The Gift of Color: Henry Faulkner - Limited Edition

Copyrighted 2017 

all rights reserved

Limited Edition 

____ / ____ 

Printed Edition 500 

The Gift of Color 

Henry Lawrence Faulkner 

Concept and Design: John S. Hockensmith 

Narrative and Text: Fine Art Editions 

Editorial Assistant: Sarah Tsiang 

Cover Design: Fine Art Editions 

Four Colour Print Group 

Printed in China 

Sponsor: First Southern National Bank 

Limited Edition: ISBN 978-1-5323-5329-1 

Not for Reproduction



PAINTINGS, POEMS, AND WRITINGS 

HIS YEARS AS AN ARTIST 1948-1981 

1924-1981 

all rights reserved

The generosity of 

First Southern Funding 

has made this book possible 



With gratitude to First Southern National Bank, its board members, 

Jess and Angela Correll, and David and Roseann Downey 

for their stewardship and patronage of the fine arts 

iii 


The Gift of Patronage 

An artist without a patron is like a seed without soil – a kite without wind – the heavens 

without stars. From the outset, the artist and the patron are presented an opportunity for 

developing an integral alliance. The patron’s financial support and the recognition inferred 

by the patron’s purchase allow the artist’s imagination to return to creative expression. It is 

with this symbiotic relationship that art continues to be born. 

The patron’s commitment to the creative process begins with the first sale. With that act 

of patronage, the art can circulate, facilitating awareness of the artist’s work and advocating 

for more creation. 

As the patron’s role progresses, it contributes to the preservation of the artist’s work 

and with vigilant stewardship, helps create a foundation for the artist’s legacy. With 

guardianship and accolades, art does not languish as décor or become a secret possession 

– it is celebrated. The enthusiastic patron can further the artist’s legacy by collecting, 

organizing, and preserving information and memorabilia related to the artist’s life and 

works. These additional efforts build a basis for the art’s secondary market value, and with 

proper documentation, sales records, and other details, a monetary worth is established 

and a currency created. 

It is because of the many patrons that Henry Lawrence Faulkner engaged and the 

transactions made between them that a comprehensive record of his life legacy is preserved. 

It is with gratitude to all of Faulkner’s patrons, especially Greene A. Settle as well as First 

Southern National Bank, that Faulkner’s magical imagination and gift of color remain 

vibrant today. 

all rights reserved 

iv

Introduction 

Destined to become a world 

traveler and famous artist, 

Henry Faulkner spent his 

troubled and impoverished 

youth a vagabond, making 

numerous stops along the way. 

Living by his wits, he honed his 

natural talents and perfected 

his flair for the dramatic. He 

was blessed with an intuitive 

charisma and the voice of a 

New Orleans nightingale, 

enabling him to weave himself into the fabric of the rich and 

famous. But he also sought solace among the less fortunate, 

the poor and downtrodden. That was Faulkner’s style. He had 

a notion and a purpose for anybody and everybody who tried to 

understand him and who was willing to lend him a helping hand 

on the road from notoriety to renown. 

Many who knew him considered him eccentric. An impulsive and 

creative person, he defiantly and courageously flaunted effeminate 

ways at a time when attitudes toward the gay community could be 

filled with danger and hateful disdain. He was frequently viewed 

with skepticism, condescension, and condemnation, but he was also 

adored for his alluringly impish and joyful ways. 

Faulkner’s circumstances were sometimes complicated by 

stepping outside the law, overstaying his welcome, or taking 

advantage of others’ generosity. Yet it seems that his strongwilled 

aspirations did not negate his sheer delightfulness. His 

fertile imagination was a conduit for success. The outcomes, 

however, were periodically a magnet for troubling accusations. 

As one fortuitous incident after another occurred, he stayed 

artistically focused and ignored rejection and denunciation. 

His art and poetry guided him like a lighthouse on a distant 

shore, allowing his wild inspirations to sail freely across the 

oceans of his visual fantasies. 

Throughout his career, patrons and acquaintances responded 

to his ebullient spirit with both adulation and disparagement, 

but he remained committed to exploring and expressing his love 

of nature, his joy for animals, and his desire to understand the 

mysteries of life and death. 

Faulkner supported his increasingly expensive lifestyle as a 

professional artist for over three decades with money he earned 

from the sale of his artwork. From the late 1950s until his tragic 

death on December 3, 1981, he was prolific. His body of work 

may have exceeded 5,000 pieces, that are now mostly in private 

collections and seldom for sale. 

Since his passing, his artistic legacy has gained momentum, and 

as more art enthusiasts discover Henry Faulkner, the appreciation 

broadens for his fanciful mid-19th-century European style and 

for his compelling life story as well. The monetary value of his 

paintings continues to grow as verified by appraisals, gallery sales, 

and auction prices. Any piece of Faulkner’s artwork, whether it 

be a sketch or an oil panel, is now a solid investment, and when 

a painting does arrive in the marketplace, the price continues to 

escalate. The historical significance of Faulkner’s artwork extends 

beyond its place in the history of American art; his works are 

internationally known as well. 

The selection of paintings in this book are presented as an 

overview of Faulkner’s artistic evolution. The placement of 

the artwork is sequenced chronologically by recorded dates. 

Where there was no reliable documentation, the artwork has 

been arranged subjectively per its perceived artistic style. The 

inclusion and placement of Faulkner’s poems and journal 

entries are not intended to be chronologically arranged or to 

depict specific paintings but rather to offer an insight into 

Faulkner’s personal thoughts in his own handwriting or from 

his typewritten pages. 

Faulkner’s art will always speak for itself. This compilation, 

The Gift of Color, offers future generations a window into the 

magic of Henry Lawrence Faulkner’s imagination. 

1 


Photo: © Maria Cosindas / Saturday Evening Post 


“Henry Faulkner, 1966” photograph by Marie Cosindas; “A Show of Color” 

by Margaret R. Weiss, Saturday Review, September 24, 1966 

2

Know Your Self 

Date: 1953 

Medium: Conté drawing 

on illustration board 

Size: 18 ” x 13 1/2” 

Signed: “Faulkner Feb. 9 - 53” 

bottom right with 

“Know Your Self” above 

3 

Titled by artist; “Thy Self ” 

changed to “Your Self ”; 

cropped from early sketch 

(see pg. 42) 


The Beginnings 

1924 - 1947 


4

THE BEGINNINGS 

1924 - 1947 

Born under a Wolf Moon in the 

backwoods of South Central Kentucky, 

Henry Lawrence Faulkner’s first cry 

echoed through the valleys on a shadowy evening of January 9, 

1924. Frail and sickly at birth, he was the tenth of 13 children, 

one of whom died, born to Bessie Lee and John Milton Faulkner. 

His birth was followed by a sister and then by twins. The new 

additions to the family were more hungry mouths to feed in a 

1 1/2 room log shack inhabited by a talented but domineering 

father and a protective, overworked mother. Faulkner’s first 

footing inside that house in the boondocks of Simpson County, 

near the Tennessee-Kentucky border, played a major role in the 

direction his life would take as an artist and a man. 

On October 2, 1926, before he was even three years 

old, Faulkner’s mother died. Only six weeks after Bessie 

Lee Pursley Faulkner’s burial, her 12 children, still reeling 

from the loss, were committed by John Milton Faulkner 

to the Kentucky Children’s Home in Louisville, Kentucky. 

