Oral history interview with Troy Anderson

Little Thunder: This is Julie Pearson-Little Thunder. Today is October 19, 2011, and I'm here with Troy Anderson at his studio in Siloam Springs, Arkansas. Troy, you've been active on the Indian art scene for a long time. It's hard to find an Indian art collector who does not have some of your work. You started off as a painter but later branched out into sculpture, and you've won numerous awards in both media. Thank you for taking the time to talk with me.

Anderson: Thank you.

Little Thunder: Where were you born, and where did you grow up?

Anderson: I was born in Siloam Springs, Arkansas, and my folks lived in Delaware County of Oklahoma when I was born, so I grew up, basically, in Delaware County of Oklahoma pretty much all my life. I think I lived in Arkansas about four months of my first eighteen years of my life. (Laughs)

Little Thunder: Any brothers or sisters?

Anderson: Yes. I had two brothers and a sister. Actually, my mom--we had two other sisters that had died within a few months of their birth.

Little Thunder: What did your folks do for a living?

Anderson: My dad was pretty much a jack of all trades. He rodeoed, he farmed, he blacksmithed. He farrowed, shoed horses, ran a backhoe, did cement work. He worked for the city of Watts for a while in the water department, so he just kind of did whatever he wanted to. (Laughter)

Little Thunder: Just to help support the family. Your Cherokee is on your dad's side, and it's Old Settler. Am I right?

Anderson: Basically Old Settlers. My first experience, I guess, with my ancestors was they came to northwest Arkansas in 1832, and then I later found them in Alabama. Then they moved to Arkansas again, then to Missouri, and then to Indian Territory.

Little Thunder: Was anybody in your family or extended family gifted artistically?

Anderson: Actually my grandmother took up oil painting when she was probably in her seventies.

Little Thunder: Is that a real memory for you?

Anderson: A memory for me because most of my family had played music. I'm always jealous of my brother. He plays guitar. He just picks it up and starts playing it, so does my mom. I can't even--

Little Thunder: Were you drawing at a young age or interested in art?

Anderson: Yes. I always remember drawing. The first time I really became aware of it was in the third grade. We were in a two-room school house. Late in the afternoon there wasn't much to do, so they'd give us pencil and paper and say, "Draw something." I was drawing, and a teacher came up behind me and 4:00complimented me on how good a job I was doing, so I took that and ran with it. (Laughter)

Little Thunder: What about junior high or middle school? Did you have art classes at all?

Anderson: Actually, I didn't take any art. It wasn't even in my mind, I don't think. I remember, about my junior-senior year, after football practice and track was all over, somebody had bought me a, I think it was, pastel set. I started doing some pastels, and that's kind of how I got--then I got a scholarship to Connors State College and, of course, they say, "You're going to 5:00major in--" and I put down art. (Laughs)

Little Thunder: Was it a football scholarship, or was it an athletic scholarship?

Anderson: It was a football scholarship. That was my first experience with art classes, was in college.

Little Thunder: Who got the pastel set for you? Was it a family member?

Anderson: It was a girlfriend's mother. I think it was to keep me busy. (Laughs)

Little Thunder: How did your folks feel about you declaring an art major?

Anderson: Well, my dad was probably--thinking that your son is going to grow up to be an artist was kind of a shock. It was always interesting. He was like, 6:00"What are you going to do with that?" But then after I became fairly known for my art, people would come up to him and say, "Are you Troy Anderson, the artist?" and he would say, "Yes." (Laughs)

Little Thunder: Happy to take the credit.

Anderson: I learned later that he would actually try to draw a little bit. Later on, I think he was a little proud, maybe.

Little Thunder: And he was a Senior, wasn't he? Was he Troy, Sr.?

Anderson: Yes, yes.

Little Thunder: So you're an art major in college. What kinds of things did you learn that were useful to you later on?

Anderson: Well, being a child of the late '60s and early '70s in our art school, 7:00most of it was collage. Looking back, I learned a lot about composition, balance. I think when I look at my work now, it's kind of a collage. I think that helped me in some ways. I remember my first figure drawing class. About a month into it, I thought, "I have got to get out of this class." They said, "No, you have to hang in there and work your way through it." I thought, "When I get out of this class, I am never going to do a human figure again." So what do I do now?

