Henry Lawrence Faulkner (American, 1924 to 1981)
Henry Lawrence Faulkner was born in Falling Timber, near Egypt, Kentucky. His flamboyant lifestyle carried him from a traumatic childhood in rural Kentucky through a bohemian existence in New York, Los Angeles, Key West and Sicily. His most pronounced traits–artistry, poetry, reverence for nature, love for animals, his restlessness and disdain for social convention, shaped him from early life. Faulkner was the eccentric rebel who brought his bourbon-drinking goat Alice to parties and exhibitions of his paintings (it was said she could sniff out Kentucky bourbon from across a room). Apart from the obvious striving for attention, his bizarre behavior was the natural expression of an unceasing and unblushing childlike wonder at the world around him, and of an unusual sensitivity to beauty.
Information obtained from: Charles House, The Outrageous Life of Henry Faulkner: Portrait of an Appalachian Artist (Knoxville, TN: University of Tennessee Press, 1988).
Courtesy of Cowan’s Auctions, May 2011 Spring & Decorative Arts Catalog