Metro Pulse/Artbeat/Serpent Handlers and Other Saints

Comment
on this story

What:
Serpent Handlers and Other Saints

Where:
Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church, 2931 Kingston Pike (call 523-4176 for hours)

When:
Through May 3rd

One artist's vehicle for transformation

by Heather Joyner

It's difficult to review Knoxville artist Gary Monroe's new show at the Unitarian Church without getting carried away by his subject matter. Then again, Monroe himself is pretty far gone when it comes to obsessing over snake handling as imagery. This ain't Reverend Horton Heat's wiggle stick we're talking about, either. It's bona fide serpents come to life on paper, hard-core East Tennessee lore as potent as moonshine. It's the stuff of our lives, and inspiration for Monroe as he produces spectacular large-scale drawings.

For Monroe, the drawings are "[a reconnection] with my regionalist roots and [participation] in the tradition of the Southern narrative." He says that putting an established religious art spin on snake handling has reinvigorated his work, and that he's arrived at a sort of "hybrid of a Renaissance drawing and a Tex Avery cartoon." Or call it Albrecht Dürer meets Thomas Hart Benton and Robert Crumb. Whatever our take, Monroe has us spellbound.

As amusing as Monroe's characterization of his art is, it borders on coy—for he is doing far more than slapping modern sensibilities onto a Renaissance framework. He has found in the Pentecostal quest for ecstasy an original and powerful metaphor for the artist's desire to transcend him/herself. Humor has its place in Monroe's oeuvre, but so does contradiction and complexity.

When Monroe calls snake handlers "his spiritual kin" and includes their activities in the exploration of his "regionalist roots," he's right on target. Born in Alabama and educated in Kentucky, the artist can indeed claim that intriguing practice as part of his heritage. In fact, it was East Tennessean "Little George" Hensley who acknowledged himself in 1910 to be the first 20th century handler of serpents in response to biblical directives.

An illiterate preacher in Cleveland, Tenn., Hensley dumped a box of rattlers on the floor during one sermon, and the rest is history. He was later ordained into the Church of God (whereas now the Church of God with Signs Following and approximately 2,500 Pentecostals are most associated with snake handling) and traveled throughout this area, encouraging fellow zealots to take up serpents in the name of Jesus. According to ChristianityToday.com, Hensley neglected his wife and family when away, and at one point, an enraged neighbor attacked him with a knife and beat him to a pulp. Hensley thereafter resigned his ministry and was eventually convicted for making and selling moonshine. He escaped to Ohio, then Kentucky, with various other wives in tow (there were 4 in all).

By 1928, snake handling was limited to a handful of hillbilly churches until its revival in the 1940s. That decade saw the banning of the practice in Tennessee, and Hensley was arrested in Chattanooga in 1948. He died as the result of a snakebite seven years later, too soon to witness another snake handling boom in the 1970s (prompting the ban's reaffirmation by the Tennessee State Supreme Court). Drawings like Monroe's "The Anointing of Saint George" center on Hensley, but references to Jackson Pollock and others can be found in separate pieces—all dizzying despite their realistic perspective. Yet "Saint George" seems a departure of sorts, with a dot pattern dominating part of the image and the addition of lines connecting Christ and angels to the hands and feet of a struggling Hensley, serpents lapping at his stigmatic wounds.

Mark 16:17-18, purportedly Jesus' last words on earth, reads: "And these signs shall follow them that believe: in my name they shall cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues; they shall take up serpents and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick and they shall recover."

Luke 10:19 says: "Behold, I give unto you the power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over the power of the enemy; and nothing by any means shall hurt you."

Fundamentalists claim their literal interpretation of the above passages is not a matter of testing their faith or testing God. Instead, an "anointed" individual benefits from divine intervention when placing him/herself in harm's way (if someone bites the dust occasionally, it's presumably chalked up to getting a busy signal when the Lord is called upon).

As misunderstood and derided as that notion is, it's not outrageous within the history of religion. Furthermore, snake handling is supposedly protected by the Constitution's First Amendment: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." Thus, no matter how misguided one finds snake handlers, they reflect the all-American love of, and right to, personal freedom.

As far as art is concerned, "divine intervention" can mean interacting with one's muse, being in touch with one's inner child, running with the wolves or what have you. Such transcendence of the self, however fraught with peril, is considered essential to creative expression. Laws regarding safety may not be an issue, but self-imposed limitations are.

Says Monroe, "In several of these drawings, the great narratives where serpents played a role served as my primary inspirations (i.e., Adam and Eve's Fall From Grace, The Laocoön Group, [etc.]). Other inspiration came from the depiction of saints where anointment, ecstasy, or the stigmata was the theme. The serpent handlers of Appalachia refer to themselves as saints, and I [want] to make that visual reference." Does he ever. I can only fault Monroe for going overboard with folds of fabric and so-so rendering of human musculature in certain instances.

With the exception of "The Miracle of the Triplets," he achieves incredible crispness and avoids overworking his intensely complicated subject matter. Snakes in "Arthur Reaches Into the Deep Light" may resemble a drawer full of writhing argyle socks, but Monroe's serpents are generally real-looking, and frightening as all get-out. Thrown in amidst the sign followers—signs including speaking in tongues and healing rituals as well as snake handling—these serpents represent more than a vehicle for those who obey God's rather than man's laws. In Monroe's hands, they symbolize the artist's sanctification through art. And that's a remarkable thing.