Little Thunder: All the time? (Laughs)

Anderson: All the time.

Little Thunder: When you say you think your paintings are collages, in a way, can you explain that a bit more?

Anderson: It takes different ideas and different materials and kind of intertwines, even, thoughts and ideas. Sometimes artists, we have a preconceived idea of what we're going to do. I find that when I start, I may start out with one idea, and then you intertwine something into that, and something else happens over here, and something else there. Before you know it, it's kind of like a stew. You start out with the potato soup, and it winds up everything's in 9:00the pot. (Laughs)

Little Thunder: What was your first experience with Indian art? When did you see your first Indian painting?

Anderson: When I was in college, my freshman year at Connors State, we went to Five Tribes Museum on a field trip and saw works of Jerome Tiger and Fred Beaver and Willard Stone. It was just, somebody turned the light on. One of my favorite people, of course, is Willard. He was always a delight, and I always loved the way he could take a block of wood and make something beautiful out of it.

Little Thunder: Did you have much interaction with him at shows and things?

Anderson: Oh yes. Yes. He was very giving. I find that all the artists at that particular time were very giving of their talents. I had the pleasure of going to Fred Beaver's house and seeing his studio and going through it. He was just gracious, and he'd share anything with you. The same with Willard. Solomon McCombs was the same way. All the artists, (at that time I would call them old timers) they were very giving of their talents.

Little Thunder: So you went to the Five Tribes Museum while you were in college. Did you enter any Indian art shows, or did that come later?

Anderson: That came much, much later. As a matter of fact, it was probably ten years later.

Little Thunder: Did you, in college, start exploring some Indian subject matter, or not yet?

Anderson: No, no. The college experience was figure drawing, still lives, just that old boring stuff, perspective, all the elementary details of art, but you need that. You need that.

Little Thunder: After college, what happened?

Anderson: When I got out of college, I decided I was going to be a teacher/coach.

Little Thunder: Art teacher-slash-coach.

Anderson: Yes.

Little Thunder: That's a great combination.

Anderson: Great combination. It made it pretty easy to get a job because most coaches are math or history or social studies. You get a staff of eight or ten coaches and all of them are teaching history, it makes it pretty thin, so as an art teacher it made it much easier to find a place, a niche. I did that for three years.

Little Thunder: In which school system?

Anderson: My first year was in Liberal, Kansas, and then I went to a place called Kermit, Texas, which is around Midland, Odessa area. As I did that, I 13:00would spend a lot of my spare time doing art. After three years of coaching and dealing with parents, I'd moved twice in three years and was getting ready to move again. I thought, "This is not stable enough for me," so I decided I would move back to Siloam Springs and try to make it in the art field. When I got back here, first thing, a coach comes up and says, "Would you like a job?" (Laughter) I said, "No. Been there. Don't want to do that."

Little Thunder: Did you have a family yet or not?

Anderson: No.

Little Thunder: But you did end up working part time at Allen Canning Company. 14:00Is that right?

Anderson: Yes, I worked for Allen Canning for eight years.

Little Thunder: What did you do for them?

Anderson: I was in traffic control.

Little Thunder: You were also painting on the side?

Anderson: I was painting on the side, doing arts and crafts shows, mall shows, anywhere I could go.

Little Thunder: And doing Indian art for some of the mall shows?

Anderson: Yes.

Little Thunder: So what were those shows like? Were people interested? Are we talking early '70s, then?

Anderson: We're talking, yes, early '70s. Of course, in that, I would do some western stuff, too. Because my dad being in the rodeos and always being around horses, I did some western stuff. It's Indian-western type stuff. Then, being 15:00from west Texas, I did a few windmills.

Little Thunder: A little something for everyone, right?

Anderson: (Laughs) That's right, yes, whatever would bring in a buck. If you were in west Texas, you had to paint windmills, so I did windmills. I admit it. I confess. I did windmills.

Little Thunder: What were your works priced at, typically, at some of these shows?

Anderson: Oh, anywhere from three dollars to twenty-five dollars. (Laughter) I have people that come up to me now and say, "I bought one of your paintings back in '74. I think I gave five bucks for it." If I remember it, I give them their money back, but I haven't had any takers yet.

