A huge, rare painting by preacher-turned-noted folk artist the Rev. Howard Finster hung “hidden in plain sight” for decades in a rural Georgia church.
The 1977 painting, “Chelsea Baptist Church,” is believed to be one of the least well-known of his early works and the biggest.
The Rev. Bobby Lemons, pastor of Chelsea Baptist Church in Chattooga County in northwest Georgia, was aware of the painting but never knew much about its creator and wasn’t quite sure he was a huge fan of the work.
It was in the sanctuary when he and his wife, Sandra, said their “I dos” in 1988. The painting on Masonite board was still there when Lemons became the church’s pastor about three years ago.
“I had no idea he was that popular an artist,” said Lemons in a telephone interview. “I think some people, like myself, questioned the imagery that was in there. I wasn’t exactly sure of the meaning of it all. ... But my understanding is there was a purpose in everything he did and a meaning behind it.”
The painting, which is more than 8 1/2 feet wide including the frame, will be the highlight of Buford-based Slotin Folk Art Auction’s Self-Taught Art Masterpiece Sale on Saturday. Steve Slotin, co-owner of Slotin Folk Art Auction, estimates the painting could fetch as much as $70,000 and expects to have bidders from around the world.
Slotin has handled the sale of several Finster works, most notably in 2013 with the painting “Vision of Mary’s Angel,” which sold for $51,500, counting buyer’s premium. That painting was created a decade after “Chelsea Baptist Church” and was smaller.
The Chelsea Baptist painting "was an amazing find,” said Slotin. “It was a groundbreaking find. This was hiding in plain sight in North Georgia for 40 years and no one discovered it. It’s amazing what kind of things are still out there.”
The piece centers around Chelsea Baptist, where Finster ministered from 1950 to 1965. He died in 2001 at age 84.
It shows congregants arriving at the white-frame sanctuary in Menlo, with a pastor standing to the side under a white-bloomed tree inhabited by a dove. The painting includes a river baptism involving biblical-looking figures, a shepherd tending his sheep and a city of “heavenly mansions.”
The minister is painted on a small metal plate, so that a new pastor’s image could be painted in his place as time went went by.
The ladies Sunday school commissioned Finster, paying a few hundred dollars for the piece.
As the story goes, Finster stopped pastoring the church after he asked members after a Sunday prayer meeting if they could remember the topic of that morning’s sermon. No one could.
When Tina Cox, executive director of the Paradise Garden Foundation, saw the painting in March, “tears came to my eyes. Without a doubt, it was a Finster. It was magnificent.”
Cox heard about the sacred painting from the daughter-in-law of a longtime Chelsea Baptist member, a man who, at 7, was baptized by Finster himself. Just thinking about the painting “gave me chills.”
Credit: HOWARD POUSNER
Credit: HOWARD POUSNER
Finster always numbered his paintings (this is #641), and Cox recognized his signature brushstrokes. The artist eventually painted 46,991 individually numbered pieces in his career.
For his part, Lemons is glad the painting will be in safe hands and may one day be available for a larger public to view.
He said proceeds will be used to make improvements to the church, including making it more wheelchair-accessible.
“I saw an interview with Howard Finster and one of the things he said was that everything he did was to further the kingdom of God and spread the Gospel,” he said. “If we can continue to do that with the proceeds and if it ends up one day in a museum for the public to see, it’s a win-win.”
People can bid online at SlotinFolkArt.com. For questions or to bid by phone, call 404-403-4244.
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