Over the next four years, Faulkner’s siblings were pulled 

out and dispersed to a variety of homes. It must have been 

especially shattering to a fragile child to lose his remaining 

family considering that he experienced at least two failed 

foster placements himself, one in Breathitt County in 

Eastern Kentucky and another in Western Kentucky. These 

events likely compounded his sense of instability. Faulkner’s 

personality and evolving character traits were undercoated 

in the black gesso of these tragic beginnings. 

In November 1930 when he was a little over 6 1/2 years 

old, Faulkner arrived at a place he would call home, where he 

could let his undernourished and shaken soul take root with 

his new foster parents, Dan and Dora Whittimore. He, at last, 

had a permanent family and for the next decade he would be 

known as Lawrence Whittimore. They lived together in a fully 

furnished one-story frame house on Falling Timber Branch. 

Nestled close by was a one-room schoolhouse among the small 

churches and homes scattered throughout the remote hills in 

Clay County in Eastern Kentucky. 

The Whittimores sent their foster son to school, brought him 

to church, and tried their best to apply discipline. But Faulkner’s 

youthful mind wandered, as did his feet. He found traditional church 

services boring and preferred the style of Holiness and Pentecostal 

practices, intrigued by the religious fervor and unrestrained manner 

of worship. His true spiritual pursuit, however, was to commune 

with God in lush meadows, in valley mornings glistening with dew, 

in ripening sweet apple trees, and in clouds hanging on the highest 

hills that drifted away and turned into stars as night fell. 

He found God in the ever-changing cycles of the seasons. He 

spent time in the summer shade and early morning green, amid 

the bursting tones of sunlit autumn days, and the subtle shapes and 

colors of snowflakes preceding the first buds of spring. Long before 

he ever read Henry David Thoreau’s words, “Heaven is under 

our feet as well as over our heads,” Faulkner had already formed a 

spiritual bond with nature, a connection reflected throughout his 

lifetime in his poems, letters, journals, and art. 

Faulkner's foster mother, Dora, in the 1960s on her farm near 

Egypt, Kentucky; presumably her second husband pictured behind 

Photo: © unknown / Faulkner-Morgan Pagan Babies Archive 

5 


Faulkner was by no means an ordinary boy. He wrote in his 

journals of being ostracized from the Falling Timber community 

during his childhood; his foster mother, the exception. Biographer 

Charles House described the peculiar dynamic of their relationship 

in which Dora, according to a social worker, appeared to “almost 

worship” her son while, in Faulkner’s own words, holding herself 

out as “the woman who raised the poor orphan.” 1 But for others 

in the community there was little understanding or forgiveness 

for his unacceptable behaviors, unorthodox encounters, defiant 

drag performances, evangelical ecstasies on the church lawn, or his 

klepto-inclined sticky fingers. The residents did not find his behavior 

amusing or perhaps even redeemable. Such denouncement regarding 

his inability or unwillingness to succumb to conventional standards 

drove him into a more interior world and prodded him to seek solace 

from nature, the wellspring of his creativity. 

Faulkner wrote of his reaction to the rejection, “I’ll 

stay inside – I won’t go out where – they can hear my soft, 

effeminate voice.” He escaped to woodland sanctuaries – 

secret places where only he and God knew where he was. 

He sought the most basic of connections, writing in his 

journal, “As a child, heard of a person with St. Vitus Dance. 

Imagination (Vitus – vitality). A saint, dancing, wind, 

mystery, wish I could catch it, chasing invisible butterflies, 

my interest was intuitive – not religious – but personal.” 

Connecting strongly with nature as indicated in another 

journal entry, he wrote “I’ll talk to myself and speak to the 

things around me. To things that can’t answer vocally, but 

only respond in their beauty. I’ll speak to these trees – they 

tremble for me – they are gracious trees. And there in the 

curve of the land – I’ll get a feeling that comes from one 

touch of the hand … we have always been very close … the 

earth and I.” A type of mysticism and pantheism, the idea 

that God is everywhere, arose from these soulful internal 

monologues and became an element in much of his work. 2 

It was in the backcountry that Faulkner could feel free, 

behaving like a feral child whose spirit was set loose to run 

wild amidst all of God’s grandeur. There was his place of 

bohemian worship, where he could frolic and fulfill his 

need to create. Relying on his basic creative instincts, he 

constructed brushes with sassafras twigs and concocted paints 

from crushed wild mulberries, blackberries, raspberries, 

black cherries, elderberries, and anything else he could find. 

He sculpted the clay of Clay County, shaping new ideas 

and molding his ephemeral thoughts in truly artistic ways. 

He had found the freedom he so desperately sought and in 

his secret reality, he made fantasy friends – creatures of the 

thickets – and communed with flowers in bloom. He sang 

with the birds, trying to escape the pain of being one who 

simply consented and conformed. 

Henry Faulkner, age 5, seated on the far right, lower step, Falling 

Timber, Kentucky 

Faulkner’s early art presentations were not well received by 

the residents around Falling Timber. Even his doting mother 

was unconvinced by his artistic efforts. His art was likely an 

abstract reflection of his inner reality and Clay Countians, at 

the time, seemed not particularly interested in the value of 

his youthful creations. Even though his fledgling attempts to 

make art were ridiculed and rejected, his vision was set, and 

he was far too defiant to veer off course. Throughout his life, 

time-lapsed memories of rural Clay County refuges would 

be an ongoing inspiration in his artwork. With that prism of 

consciousness embedded, he often referenced these experiences 

in his poetry and painting. 



6


Kites of Spring 

Undated: late ’50s or early ’60s 

Medium: Watercolor with gouache wash and pen and ink on paper 

Size: 24 ” x 18 1/4” 

Signed: “Faulkner” bottom right 

Example of Faulkner's experimentation with mixed media, collage, and the inclusion of lines 

of his poetry (signature is visible under infrared light); layout cropped from the original art 

Titled by artist 

97 


The Formative Years 

1948 - 1957 


8

A young Henry Faulkner in the '50s 

The Formative Years 

1948 - 1957 

Faulkner’s geographical cure for grief was found along the 

highways heading to Key West; the 23-year-old’s desolation 

lifted. Enraptured with a zeal for life, for Faulkner, running away 

had become a means of embracing all things. He had set out 

for Key West on a writer’s path, but the beauty of the tropical 

landscapes stirred his deepest emotions and enlivened his spirit, 

compelling him to convey his experience in both words and 

paintings. In that summer of 1947, in the sweltering Floridian 

air on the road to Key West, Faulkner began to sketch and 

paint in earnest, and art became his lifelong passion, eventually 

becoming his profession. 


Key West was a perfect place for wintering, but in mid-1948 

Faulkner went to Washington, D.C., for a short time to sketch, 

paint, and fill his journal with reflections and poems. With a 

novel also in the works, he had hit his stride as a writer, adopting 

a “Beat-style” in the vein of William S. Burroughs, Allen 

Ginsberg, and Jack Kerouac. At the same time, he was drawn 

more and more toward visual art, making countless studies with 

charcoal, pen, watercolors, and paint. 

As the decade wound down, he headed back to New York 

where his sister Lois joined him on occasion to explore the 

city. The two stayed with the niece of their half-brother, Dite 

Faulkner, on Faile Street in the Bronx during those Big Apple 

adventures. 

Faulkner gained confidence in big city ways and by early 

1949 he had rented a room on the Upper West Side across from 

Riverside Park, just a few subway stops from Greenwich Village. 