Little Thunder: What was one of the first galleries that you started working with, as well, besides doing the mall shows?

Anderson: I guess the first experience with galleries was in about '76. I had been taking some stuff to the Five Tribes Museum, and a lady from Phoenix, Arizona, came through, looking for artists for her gallery in Scottsdale. They sent her to my house. She said, "We want to do a show for you, one-man show, and we need x-number of pieces. Can you do that?" Of course, "Yes, I can do that." I 17:00think it was called the Sun Gallery in Scottsdale. Did a one-man show. It was a little country boy, going to Scottsdale, Arizona.

Little Thunder: How many pieces did you have?

Anderson: Oh, I think I had probably twenty-five or so.

Little Thunder: How many months to prepare?

Anderson: I actually was pretty prolific back then. Well, I was younger, so I could paint--I'd get off work at five o'clock, start painting at six thirty, seven, and go until four or five in the morning, get a couple hours sleep and go again, but I don't do that anymore.

Little Thunder: What was that like? Basically, your first gallery show was a 18:00one-man show.

Anderson: Well, I didn't think much--thinking back on it, when you're a young kid, you don't think about how not many people get to do that. I sold more artwork and made more money at that show than I made working at Allen's for six months. I thought "Hey, this is the way to go."

Little Thunder: How about Indian Paintbrush Gallery? I know you had a pretty close relationship eventually with the Van Pouckes, who were collectors, started out as collectors and later opened that gallery. Was that important to your career?

Anderson: Moose and Nancy basically sponsored me during that period from Allen's 19:00until I was able to make it in the art world. They supplemented, actually, my income.

Little Thunder: Once you quit Allen, which was how many years after you started?

Anderson: I'm going to say probably two or three years, which was a big help because in the art business, some days are diamonds and some days are gravel. I was very fortunate in having them as backers and supporters. Even their interest 20:00in my work went over to some of their friends, so it was very helpful in my career at that time.

Little Thunder: So they were essentially buying art, a certain amount of art, per month?

Anderson: Yes, and the gallery, she started that quite a bit after that. You'd think, well, she had all this artwork that she needed to sell, but that wasn't the case. She just loved art and wanted to open a gallery. Basically, she bought artwork from artists and put it in her gallery. I don't know that she did a lot 21:00of consignment. That's how supportive she was of the artists. She would buy. Of course, she bought at wholesale prices, yet she didn't have to do that. She realized the importance of the need to support the arts. She, actually, I think, helped a lot of artists when they needed it.

Little Thunder: Did you experiment with flat style at all, "traditional style," when you started painting Indian subject matter?

Anderson: Yes. Of course, when you see Fred Beaver and you see Solomon McCombs, 22:00the master artists at that particular time, Terri Saul, it's flat. That's what Indian art was. What I tried to do was, I kept it flat but I tried to take it to another level. Like with a face, you have one facial tone, and what I wanted to do was to break up the tones of the face. I would have three tones or four tones, so that you got a little more 3-D effect. That's how I handled my work was trying to get more dimensional but not blended but flat.

Little Thunder: Were you pairing portraits with bird or animal imagery yet?

Anderson: You have to do that with Native art. The legends, the stories, animals are involved. One of the things I think I tried to do was involve animals and nature more into the Native...

Little Thunder: With elements of landscape, trees, or--

Anderson: Yes.

Little Thunder: What was the first award you remember winning?

Anderson: Probably First [Place] at the Five Tribes competitive show. I think in 24:00my early years, one of the shows we did was the Heard Museum. I think you were able to enter two or three pieces, and they sold. We actually went to the opening. I don't know whether I was just young and naive, but looking back on it, it's--I don't know if they still do that kind of show anymore. I know we went to Denver once. It was an all-Native show. It was a big deal.

Little Thunder: Big receptions.

Anderson: Big receptions. Name people were there. For a young kid from the 25:00sticks, it was pretty exciting.

Little Thunder: Exciting experience. Did you do pretty well at the Heard? Did you win any awards at the Heard?

Anderson: Yes. Won First. That's always exciting.

Little Thunder: Did you get any business tips from some of the older artists?

