, then consider finding and reading the two books by William Howard Cohen which are more easily located, "The Hill Way Home" and "A House In The Country: Poems From Southern Illinois".  They are both well worth reading.  

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Addendum: August 27, 2024

I have recently been contacted by first cousin of William Howard Cohen, also a former university professor in Indiana who had read my blog posts about Dr. Cohen and seen that a niece and nephew of Doctor Cohen had left comments on these posts.  This cousin, Dr. Paul Newman, P.H.D, is the retired chair of the linguistics department at Indiana University and would like to be able to locate these mutual relatives of his and Dr. Cohen's.  They can contact me at rchicks@mrtc.com and I will provide them with Dr. Newman's contact information.  Thanks!   

Edward Melcarth Exhibition "Points Of View", University Of KY 2018

Edward Melcarth & his painting "Last Supper" Photo by Lexington Herald Leader

First and foremost, I need to apologize for not having written and posted about this exhibition as soon as I was first aware of it so some of my readers might have been able to go to the exhibition.  But a combination of my schedule, my personal life, and other commitments prevented me from doing it when I should have.  But this exhibition was far too good to see it without attempting to write about it and inform other people of Edward Melcarth and his work.  The exhibition called "Edward Melcarth Points Of View" was at the University of Kentucky Art Museum and ran from January 13, 2018, to April 8, 2018. As I recall, my wife Candice and I saw it on the last or next to last day in April just before it closed.  There was also a second exhibition of Melcarth's work in Lexington for part of the time this exhibition was open.  That exhibition took place at Institute 193, 193 N. Limestone, Lexington, KY.  It was labeled "Edward Melcarth: Rough Trade”  and ran from Jan. 13, 2018, to February 10, 2018.  I had hoped to see both exhibitions on the same day but the weather in January and February prevented me from doing so.  I had learned about both exhibitions from an excellent article by Herald Leader columnist Tom Eblen which appeared online on January 11, 2018.

Edward Melcarth "Amendment" Photo by Lexington Herald Leader

But the major exhibition at UK was a real joy to see and gave us an opportunity, as well as the rest of the Lexington market to see work from an artist whose work had nearly fallen through the cracks into oblivion and was rescued from anonymity by a strange quirk or circumstance.  Melcarth had been born in Louisville in 1914, and early in his career was receiving critical acclaim.  He created murals which are still on display at the Pierre Hotel in New York City.  He received an award from the Art Institute Of Chicago in 1951.  His works are in the private collections of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, the Whitney Museum Of American Art, the Museum Of Fine Arts in Boston, and the Art Institute Of Chicago.  Yet no one has ever written a biography of him.  He has no biography on Wikipedia.   He had nearly disappeared from view in the ever changing world of American Art and art appreciation.  But an unusual set of circumstances served to bring Melcarth back into the public eye and to motivate the two exhibitions in Lexington.

Lexington historian Jonathan Coleman wandered into Melcarth's art while working on other projects including The Faulkner Morgan Pagan Babies Archive of Kentucky LGBTQ History.   Edward Melcarth, who was openly both gay and a communist,  had been born into a prominent Louisville Jewish family but changed his name from Edward Epstein for unknown reasons to Edward Melcarth.  He also moved to Lexington which has had a long and interesting history as somewhat of a minor gay Mecca for more than a hundred years.  Later in life, he moved to Venice, Italy, where he died in relative obscurity in 1973.  But Jonathan Coleman discovered his work and learned that upon Melcarth's death the publisher Malcolm Forbes had bought his entire estate.  Coleman approached the Forbes Collection and eventually arranged through his Lexington and University Of Kentucky connections to bring about the simultaneous exhibitions in Lexington which were the first public displays of Melcarth's works in many years.  Thanks to Jonathan Coleman art aficionados in Kentucky have at least had recent opportunities to view Melcarth's work and he has been rescued, at least temporarily, from obscurity.  He deserves to remain forever in the public eye.

Edward Melcarth "Motorcyclists" Photo by Lexington Herald Leader

Melcarth's works are powerful, emotionally evocative, and often unforgettable.  As an openly gay man, he frequently painted male subjects with striking appreciation of their bodies.  As a communist, he also created works involving strikers and working class subjects.  He worked in both paints and sculpture.  His wood carving "Amendment", seen above, is a wonderful construction but had visible damage and repairs from the past.  However those blemishes do nothing to keep the work from burning itself into an art lover's brain.  His use of light and shadow combined with his depiction of motion in "Motorcyclists", above, is also powerful and memorable work.  The male subjects in "Excavation", above, are wonderfully rendered and the painting gives insight into the lives of the working class.  I will not soon forget the works of Edward Melcarth.  If I ever have another opportunity to see his work on exhibit, I will beat a path to the gallery's door.  So should you!  Let us hope that these two recent exhibits serve to keep the works of Edward Melcarth in the public eye for many years to come, generate a desire on the part of other gallery officials to show his work, and facilitate his rebirth as a darling of the world of American Art.  

Read more here: https://www.kentucky.com/news/local/news-columns-blogs/tom-eblen/article194180314.html#storylink=cpy