He continued to absorb city life as he roamed the museums 

and coffee houses, and explored the nightlife. He worked at 

menial jobs and scraped, scrounged, and snatched to keep his 

head above water. But it was during this time of meandering 

that Faulkner walked into a bookstore and discovered a recently 

published book by a Kentucky author. To his astonishment, the 

author was from Falling Timber Branch. The writer was Henry 

Hornsby; the book, Lonesome Valley (1949). 

This bookstore discovery reignited Faulkner’s literary 

aspirations and the success of Hornsby, a man from his part of 

the world, now a successful Lexington, Kentucky, newspaperman, 

helped him focus on his need for a formal education. Hornsby 

was an alumnus of Berea College, and the persistent Faulkner 

sent him letters asking for help in gaining admission. He 

consequently lost interest in New York and returned to Falling 

Timber. In November 1949, he moved to Lexington to be near the 

Hornsby family and continued his insistent pleading. Hornsby 

finally convinced the college to grant Faulkner an interview. For 

over a century, Berea College had been nationally recognized 

for its mission of helping underprivileged Kentuckians from the 

Appalachian region obtain an education. Still, it was remarkable 

that Berea College actually considered Faulkner, given that he 

had only completed the first five grades of school. 

9 


Berea admitted Faulkner in September 1950, but only 

a month into his first semester he felt stifled by his English 

composition class and his enthusiasm waned. He asked the dean 

to be dismissed. Dejected and with yet another failure behind 

him, he looked for a new path that did not depend on writing. 

His social worker, Betty Neal, from the Kentucky Children’s 

Home had always been supportive and had corresponded with 

him throughout the ’40s. She suggested that his gifts might best 

be channeled back into painting and visual art. Neal’s respectful 

encouragement buoyed Faulkner’s listing spirit and prompted 

him to return to familiar territory, Washington, D.C. There, he 

rambled into another meaningless job and cheap apartment as 

he set about drawing, sketching, and painting. During this time 

he still wrote to his friends and family but now devoted much 

of his time to art. 

Sicilian Goat 

Undated: mid-to-late ’50s 

Medium: Pen and ink with wash on paper 

Size: 16 ” x 22 1/2” 

Signed: “Faulkner” bottom right with “Sicilian Goat” below 

Titled by artist; a gift to Paul “Skip” Olsen from Faulkner for yard labor 

in the mid -'70s 

Times Square 

Undated: mid-to-late ’50s 

Medium: Pencil sketch 

Size: 4 5/8” x 6 3/4” 

Signed: “Faulkner” bottom right with “Times Square” 

bottom left 

Titled by artist; paper from small pocket-size pad 

With a sense of urgency Faulkner built up an art portfolio and 

promptly presented his work to the Corcoran Gallery of Art, one 

of the oldest and most prestigious galleries in the United States. 

The gallery included a school, and its principal, Richard Lahey, 

a well-known artist himself, took special interest in Faulkner’s 

inventiveness. He was given a scholarship in the fall of 1950 and 

began studying portraits and landscapes under renowned artist 

Kenneth Stubbs. Faulkner had natural instincts and learned new 

mediums and techniques quickly. Inspired and confident, just 

after New Year’s Day 1951, Faulkner showed his work to various 

galleries in Georgetown and was offered a debut show for October. 

In mid-January, he was arrested for propositioning a District 

of Columbia policeman and lost his scholarship at the Corcoran. 

He still maintained his mettle, though, and still believed 

he could make it as a professional artist. He found a job at a 

pharmacy and spent the spring getting ready for the October 


10

Self Portrait 


Medium: Pencil 

Size: 9 3/4” x 7 ” 

Unsigned 

Descriptive title above for reference; not shown at 

bottom center of sketch is typewritten “FAULKNER ” 

19 11 


1948 – 1957 

Thirty-six paintings and sketches, with 

poems and journal entries 


12

Wounded Dove 


Medium: Watercolor, pen and ink on paper 

Size: 12 ” x 17 1/2” 


Descriptive title above for reference; 

artwork mounted with glue on board 

13 




14

"Forgotten Man" 

He stood there, 

In his old clothes, 

And his soul creeped 

From the tattered holes. 

He was a forgotten man, 

By all men. 

And where was god?? 

Where O where??? 

Price 

Undated: late ’40s or ’50s 

Medium: Pencil sketch 

Size: 12 ” x 9 ” 


with “Price” above 


15 




16

Return Home 

Coal Cars, Kentucky Mountain 

Date: mid-’50s 

Medium: Watercolor and gouache 

Size: 14 3/4” x 21 7/8” 


The train comes snorting in 

through the field like a horse 

past those squatted shacks 

with sad eyed windows 

Where smoke moves like the devil 

to do its dirty work. 

Clothes hang on lines like souls of the poor 

In the back yards of shantytown . . . 

And in the streets, time loiters 

Like a young boy with hands in his pockets 

fumbling the marbles of memory. 

When the yard gate waves you in 

And birds sing you home again 

memory is youngness gone . . . 

memory brought you home 

and slipped away without pity. 

Welcome swells in your mother 

And the screen doors leak their strange 

And far away abstractions of summer 

The sun flowers have no part 

In sentimental reasons 

And the apple trees of truth 

Will hurt you real as orphans' cries 

You smile because you understand 

Not because you’re happy - 

Titled by artist; also titled “Coal Train”; 

another watercolor is painted on back of same paper 


17 




18

Love winds & wild flowers 

Winds come rushing, faster rushing 

Rustling through the golden rod, 

Gently, powerful!! Now they're mighty!! 

like the changing breath of God. 

O winds come back make me forget 

I am alone no lover yet -- 

This tree is strong these weeds are dry -- 

Give me a song while here I lie. 

The blue sage moves 

My house stands still, 

The winds come loose across the hill, 

Ky. hills lie huddled close 

In love with wild Ky. rose. 

Clay County Barn 

Undated: mid-’50s 

Medium: Gouache on paper 

Size: 13 1/8” x 20 ” 


What god is there that made the child 

and left all lovers growing wild. 

The trees make love to winds that roam 

And me? I’m always left alone. 


19 




20

Religious Icon 

Undated: late ’50s 

Medium: Gouache and metallic paints on veneer 

Size: 9 7/8” x 5 1/8” 

Unsigned (authenticated) 

Descriptive title above for reference; experimental study using either 

separated plywood veneer or perhaps furniture veneer as the substrate, 

fortified by gluing to store-bought student canvas board 

21 




22

Wicks of April 

Bluegrass Farm 


Medium: Oil on board 

Size: 24 1/2” x 19 ” 


spring came upon the mountain 

and now in the yard 

is beautiful. 

trees turn up their green wicks 

and tonight the stars 

will join them shining. 

spring the silent comer 

is more secret 

than the color of thunder 

or remembered rivers 

turned music, or wet, 

warm April rains. 

spring will burn joy 

and her green singing 

will turn the wounded, 

healed . . . 

it is too beautiful for wars 

or hate . . . too beautiful 

not to love and be loved . . . 

the ground wet 

and the garden standing 

in midnight . . . while 

the moon spills 

little white rabbits 

that fall through the 

sound of country bells 

ringing high above the mystery 

high above the sweetness, 

high above the green wick 

burning timbers. 



23 




24

These I love, bending trees laden with fruit, 

A sound that travels from the flute, 

All nude bodies on gleaming sands 

Tall weeds to touch a passing hand. 