Anderson: No, we didn't really talk about business. It was more about, maybe, techniques or how they saw things. Willard, we were in his studio. He had this 26:00pile of wood outside of his studio. I thought, "Why do you got it stacked out there? Why don't you have it put away in a safe place?" He says, "Well, every day I walk by that piece of wood, and one of these days it's going to speak to me, and I'm going to bring it in." He always told me, "It's in there, and all I've got to do is carve away what's not part of the image that's in there." He says, "Until it speaks to me, it stays outside." (Laughter) After I thought about that, I thought, "Well, if you had to sit outside all day, you'd 27:00eventually want to say something." (Laughter) It makes sense.

Little Thunder: Would you visit him when you were on route someplace else?

Anderson: Yes. Of course, I knew Jason. You go and do shows. As well known as Willard was and as popular as he was, it wasn't uncommon to find him at Grove under a tree with a tent, or in a small gallery with three or four pieces, maybe ten-thousand-dollar piece, sitting in a little gift shop. (Laughs)

Little Thunder: Wow, just visiting, in a gift shop?

Anderson: Yes.

Little Thunder: How about the Indian art landscape in the '80s? How did it change from the '70s to the '80s?

Anderson: Well, during the late '70s and early '80s it became very popular. I think like with anything that becomes popular and there's money in it, people want to get--it's like the Gold Rush. Nobody cared anything about California or Arizona or Nevada until the gold and silver was there, and then everybody went 29:00there. I never thought about it until now, but it's probably true that the ones that discovered it made a little money, and the ones that came in later didn't make it. You know what I'm saying? It was all panned out, so to speak. (Laughter) I don't know. It was an interesting time. It was an exciting time. I always thought that it would come back, but I'm not so sure now. I'm not so sure.

Little Thunder: Did you do the Philbrook Annual at all?

Anderson: Yes, those were exciting shows.

Little Thunder: The last year was '79, right?

Anderson: Yes.

Little Thunder: There was a lot of experimenting, stylistically, on the part of painters in the '80s. I think you sort of ventured into a more expressionistic approach, or was that later that you were doing that?

Anderson: Yes. It was probably a little later than that. When you say experimental, again, the flat style, I wandered out of that style fairly soon. And then, with a lot of the stories and legends, you can tell a story the same 31:00way all the time, or you can put a bit of a twist to it and try to make it a little more exciting. That's what I try to do with my paintings. It's like Willard. He always had a story to go along with the piece that he was working on or that he completed, and I loved this.

Sometimes the stories are more exciting than the actual piece. It's hard to believe, but you see a squirrel carved out of wood, and you think, "Well, it's a squirrel carved out of wood," but it's not really because it has more. It has a story behind it. I think the more I got into that, I wanted my paintings to be 32:00more than just a visual thing. I wanted it to have a deeper meaning. I think that's what makes Indian art. It's more than just a visual thing. It's a story.

Little Thunder: Were you drawing specifically on Cherokee stories at that time?

Anderson: No, if it was of interest to me--later on, I heard people say, "You shouldn't be doing Apache. You're not Apache." Well, I shouldn't be painting birds because I'm not a bird, and I shouldn't be painting grass because I'm not grass. That didn't make sense to me. If it's of interest and you can put a 33:00different twist to it or a different perspective, I don't see anything wrong with that.

Little Thunder: When did you begin trying your hand at sculpture?

Anderson: Well, let's see. I had always loved sculpting from a young age. Of course, when you're around Willard's work, if you don't get interested in sculpting when you're around Willard Stone, you probably never will. Just being around him, being around his work--to this day, I don't see how the man could 34:00take a block of wood and sculpt a face out of a block of wood and have the grain of the wood go where it goes.

I also believe that until you can experience what that artist has done, you shouldn't criticize or you shouldn't judge. It's the old adage: until you walked in my shoes, don't judge. I've tried stone sculpting. I've tried wood sculpting, metal. To me, the hardest would be the wood and how he could get those things. I 35:00would be using a lot of glue. Elmer's Glue would be my best friend.

Little Thunder: When you first tackled sculpture, you started immediately with bronzes. Is that right?

Anderson: Yes, pretty much.

Little Thunder: How do you think your sculptural style has changed over the years?

