What makes a good story?
Like many small, Southern communities, church meetings and Bible studies were integral to life in Carroll Cloar’s childhood home of Wynne, Arkansas.
The Draught of Fishes is a clear, albeit uniquely Southern, interpretation of the miraculous catch by the disciples of Jesus on the Sea of Galilee as told in the Gospel of Luke.
In Cloar’s interpretation, we see a lone, young fisherman in overalls, his nets still partially in the water.
The banks are scattered with his recent catch: crawfish, catfish, bass, trout, and even a turtle.
Cloar’s The Draught of Fishes brings us to the Arkansas shores of the Mississippi River as he blends sermon into memory.
Using elements from Grant Wood, Edward Hopper, and Henri Rousseau, Cloar’s work was described as realist, folky surrealist, or real-surreal.
However, Cloar was more often tied to magical realism because of his use of symbols and allegory to portray the mysteriousness of everyday life.
However, Cloar avoided the label of “magical realist” rather choosing to describe his work, more thematically as, “American faces, timeless dress and timeless customs... the last of old America that isn’t long for this earth.”
Yet, Cloar’s style, which was consistent throughout his career, pays homage to these influences as well as Pointillism of the Post-Impressionists.
These characteristics can be seen within The Draught of Fishes — a landscape of saturated yellow-greens, a flat figure immersed in a variety of textures with stylized and decorative patterning.
Cloar also drew inspiration from Southern Gothic authors such as Eudora Welty and William Faulkner — both authors shaped by place.
“Southerners love a good tale,” Eudora Welty once said. “They are born reciters, great memory retainers, diary keepers, letter exchangers [and] great talkers.”
Called a painter of memory, Cloar was a storyteller, weaving together his life, myth, and place.