Dry grass where big red apples fall, A scent 

that no one can explain, of rotted weeds and musky 

grain. Rippling muscles on a masculine back, 

and soft feminine flesh. Long shadows deep 

in the night and dark, dark windows gleaming 

light. A cat a dog on a quiet street - 

A country path and David’s feet. A healthy 

laugh, a friendly touch and David’s voice all 

rich and such. Dawns and evenings, flower 

and trees, Winds and rains and all of these. Ferns 

that grow 'neath dry dead brush. Fall leaves 

that turn to color blush. Many faces in a 

dark still room, Half light, half shadow 

like a half lit moon. These I love. 

Sailor Boys 


Medium: Gouache on illustration board 

Size: 13 1/8” x 20 ” 


Descriptive title above for reference 

25 




26

27 



Nude Fantasy Dancers 


Medium: Gouache and acrylic on paper 

Size: 20 5/8” x 23 ” 

Signed: “Faulkner” bottom left 

Example of Faulkner’s experimentation with mixed media; 

notation on back: “Nudes & half nudes” 


Titled by artist; width cropped and condensed for page layout 9428

Oh Happiness !! 

I walk in the night the quiet night 

And the soft low flute like purr 

Of the cricket bird sings to me - 

And the soothing sound 

Wipes the sweat from my mind - 

As you come to me saying nothing 

And nothing said nor needed is 

For your presence is all I want. 

I walk in the night, the quiet night 

I mark the elms slow swing 

In the wind of the night 

That passes, O so gently 

Like a hand that I pass 

Over your brow and leave it there 

Like the wind leaves a sigh 

In the tall tall tree 

Of the night, that passes gently - 

29 


The Masterful Years 

1958 - 1969 


30

Professional portrait of Faulkner around 1960 

The Masterful Years 

1958 – 1969 

Faulkner had returned to Key West in fall 1957, flush with a 

newfound success. As 1958 drew near, he began to form lasting 

relationships as he entertained and mingled with artists, writers, 

and socialites in Florida. Significant among these was aspiring 

writer James Leo Herlihy, whose breakthrough play, Blue Denim, 

would be produced on Broadway in February 1958. Herlihy’s 

career later blossomed with the subsequent publication of All 

Fall Down (1960) and Midnight Cowboy (1965), both made into 

movies. Midnight Cowboy brought Herlihy into the limelight, 

making him both popular and famous. He and Faulkner became 

lifelong confidants. Faulkner had found someone he could trust 

and admire, and Herlihy had found a stimulating companion. 


While Faulkner succeeded in reaching his winter destination 

in style, his money did not last long. But he knew well the role 

of the starving artist. In early 1958 he met Stefan and Mary 

Brecht, who helped him personally and financially, extending 

the type of stabilizing influence he needed. Stefan Brecht was 

the son of famous German poet and playwright Bertolt Brecht 

and was a poet himself. The Brechts shared Faulkner’s passion 

for poetry and became his patrons by purchasing his paintings 

and encouraging him to continue writing. 

Faulkner, in turn, relied on a combination of “inspiration 

and perspiration” to produce a new portfolio, and in February 

1958 the Diftler Gallery in Coral Gables gave him his first oneman 

show. He received a glowing review in The Miami News, 

making his debut solo exhibit a triumphant success. Now there 

was no looking back. Within a couple of months, he had become 

a self-sustaining professional artist. 

Fueled by his recent successes, Faulkner later participated in an 

outdoor group exhibit in Coconut Grove, where one distinguished 

visitor found both the artist and his work interesting and purchased 

three colorful paintings. Faulkner later discovered his new admirer 

was well-known playwright Tennessee Williams, currently at the 

peak of his career with plays such as The Glass Menagerie (1944), A 

Streetcar Named Desire (1947), and Cat On a Hot Tin Roof (1955) 

already produced. This fortuitous meeting and act of patronage 

was the beginning of another of Faulkner’s few close and enduring 

friendships. The cultivation of relationships with Herlihy, the 

Brechts, and Williams afforded him inclusion and acceptance 

within the Florida arts community. Henceforth, he was a winter 

bird that returned to this southern nest annually. 

Springtime 1958 beckoned Faulkner back to Kentucky, 

where he visited family, painted, and worked on an application 

for a Guggenheim Fellowship. He stayed a few weeks in the 

vacant Whittimore house in Falling Timber, which he now 

considered his studio. His foster mother, Dora, had remarried 

and moved to her husband’s farm in the nearby community of 

Egypt in Jackson County, Kentucky. 

Inspired by Herlihy, Williams, and Stefan Brecht, Faulkner 

focused his attention on writing. He set his hopes on a Guggenheim 

Fellowship to provide a stipend that would allow him to travel to 

31 


Italy, following in the footsteps of artists and writers he admired. 

Although he received help with the fellowship application, his 

own voice rang clear as he stated: “I have painted poetry ever 

since I was a young boy. I use that expression here because 

I have done a great deal of painting, and have written many 

poems, and the two forms compliment [sic] each other in my 

own mind’s eye.” 7 

Back in New York in the fall of 1958, Faulkner had the 

chance to build on his previous year’s success, this time calling 

an apartment on East 34th Street home. His roommate was 

thought to be Edward Melcarth, a native Kentuckian and 

successful social realist painter and sculptor who had spent most 

of his career in New York. Melcarth had also lived in Italy. 

Faulkner’s success followed him from Florida to New York, 

where he was again accepted for a group show at Burr Gallery 

and sold another painting to the Collectors of American Art. 

His greatest professional opportunity to date came in the form 

of an offer for a one-man show at the Ligoa Duncan Gallery on 

Madison Avenue. That exhibit, which ran through December 

1958, led to his first mention in Art News. Burr Gallery also 

invited him to present his first gallery poetry reading and awarded 

him first prize for their 1958 International Group Show. Those 

accomplishments confirmed, undeniably, that Henry Faulkner 

had indeed arrived on the New York art scene. 

While enjoying his accomplishments, Faulkner met Keith 

Ingerman, an artist who exerted a significant influence on his art 

and career. Ingerman was a successful New York artist, but he also 

spent time in Palm Beach, Florida, Southern France, and Sicily. 

He had connections and an international lifestyle that Faulkner 

found appealing. Even more captivating for Faulkner, though, 

was Ingerman’s artistic style because he painted with a European 

flair and presented his artwork in antique frames. Ingerman 

suggested that Faulkner approach Worth Avenue Gallery in Palm 

Beach and introduce himself to Mary Benson. That prestigious 

gallery was opened under the co-direction of Benson and Emily 

Rayner, but it was owned by elusive art patron Alice DeLamar, 

one of America’s richest and most influential women, especially 

in theater and the arts. DeLamar also became a major influence 

in Faulkner’s career. 

Faulkner with Alice the goat in front of The Gallery in Fort Lauderdale, 

Florida, in the mid-'60s 

Faulkner demonstrated boundless confidence in the 

unabashed letter of introduction he wrote to Benson: “I am 

endowed with that gift of color and personal touch which makes 

my art more than ordinary.” 8 He followed up with a personal 

arrival at the gallery’s doorstep. As with many before her, 

Benson did not take long to find Faulkner charming. But more 

important, she found his portfolio promising. 

Photo: © unknown / Clifton Anderson Collection 


32

33 


1958 – 1969 

Fifty-five paintings, with poems 

and journal entries 


34

Mendelssohn – Bette Davis 

Undated: ’60s 

Medium: Acrylic on board 

Size: 23 5/8” x 11 1/4” 

Original frame: 27 1/8” x 14 5/8” 

Signed: “Faulkner” top left 


35 




36

Old Lady 

She quite naturally comes 

to the large park 

where nature accommodates 

her tendencies . . . 