Anderson: I once had an artist friend tell me that I sculpt like I paint, so it's a collage, basically. When I do sculpt, a lot of times it is a lot of 36:00different elements in one piece. Again, it depends on how you want to tell the story. If the story is one-dimensional, you wind up with one-dimensional artwork. If your story is two-dimensional or three-dimensional, then you have to have that in your work, so that's what I try to do.

Little Thunder: I remember that you met your wife Gail during the '80s. She was working at a bank, kind of the opposite spectrum from art. What drew you together?

Anderson: I had just recently divorced, and she was working at a bank where I had my banking account. I had a friend that was president of the bank, and I 37:00would go and see him. I'd see her walk across the lobby. Often times, I would forget what my balance was at the bank, so I would have to call the bank to get my balance. That's pretty much how that all started.

Little Thunder: What role has she played in your art business over the years?

Anderson: Oh, it's hard to describe. She's my best friend. She's always looking out for me. She always knows what my bank account is. (Laughter) No. She 38:00just--there's nobody better. I'm very lucky to have her.

Little Thunder: And you did travel to shows together, I know, for a number of years.

Anderson: Yes, we went everywhere. We've been just everywhere you can imagine. She's been there right with me.

Little Thunder: What was one of your more memorable art show travel adventures?

Anderson: Art shows? I don't know if I should tell it or not. We were doing a show in Santa Fe, I think, and it was at Ted Miller's. We were at the hotel 39:00getting ready to go to the opening. Miranda, she was a toddler, running around. Gail always had her dressed to the nines with her curly blonde hair. I think we were even in tuxes, if I'm not mistaken. It was real fancy. We get to the show, and we're meeting and greeting and talking to people. I don't know if I should tell this or not. (Laughs) Miranda is playing around, and all of a sudden Gail goes, (gasps). I say, "What's wrong?" "I forgot to put Miranda's panties on!" 40:00(Laughter) So we have a little girl that's going around bare-bottom at the art show. (Laughter)

Little Thunder: Everybody got fully dressed but her. (Laughter) You've had a number of commissions, I saw, to design medallions, various commemorative medallions. What's one that you especially enjoyed doing and why?

Anderson: Oh, I enjoy all of them. They're all different challenges. I guess the one for the Red Earth Ambassador of the Year has probably been the most exciting because of the people it's gone to.

Little Thunder: Can you explain a bit about the award?

Anderson: Red Earth gives the Ambassador of the Year to someone that has contributed to Native American furtherance of the culture or just to bring it to the foreground. I think the first or second year, right after Dances with Wolves came out, they gave it to Kevin Costner. It's been a lot of celebrities and dignitaries that have received it, and you get to meet those people. It's pretty exciting to know they have a piece of your sculpturing. They don't have a choice. It's not like they bought it, (Laughs) but they have it.

Little Thunder: That is exciting. What's a sculpture award that you're 42:00especially proud of, a show award?

Anderson: You mean as far as an individual piece? I did a piece called The Healer. That's probably the one I'm most proud of. It's just the story. It's a collage, and it has different elements. Looking at it, you don't really--I think, visually, if you just look at it, you know that it's a piece of artwork, but when you hear the story about it, it's something totally different. The 43:00elements that are in it, most people don't even realize that it's throughout our culture.

I often ask people, "Do you know where these symbols came from?" People even that work for those particular businesses--medicine, the symbol for medicine is a pole with a snake going up it. Most people have no idea, probably a few doctors do, why that is their emblem, or EMTs. Anything that has to do with medicine has that symbol. Most people that work in those industries don't know what they're looking at. It's interesting.

Little Thunder: I hope we get to see that piece. You're one of the few artists I know who pretty much built their own house, and you built it out in the country. Why was that important for you to have a studio out here?

Anderson: Well, I first had a studio that was public. When you have a public studio, you have a lot of visitors. Those visitors don't always understand that it's work. I don't have any difficulty with working and having people watch me work, but sometimes you feel guilty, not being entertaining. Because of that, I 45:00just felt like I needed more seclusion and more inaccessibility.

Little Thunder: In 1990 the Indian Arts and Crafts Act was passed, which required Indian artists to provide proof of Indian identity or a letter of certification from their tribes. Do you remember how that impacted galleries and Indian artists at that time?

