The Miracles of William Edmondson
OSGF
William Edmondson’s career was both exceptional and prolific, especially considering that he only began sculpting around the age of 55. Born between 1874 and 1883 (exact records have been destroyed by fire) in Davidson County, Tennessee, Edmondson grew up as the son of former enslaved people. His family initially made a living by sharecropping on the same plantation where his parents had been enslaved. Edmondson eventually moved to the city of Nashville, where he would spend much of his life. He never married, living with a rotating variety of family members in his house in Nashville’s Edgehill neighborhood.
Around 1934, Edmondson experienced a divine call, later articulating a vision in which God prompted him to take up chisel and begin carving – or preaching, as he described it – religious messages through art. He began by making tombstones for people in his Nashville African-American community before expanding to carve animals and people, almost always with biblical significance.
In 1936, approximately two years after he began making art, Edmondson was introduced to the New York-based photographer Louise Dahl-Wolfe. Dahl-Wolfe, who worked for Harper’s Bazaar, had wanted to feature Edmondson in the magazine; William Randolph Hearst, its infamously racist publisher at the time, rejected the story. Dahl-Wolfe subsequently showed Edmondson’s to the executive director of the Museum of Modern Art in New York, which lead to a 1937 solo exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art. Although Edmondson did not see the exhibit himself and the museum did not acquire any of his pieces, he went down in history as the first Black artist and self-taught artist to have a solo exhibition there.
Edmondson would continue sculpting and carving almost until his death in February 1951. Unfortunately, the current location of his grave at Mount Ararat Cemetery in Nashville (now Greenstone Cemetery) is unknown, as he was buried without a stone marker and his burial records have since been destroyed by fire.
In the decades following Edmondson’s death, his work became more well-known than it had been during his lifetime, when the fine art community had shown only a short-lived interest in it (see the collection of Edmondson sculptures at Cheekwood Estate & Gardens). This is when the Oak Spring Garden Foundation’s founder, Bunny Mellon, was likely introduced to Edmondson. Bunny Mellon found Edmondson’s work to be wonderful, and during an October 2000 Sotheby’s Americana sale, she purchased an Edmondson birdbath.
Stone birdbaths are technically complex pieces to create. The base, shaft and capital are held together by gravity alone, which means they need to have precise fitting and balance in order to stay upright. Like most of Edmondson’s work, the doves adorning the piece Mellon purchased have symbolic religious significance, but also fit in with the aesthetic that she curated around her home and gardens.
The bath stood outside her library from the time it was purchased until a severe thunderstorm in the fall of 2016 blew it over. The sculpture was was damaged and moved into storage to prevent any further wear. In February 2018, the Oak Spring Garden Foundation restored and rededicated the birdbath.
William Edmondson Birdbath, circa 1940s, on display in Oak Spring Garden's Honey House.
It was set in a place of prominence within the “Honey House” in Oak Spring’s formal garden, where it is protected from the elements and where visitors can learn about the artist. William Edmondson’s incredible legacy lives on in this birdbath as well as his other work, the beautiful tombstones and gardening ornaments he called miracles.
Interested in learning more about William Edmondson? If you’re ever in Nashville, be sure to pay a visit to Edmondson Park, which contains original works by acclaimed modern-day Black sculptors Lonnie Holley and Thornton Dial. Those in the Virginia area can view several of Edmondson’s pieces at the Smithsonian American Art Museum. There is also a documentary in the works about his life titled, Chipping Away: The Life and Legacy of Sculptor William Edmondson, which is slated for a summer 2021 release according to the Facebook page.
This is an updated version of the original blogpost from 2018.