Oh, she is quite old and very poor 

except for a priceless smile 

Even in all her hunger 

and need, she has managed to retain 

She is one of those gifted ones 

who in spite of her poverty, 

has managed to keep day light 

in her eyes. 

And in her walk a pitiful jerky 

movement for a certain pace & 

then suddenly stops as tho 

the world ended there - and 

then with serious effort 

starts off again. 

She mumbles and tho I cannot 

hear what she says . . . 

I understand . . . 

She is talking to the image 

of loneliness - because its 

silence is so unbearable 

she is creating all sorts of 

nice good people to speak 

to gently, because the worlds big 

back is turned upon her. 

And at times when the skies are 

very blue . . . you may see how 

surely once - her eyes were 

also blue - but now like a 

dress that has endured too many 

summers - . . . those eyes have 

faded & yet because of how 

they see things in spite 

of time & perhaps god 

there is something of a 

child in them yet. 

Faulkner 

New Orleans Woman 


Medium: Casein on board 

Size: 19 7/8” x 11 1/8” 

Original frame: 27 

7/8” 

x 19 1/8” 


Titled by artist; three-dimensional leather leaves with twigs and 

berries varnished and attached to the exterior of 4 ”-wide frame 

37 




38

Runnymede 

Date: 1964 


Size: 14 ” x 20 ” 


Signed: “Faulkner 64” bottom right with “Clay” below 

Descriptive title above for reference; painted for the Clay family of 

Runnymede Farm, Kentucky's oldest Thoroughbred breeding farm 

39 




40

Birds at Fountain 


Medium: Casein and oil on board 

Size: 8 ” x 10 ” 

Original frame: 12 ” x 14 ” 


Descriptive title above for reference; frame adorned 

by the artist in country blue with vine and berries 

41 




42

Black Rastas with Birds 



Size: 18 3/8” x 14 ” 

Original frame: 21 3/8” x 17 ” 

Signed: “Faulkner” top left 

Titled by artist; Black Rastas was one of Faulkner's favorite cats 

43


44

Walnut Leaves 

Our joy and our sorrow 

Is the same Truth. 

It is merely our life. 

Our soul is a memory of Him. 

One who created us in His own image 

Wanting to be young again. 

Our birth is only the opening 

Of peach seeds, planted by God, 

And we are only another tree 

In the high hills of memory, 

Sweet and bitter in youth 

Recalling the adolescence of one 

who cannot bear to forget 

and green walnut leaves 

Some springtime long ago. 

Iroquois Hunt Club 

Undated: ’60s or early ’70s 

Medium: Casein on board 

Size: 12 3/8” x 15 1/2” 




Titled by artist; the Iroquois Hunt Club is a Bluegrass foxhunting 

club located on Grimes Mill Road, Lexington, Kentucky 

45 




46

47 



New Orleans Street 

Undated 

Medium: Casein on illustration board glued to Masonite 

Size: 13 5/8” x 21 5/8” 


Titled by artist; width condensed for page layout 


48 

230

I shine . . . Directly 

and obliquely. 

the flowers of my heart 

. . . Bleeding . . . 

Alive the colored glass 

of my mind . . . shines 

for you . . . 

Oh the glorious nightmares 

of flowers . . . 

are my dreams and honey. 

God is mad with color 

multiplying the rainbow 

Angels are preparing 

new tables . . . 

Of his great delight. 

49 


The Accomplished Years 

1970 - 1981 


50

Faulkner singing the blues at a nightclub, most likely in Key West at 

Capt. Tony's Saloon or possibly in Taormina, Sicily, at Mocambo Bar 

in the early '70s 

THE ACCOMPLISHED YEARS 

1970 – 1981 

With his Key West house on Peacon Lane rented, excitement 

peaked as Faulkner boarded the Federico C on October 19, 1969, 

bound for Italy’s largest port, Genoa. Daphne Phelps recounts 

having first received notice of his impending return in a letter 

written on pale green paper, saying that he was on an ocean liner 

and terribly excited because he would be arriving in Italy the 

next day. At the bottom he had written: “PS. I have three dogs 

and six cats with me, but don’t worry.” 18 

Photo: © unknown / Paul and Cindy Olsen 

On arrival, Faulkner made his way to Perugia, where he 

got a room and stayed for about two months. He brushed up 

on his Italian at the Foreign University and bought as many 

old ornate frames as his room could hold. With Christmas 

approaching, it was time to grace Taormina and Casa Cuseni 

with his presence. He rented a car and piled in all the frames 

with just enough room for himself, his driver, and his furred 

and feathered companions. The passengers included dogs 

Gentry, Lady, and their oversized puppy named Onassis; and 

cats Black Rastas, his black Persian; his white Persian, Gerolomo; 

his pedigree Siamese, Esquire; and Black Sister, his half-Siamese 

who was expecting Esquire’s kittens. Last on board were two 

tabbies and a newly acquired white drake he had just rescued 

from the Perugia marketplace. 

The tightly packed group arrived at Casa Cuseni on 

Christmas Eve at 9:40 p.m. Phelps recalls she was “not 

exactly idle,” yet she was willing to receive Faulkner and his 

entourage wholeheartedly just as Faulkner had assumed. 19 His 

obliviousness to the hour of his brash arrival on a holiday 

set the tone for what became, in the months that followed, a 

colorful year indeed. 

During the next several weeks, Faulkner painted in the 

mountains and re-established connections with the shops and 

taverns along Corso Umberto. He also reunited with Giovanni 

Panarello and became better acquainted with his brother, Carlo, 

and Carlo's wife, Mirella. They also owned an antique shop 

down the street from Giovanni’s. Faulkner had great respect 

for Mirella’s education and opinions, and they quickly became 

close. Carlo, as a businessman, offered to act as his art agent. 

Faulkner thoroughly enjoyed the couple’s company, and they 

were committed to helping him make money. He glided back 

and forth between Carlo and Mirella’s exquisite home above their 

shop and Casa Cuseni, enjoying the company of the Panarellos, 

as well as Phelps, as he once again painted in the elegant gardens 

of the stately villa that had so stimulated his imagination eight 

years earlier. 

In Taormina, his pets continued to be a prominent part 

of his life. And despite all the attention they needed, he was 

never averse to taking on another. Faulkner returned to Casa 

51 


Cuseni from the mountians one afternoon with yet another 

rescue, a baby goat he named Massimo. Almost immediately 

the kid fell deathly ill and the hysterical nighttime calls and 

visits that followed were characteristic of the ever present 

Faulkner drama while demonstrating his love for animals. 

Faulkner’s second stay in Taormina, unfortunately, was 

interrupted. He had to return to Kentucky for over a month 

to deal with property issues, leaving Phelps to tend to his dogs 

and cats as well as the new drake and mountain goat. After his 

return to Sicily, he left for England seeking medical care for 

Photo: © Brian Jannesen / Almay 

Stone cherubs outside Carlo and Mirella Panarello’s antique shop 

along Corso Umberto, where Faulkner visited and stayed during his 

second trip to Taormina 

Along Corso Umberto approaching Taormina’s main square and 

the clock tower in Piazza IX Aprile decorated for Christmas 

Photo: © Fausto Renda / iStock 

his arthritis and a hip ailment from which he had been suffering 

for some time. The specialist he sought in Manchester declined to 

give him the hip joint implantation that Faulkner believed would 

solve the problem. Phelps traveled to London to join him where 

they toured the National Gallery and other cultural sites. Back 

in Italy, Faulkner continued to buy antiques and ship them back 

to Lexington. Still plagued by the pain in his hip, he did not let it 

completely hamper his remaining time in Taormina. He resumed 

painting and occasionally sang with the house band at Mocambo 

Bar, cheered by the company and comforted by the atmosphere. 