Anderson: Yes. I actually remember the first time I think I had talked to somebody about it was Ben Nighthorse Campbell, and this was before he was senator. I've known Ben for many years, done shows with him and traded with him, 46:00so he was familiar with me, and I was familiar with him. When I heard about the act, I actually called him. I asked him, I says, "What's the deal here? What is this?" He says, "You don't have a thing to worry about." If I don't have a thing to worry about, I'm not going to worry about it, so I didn't worry about it. Then all of a sudden, everything just starts because I'm not a member of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma. I have in past years been--I've done things for 47:00them without charge. I have supported them, so I saw no problem with them or any of the other tribes.

A lot of my friends at that time--sometimes I think you find out who your friends are when things are going not the way you want them to. In some ways, the Arts and Craft Act helped me in that I found out who my friends were. In 48:00some ways it hurt because I found out who my friends were and weren't. It's kind of like a double-edged sword.

During the whole thing, I always figured "I ams what I am," like Popeye the Sailor Man. I've tried to stay strong in knowing who I am and what I am. Always tried to be truthful about that aspect. I've never claimed to be somebody I'm not. What else can one do? There's been times when I've thought, "Well, just 49:00don't paint Indian anymore," but when it is what you are, you can't stop being what you are. It's like breathing air. You can't stop breathing, or you're dead. So when I'm dead, I won't be an Indian artist anymore. (Laughs)

Little Thunder: You have a website now, and I'm wondering how that's changed the marketing of some of your work or the business part of your artwork.

Anderson: I have never done much online as far as selling work, but I find it a way where people can contact me and call me. I probably could use it better than 50:00I do, but you either paint or you work on your website, so I paint.

Little Thunder: I understand your youngest daughter, Courtney, is helping you with sculpture.

Anderson: Yes. She's been a great asset as far as the last couple of years. She's been working on a project with me, and she's learned to do things in the sculpting area. One of the things that she does is she's my quality control person. When you're doing multiple pieces as an artist, we don't want to be 51:00doing the same thing all the time, so we make little alterations so that they're not all the same. When you're selling multiples, they're supposed to all be the same, so she checks me out. Sometimes I'll have something maybe turned a little bit different. She corrects it. Maybe I'll forget to put something on, leave a feather off or something. She'll say, "Hey, Dad, this one doesn't have a feather," so I have to go back and put feathers on. It's good.

Little Thunder: Is she doing some of her own sculpture?

Anderson: She's going to. She hasn't yet. I've kept her too busy. She wants to do some of her own. She's very artistic.

Little Thunder: She's getting some good training. You paint mainly with acrylics. Have you experimented with other media at all?

Anderson: Yes. I've done oil, watercolor, pastel. I love pencil. A lot of the things I've done recently have been pencil. It's one of the first arts, but it's like nobody does it anymore.

Little Thunder: Right, very challenging. How about talking about portraits, which are an important format for you. What attracts you to portraits?

Anderson: I think the character of people, the differences. No two people are 53:00the same, and yet we all have the same elements. Trying to position those has always been a challenge. It is a challenge, especially if you're doing a portrait of somebody that's known, to make that person look like the person that they're supposed to look like.

I once did an oil painting of Mr. [Earl] Allen of Allen Canning Company, an oil painting for the lobby of the bank, and it's a very traditional portrait. You're doing it for family that knows the person, so you have to get all the shadows 54:00and all the blemishes and everything just right, or it doesn't look like that person. I enjoy the eyes of people. The heart or the soul of people is seen through the eyes. That's always, to me, the challenge, is to get people to look at the eyes.

Little Thunder: You've been quoted as saying you thought Indian artists were getting away from flat-style "traditional" painting, and you felt it was kind of a shame because it is a difficult style to do. Can you explain what's difficult about it?

Anderson: I think it's time consuming. It is not like you just take a brush and 55:00go like that. You have to be very precise. You have to be very considerate of the tones of the painting. You can't have one side be light and one side be dark. It has to be flat. It's time consuming, and sometimes artists aren't willing to sit there to do that. Ben Harjo, to me, is probably about the only one that still paints traditional. When you see his work, first thing you have to ask, "Why? Why would you want to spend all that time painting little 56:00squares?" (Laughter) I think that's what young artists, when they see that, "You're taking two or three days to do something that I don't want to spend over thirty minutes doing," but yet they want to get the same money for their forty-five minutes as he gets for two or three days. It's kind of sad, but it's true.