52

Poets write in the book of thunder 

little lambs sweetening their beings 

it is all God!! . . . 

every billion years it all comes back to me 

53 


1970 – 1981 

Fifty-five paintings, with poems 

and journal entries 


54

Hunt-Morgan House 

Date: 1972 


Size: 21 7/8” x 24 3/4” 



Titled by artist; the Hunt–Morgan House is a Federal style residence in Lexington, 

Kentucky; it was built in 1814 by John Wesley Hunt, the grandfather of General John 

Hunt Morgan; the house was saved from demolition in 1955 by The Blue Grass Trust 

for Historic Preservation; located at 201 N. Mill St. in the Gratz Park Historic District 

55 




56

Cool Christmas Snows 

Down the dark, dark dirty streets, 

Come Christmas snows in their white fleet. 

And settled down to rest awhile 

Like a homeless swan or weary child. 

Like a great white dream or a great white sleep 

Sprawled quietly in her great white heap -- 

To give the earth that soft white glow 

That none could give but Christmas snow. 

Cool Christmas snow. 

Farm and Church Snow Scene 


Medium: Watercolor on board 

Size: 16 ” x 20 ” 



Faulkner 


57 




58

I’ll see your smile in flowers grown from the clay 

For clay you are, once more, so rich to stay. 

I’ll see you dance before the stir of wind 

Who said you’re dead, this dust would be the end?? 

There in a thing grown wild I’ll see your limbs 

Those leaping, tender limbs so quick to climb. 

You are the music in the wind and trees, 

The endless water’s music, all of these. 

You are among the gods that ride the air 

For in these winds is your own soothing hair. 

They cannot hide you in that deep, red clay 

Already you’ve come back in a million ways. 

How can they say that you are dead and gone? 

While in these flowers and rivers you live on. 

Beyond these rocks, beyond this hour 

These mountain tops, and every flower. 

And from the sky so far and blue -- 

Come whispering sighs on winds, of you. 

Yes in those rocks I saw your strength -- 

And in these flowers your eyes do blink. 

And like these skies your eyes were blue 

And on these winds come hints of you. 

Yes, on my cheeks brushed winds so fair 

Like golden threads that is your hair, 

Crawled round my neck and cross my face 

And stirred these passions in their place. 

And now I think of you when you'd blush -- 

The color of these flowers I touch. 

And here among the hills that tower 

Is life of you again in flower. 

When you return to spring’s warm glow, 

From winter’s sleep beneath the snow, 

I’ll come and look and find you there 

Your face the flower, the wind your hair. 

And when I fall to death’s tight clutch 

I’ll too be clay, we’ll both be such. 

We’ll mix again in clay our blood 

And add to summers color flood. 

Our blood will mix again new life to blend 

The Peaceable Kingdom 



Size: 31 7/8” x 43 3/8” 


Signed: “Faulkner” bottom right of center 

Who speaks for death, who says she is the end? 

Titled by artist; frame fitted with ornamental crown that detaches 

59 




60

Black Rastas My First Baby 



Size: 18 ” x 11 ” 



Titled by artist; title on back 

61 




62

Madonna and Child 

Date: 1979 


Size: 19 1/2” x 15 1/2” 

Original frame: Oval 24 1/2” x 20 1/2” 


Titled by artist; preliminary sketch found after Faulkner's death 

and donated to Faulkner-Morgan Pagan Babies Archive 

63 




64

Death and life is the algebra of the stars 

death and the sea, earth and death 

Orion taking that vast drink of night 

blue Gershwin heard the light of the stars 

his blue values come in musical calculations 

the politics of greed of love and hate 

you are here, I am here 

the joy is short but glorious 

to be able to say stars, night 

to be able to say sun, moon 

and live in visual pleasures 

pleasures of the senses is the ultimate 

reason for being 

even as wormwood is waiting 

hunger and green fit His calculation 

obese civilizations 

killer kings and queens 

there are no masters here 

only the guts and bowels to rot and go 

Alice Cherubs and Roses 

Date: late ’70s or early ’80s 


Size: 17 3/4” x 29 3/4” 

Original frame: Oval 33 1/2” x 43 1/2” 

Signed: “Faulkner” right middle 

the stars keep drinking our blood 

and we give it back 

the homeless do have a place 

to go at last 


65 



66

Notes on References 

For the biographical sketch, three primary collections of Faulkner materials were consulted. 

UT Archives. 

The set of materials “Henry Faulkner Papers” including Faulkner poems, 

correspondence, and documents, as well as interviews and press clippings, was collected by Charles 

House and donated to the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Special Collections. 

Settle Papers. This private collection of Henry Faulkner papers dating from 1964-1974, 

including legal and personal papers, gallery transactions, and memorabilia, was compiled by 

Greene Settle, Faulkner’s close friend and longtime adviser and art agent, and included along with 

the artwork in the Greene A. Settle Jr. Faulkner Collection. 

Faulkner-Morgan Pagan Babies Archive. 

The Faulkner-Morgan Pagan Babies Archive, 

including Faulkner art, photographs, and writings among its collection of items and interviews 

related to LGBTQ life in Kentucky, was mainly collected by Robert Morgan, with new materials 

being added by Morgan and Dr. Jonathan Coleman. 

House. 

Two key books provided information about Faulkner’s life and career. 

Much of the chronology of Henry Faulkner’s life presented here follows the account 

given in The Outrageous Life of Henry Faulkner: Portrait of an Appalachian Artist by Charles House. 

Many details of key events included here either correlate with House’s descriptions, or are drawn 

directly from House’s research. 

Phelps. 

Additional details about Faulkner’s visits to Taormina, Sicily, are taken from A House 

in Sicily, the memoir of Daphne Phelps, proprietress of the villa where Faulkner spent long stays. 

Her visit to Lexington, Kentucky, is also recorded there. 

Many artwork titles, and in particular those described as cataloged, refer to those recorded in the 

catalog of the Greene A. Settle Jr. Faulkner Collection. 

Poems included here are taken from “Henry Faulkner Papers” (UT Archives) unless otherwise 

indicated in the index. Misspellings in retyped poems, as well as some artwork titles, have been 

edited, though some idiosyncrasies of Faulkner’s style have been preserved. 

The primary personal recollections about Faulkner’s life were collected for this book from Clifton 

Anderson, Ann Bevins, Marie Cosindas, John S. Hockensmith, Pattie Hood, Robert Morgan, Dr. 

Maury Offutt, Paul Olsen, Jr., and Howard Settle. 

67 


Endnotes 

These endnotes reference the source of specific material included in the text, and correspond to 

entries in the bibliography below. “UT Archives” indicates material consulted from the Special 

Collection “Henry Faulkner Papers”; “Settle Papers” indicates material consulted from the Greene 

A. Settle Jr. Faulkner Collection. 

1 House, pg. 48 

2 journals, UT Archives 

3 journal, UT Archives 


5 journal, UT Archives 

6 House, pg. 139, 306 




10 Cosindas, plate 52 

11 document, UT Archives 

12 clipping, Settle Papers 



15 House, pg. 210 

16 House, pg. 211 

17 article, Settle Papers 

18 Phelps, pg. 223 



21 Phelps. pg. 241-242 

22 catalog, Settle Papers 

23 poster, Settle Papers 

24 House, pg. 275 

25 Phelps, pg. 245-246 

26 letter, UT Archives 

Selected Bibliography 

Cosindas, Marie. Marie Cosindas: Color Photographs. Boston: Little Brown & Company, 1978. 

The Faulkner-Morgan Pagan Babies Archive. Private Archive. Lexington, KY. 

Greene A. Settle Jr. Faulkner Collection. Private Collection. Lexington, KY. 

Henry Faulkner Papers, MS. 1398. University of Tennessee Libraries, Knoxville, Special 

Collections. Knoxville, TN. 

Hornsby, Henry. Lonesome Valley. New York: William Sloane Associates, 1949. 

House, Charles. The Outrageous Life of Henry Faulkner: Portrait of an Appalachian Artist. 

Knoxville, TN: University of Tennessee Press, 1988. 

Leavitt, Richard F. The World of Tennessee Williams. New York: Putnam, 1978. 

Messineo, Gaetano, and Emanuela Borgia. Ancient Sicily: Monuments Past & Present. Rome: 

Vision, 2005. 

Phelps, Daphne. A House in Sicily. New York: Carroll & Graf, 1999. 

. 


68

Index of Artwork 

14 Karat 266 

A Garden for Tennessee Williams 202 

Aesthetic Mind – Soul of a Violin 214 

Alice Cherubs and Roses 358 

Alice Hi on Butterfly 300 

Alice in Venice 312 

Alice on Top of the World 354 

Amalfi 200 

Angel over Frankfort 352 

Artist Home at Martha’s Vineyard 288 

Backyard, Washington, D.C. 26 

Birds at Fountain 178 

Birds of Nationality 270 

Black Rastas My First Baby 304 

Black Rastas with Birds 204 

Blessing of the Fishes 350 

Blessing of the Horse at the Palio di Siena 142 

Blue Blast 239 

Blue Dresser in Street 198 

Blue Mannequin in the Street 132 

Bluegrass 170 

Bluegrass Farm 80 

Bounty of the Sea 278 

Boy and his Pet 126 

Boy in Blue Jeans 38 

Bunker Hill, Los Angeles 1956 58 

Bunker Hill – Cityscape 60 

Butterfly 322 

Canary Alley 314 

Capricorn 330 

Casa Cuseni 105 

Cat and his Pet 136 

Cat, Canary, and Piano 334 

Catania Elephant 228 

Cave Hill 340 

Central Park 68 

Chinese Girl with Musical Instrument 104 

Christmas at Rose Hill 296 

Christmas Scene 130 

Clay County Barn 48 

Clay County Girl with Bird 109 

Coal Cars, Kentucky Mountain 30 

Colored Town Lexington 32 

Day and Night 120 

Delphiniums 54 

Divided Cityscape – Portugal 172 

Doctor at St. Elizabeths Hospital 14 

Ecce Homo 242 

Farm and Church Snow Scene 282 

Floral – with Double Signature 318 

Floral: Violets in Blue Bottle 168 

Floral Bouquet on Green 328 

Floral in Black and Blue Vase 212 

Floral in Eagle Vase 156 

Floral in Fish Vase 206 

Floral in Rose Vase 124 

Floral on a Chair 336 

Floral on Table 272 

Flower Vendor 192 

Flowers for Life – Soul of a Chair 188 

Fucatzzi 268 

Ghosts 52 

Goats in Sicilian Mountains 254 

Green Couple/Lovers 76 

Gribbin’s Gallery 316 

Group Meeting H. H. 13 

Harlequin 82 

Harlequin, Sicilian 152 

Henry’s Palette 17 

Hollywood Hills 66 

Hollywood Hills 1953 40 

Horses After Miro/Chagall 182 

Horses in the Pastures 146 

House in Nicholasville 320 

House of Sin – Key West 306 

House with Clothesline in Front 28 

Hunt-Morgan House 258 

I Sleep in the Book of Roses 360 

Icon – Scholar 162 

Iroquois Hunt Club 222 

Jeromino 286 

Jerusalem 247 

Jesus Walking on Water 324 

Jonah and the Whale 326 

Key West House 302 

Kites of Spring (chapter intro art) 9 

Kitten and Canary 310 

69 


Know Your Self (chapter intro art) 3 

Know Your Self 42 

Lady at Table with Flowers 44 

Landscape – Country 56 

Leaning Tower 216 

Leaning Tower of Pisa 164 

Lemon & Pitcher 332 

Lemon Festival 256 

Lemon, Tea, and Cigar Box 294 

Lime & High – Jefferson Davis Inn 160 

Lion 292 

Love Vine in Venice 290 

Madonna and Child (study) 345 

Madonna and Child 346 

Mendelssohn – Bette Davis 128 

Midnight Blue Cityscape 84 

Midway 194 

Midway House 62 

Mockingbird 186 

My Soul is a Blue Lion 154 

New Orleans 70 

New Orleans 1956 72 

New Orleans Cemetery 106 

New Orleans Street (chapter intro art) 230 

New Orleans Woman 134 

New York Shop Window 92 

Noah’s Ark 190 

Nocturne in Blue 342 

Nude Fantasy Dancers (chapter intro art) 94 

Off Limit 220 

Parisian Street 208 

Park Scene 226 

Pasadena Landscape 50 

Peggy Guggenheim Garden 101 

Pitcher and Flowered Blue Plates 338 

Praying Angel 140 

Price 24 

Red Light District 46 

Religious Icon 78 

Runnymede 158 

Sailor Boys 88 

Saint – Icon 344 

Scout 15 

Self Portrait 19 

Sicilian Goat 12 

Sicilian Youth – Boy with Lemons 348 

Sinorina de Neptune 280 

Sketch from St. Elizabeths Hospital 13 

Small Iroquois Club Horseman 174 

Small Snow Scene 276 

South of Rome 196 

Spires and Crosses 34 

Spring Kite 90 

Springtime in Venice 176 

St Francis Feeding the Birds 104 

Strawberries 138 

Strawberries in Alice’s Cup 218 

Strawberries on Flowered Plate 308 

Tall Four Story Building 86 

Tall Narrow Building – Gables 64 

Taormina – Italian Street Scene with Stairways 298 

Taormina – Sicily 264 

Taormina Archway to City 103 

Taormina Houses and Garden 150 

Taormina Street Scene 245 

Taormina Terraces 361-362 

Taormina Tower 184 

Terraces in Taormina 210 

The Blue Hairdo 224 

The Greatest Show on Earth 262 

The Peaceable Kingdom 284 

The Wine Tasters 18 

Three in a Boat 260 

Three Musicians by the Ionian Sea 113 

Tiered Houses 74 

Times Square 12 

Two Lemons and a Cup 16 

Two Musicians 122 

Two Winged Friends 274 

Vase on Chair 148 

Venetian Canal Scene 180 

Vizcaya Quintet 356 

White Birds 36 

Winner of the Palio at Siena 144 

Wounded Dove 22 

Yellow Roses 166 


70

Index of Selected Writings 

An April Thunder 39 

Answer 125 

Apple Trees 171 

Cool Christmas Snows 281 

Crucify (House, pg. 244) 347 

Death and life is the algebra (House, pg. 295) 357 

Elegy 17 

For the roses of sleep 359 

Forgotten Man 23 

From the clock tower 183 

From Venus unto brightness 209 

Frost 35 

Green are the eyes of God 65 

He took the very thunder 189 

I asked the winds 163 

I came to California 20 

I have just painted a portrait 37 

I miss you 4 

I shine . . . 231 

I’ll see your smile 283 

In a valley where the patchwork abstractions 33 

It is a gift . . . 10 

It's where the butterflies 117 

Knowledge in our teeth’s hard bit 45 

Love winds & wild flowers 47 

My art and poetry 229 

O my Soul 93 

Of Time and Houses 313 

Oh Happiness ! ! 95 

Old buildings 85 

Old Lady 133 

Play gently god 139 

Plough up my strong white bones 51 

Poems and Selected Writings (journal cover) 21 

Poem for Tennessee Williams 201 

Poetry is the Bread of Children 81 

Praising Leaves 149 

Pre Dawn 83 

Rain Storm 259 

Spring Wine 327 

The big glad rains of April come 315 

The blue-eyed summer children 297 

The book of thunder (House, pg. 293) 251 

The cypress trees 121 

The green day flushes its roses (House, pg. 290) 165 

The purple thunders of the spring 59 

The Taste of Color 293 

The train comes snorting in 29 

These I love 87 

Thunderheads 55 

To define it – is to weep 329 

To open that other book — 353 

Translating blackbirds 63 

Wait to tell 305 

Walnut Leaves 221 

When God picks purple grapes 249 

When in your young and drinking youth 75 

Who is the blue-eyed (House, pg. 253) 191 

Wicks of April 79 

Young Girls 43 

“To all those who love / and those who weep / and to the lost who / seek a poet’s wings” Faulkner 1949 

71 

Faulkner’s writings were seldom published and his original texts are scattered and have never been systematically curated. Many of his 

poems were spontaneous recitations at art openings. So the available texts do not provide a comprehensive account of his talents as a 

writer and a poet. The poems and journal entries included here are offered to help the reader gain a sense of Faulkner’s personality and 

perspective on life. The artist followed his muse, where both his poetry and his painting were his art, truly seeking a “poet’s wings.” 


Index of Text 

A 

A Sense of Wonder, exhibit 112 

ACA Galleries, New York 16, 99 

Adams, Ansel 107, 247 

Alice, goat 98, 103-105, 107, 

109-111, 115-116, 217, 299 

American Art, style 1, 15 

“American Chagall” 15 

American Consulate, Venice 103, 106 

Anderson, Clifton “Andy” i, 111, 363 

Arlington Avenue, Lexington 103, 113, 116, 236 

Art Academy of Cincinnati 16 

Art News 98 

Artists Associates Gallery, Atlanta 135 

Arts Magazine 115 

Atlanta, Georgia 99, 110 

Aversa, Piero 99 

B 

Ball, Gordon R. 235 

Bar Complex, Lexington 238 

Barker, James Hunt 236-237 

Barlow, Jarvis Walter 14 

Barlow, Margaret Montgomery 14, 248 

Beat, style 11 

“Beetles,” Faulkner's friend 13-14 

Benoit, Rigaud 99 

Benson, Mary 98-99, 116 

Benton, Thomas Hart 15 

Berea College 11-12 

Beuys, Joseph 110 

Bevins, Ann i, 241, 363 

Black Rastas, cat 103, 203, 233, 236 

Black Sister, cat 233, 235 

Blackwell, Delores 112 

Blue Grass Trust for Historic Preservation 111-112 

Blum, Gary & Cindy 241 

Brando, Marlon 99 

Breathitt County, Kentucky 5 

Brecht, Bertolt 97 

Brecht, Mary 97 

Brecht, Stefan 97 

Broadus, Marian “Mike” 114 -116, 235 

Brown, John Y. 339 

Brown, Phyllis George 245-246, 339 

Browns Mill Road 240 

Bulman, Orville 99 

Burr Gallery, New York 16, 98 

Burroughs, William S. 11 

Byzantine, style 104, 108 

C 

California School, style 14 -15 

Canavest House, Toronto 235 

Capt. Tony’s Saloon 105, 112, 233, 237, 246 

Caravan Gallery, New York 16, 99 

Casa Cuseni i, 101-103, 233, 235-236, 247 

Catania, Sicily 102, 227 

Cézanne, Paul 108 

Chagall, Marc 15, 108, 116 

Chestnut Ward, St. Elizabeths 13 

Cincinnati, Ohio 15, 100, 102-103, 105, 109, 111, 265 

Cincinnati Enquirer, The 104 

Clare’s, Key West 246 

Clay County, Kentucky 5-6, 8, 47, 111, 243 

Clay Family, Runnymede Farm i, 157 

Clendenin, J. Gregg 240, 243, 248, 250 

Closson’s, Cincinnati 102-105, 109, 113, 236 

Coconut Grove, Florida 97 

Coleman, Dr. Jonathan i, 363 

Collectors of American Art 16, 98-99, 116 

Coral Gables, Florida 97, 100 

Corcoran Gallery of Art 12 

Correll, Jess & Angela 

i, iii 

Corso Umberto, Taormina 101-102, 233-234 

Cosindas, Marie i, 2, 107, 110-112, 363 

Costanzo, C.J. & Grace 111 

Crawford, Joan 261 

Cubism, style 15-16 

Cummings, E. E. 13 

Curry, John Steuart 15 

D 

Dahl, Roald 102 

“David,” Faulkner’s friend 8 

David, Terry Costanzo i, 111 


Davis, Bette 99 

de Kooning, Willem 15 

DeLamar, Alice 98-102, 104, 116, 237 

Diftler Gallery, Coral Gables 97 

Dine, Jim 110 

Doctors Park, Lexington 238 

Downey, David & Roseann 

i, iii 

Dufy, Raoul 16, 108 

E 

Egypt, Kentucky 5, 55, 97, 103, 243 

Eight Florida Artists, exhibit 103, 106 

Eliot, T.S. 13 

Ernest Hemingway Home 241-242 

Esquire, cat 233 

European, style; Euro Art 1, 15-16, 18, 98 

108, 248 

F 

Falling Timber (Branch) 5-8, 11, 14-16, 97 

99-100, 111, 236 

Farmers’ Market, Lexington 238 

Faulkner, Bessie Lee Pursley (mother) 5 

Faulkner, Dite (half brother) 11 

Faulkner, Harvey (brother) 7 

Faulkner, Henry Lawrence i-370 

Faulkner, Ida (sister-in-law) 7 

Faulkner, John (brother) 248 

Faulkner, John Milton (father) 5 

Faulkner, Lois (sister) 7, 8, 11, 13, 14, 105 

Faulkner, Pet (sister) 13 

Faulkner, William 115 

Faulkner-Morgan Pagan Babies Archive 345, 363 

Fauvist, style 15 

Fellini, Federico 108 

Fine Art Editions, Georgetown, Kentucky i 

First Southern National Bank 

i, iii, iv 

Florence, Italy 103 

For colored girls, play 246 

Foreign University, Perugia, Italy 233 

Fountain of Rome 115 

Frame House of Georgetown 244 

Frankfort, Kentucky 108, 244 

Friday, Nancy 246 

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73

The Gift of Color: Henry Faulkner - Limited Edition

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