Little Thunder: Right, it has that special effect that you can't get any other way. We talked about story being important to your work. How about the kinds of research that you do for your paintings?

Anderson: I used to do more research than I do now. Of course, you retain a lot 57:00of the stuff that you learned before, and I think talking with people you find out a lot of things. We were talking earlier about making sure that your stories are accurate and that your legends are true. I've talked to people in the Eastern Band [of Cherokee Indians] who tell stories of one way, and you come west, and it's another. So I have decided or learned that sometimes telling the 58:00story is all about your perspective.

It's like when there's a wreck. Everybody gets out of their vehicles, and everybody's got their own story of the wreck. There's only one wreck, but every person has their own version of what happened. That's the way it is in art. We can all paint, but our interpretation of the situation is all personal. Now, you have to be painting the same accident, but we all see it differently.

Little Thunder: Do you do a lot of preliminary sketching when you paint?

Anderson: Not really. Matter of fact, I usually have a concept in my head of what I'm wanting to do, but often times that evolves as I'm producing. I may start out with one idea and then change colors. Or you may add something that sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. When it doesn't, you cry a lot. You 60:00want to be the best you can be, and often times when you're making an unknown move or an attempt to do something, it's scary. You can actually ruin days of work in a moment of insanity. (Laughter) When you get there and you do it, you're like, "This was crazy to try this." (Laughter)

Little Thunder: When you're doing figurative work, whether it's in painting or sculpture, have you ever used a model?

Anderson: Yes. I did a sculpture called Tracker's Nightmare. It has to do with 61:00the Indians when they first came upon the railroad tracks. What were they thinking? It's something they've never seen before. It must've been, to their minds, "What is this? Where did it come from? What's it do?" There's so many questions. It would be like us seeing a spaceship. There's four Indians on the railroad tracks, and each one of them is in different positions and different poses.

In order to determine that proportion, because you don't want to have big Indians on little tracks and you don't want to have big tracks and little Indians, you have to get all that in the right proportions. So my wife and I, we 62:00went down to the local railroad tracks, and I posed in that position, and she would take pictures of me from different angles for all four Indians. Each of those figures I posed for, she took pictures of. We did it on the tracks so the proportions of people to tracks would be correct.

Little Thunder: I wanted to go back to this notion that you sometimes have to--Courtney's been helping you make sure that these sculptures in a series are all basically alike. When you're doing a bronze, you're working from a mold, a wax mold, right? I would think they would be all the same.

Anderson: Well, it's always your hope, but it doesn't always happen. There's a lot of factors that are involved. Sometimes it can be even the weather. If it's cold, your wax will harden faster. If it's in the summertime, it doesn't harden as fast. Sometimes the wax is not the same tolerance. It's stickier one day, and the next day it's like paraffin. There's a lot of different variations.

Sometimes you can have your two-piece mold can slip maybe a hundredth of an inch, but yet it changes the seam, so the seam's off a little bit. In order to 64:00get the piece back to where it's got to be and needs to be, you have to scrape the seam down. When you scrape that down, it alters different aspects of it. Sometimes there can be an air bubble in there, so when you pull it apart, you've got bubbles. You have to fix those, and when you fix it, it's different from the ones that didn't have bubbles.

This last project, an interesting thing happened. I do latex molds. I did the same figure with two different molds. When I'd pour wax in one mold, a different 65:00texture of wax comes out of it. I can pour the same wax in the other mold, and it's different. I don't know why, but I wish I did know why.

Little Thunder: So are you having to chose which--

Anderson: No, I use both of them, but it's just a matter of thinking, "Why is this one so much better than this one when they're done the same?"

Little Thunder: How big are your editions of sculptures, typically?

Anderson: Typically, my editions are twenty-five, but I do larger and smaller. If you ask me to go out and tell you what the edition was, I can pretty much tell you it's twenty-five.

Little Thunder: How do you divide your time between painting and sculpture these days?

Anderson: If the sculpting is selling, I'm doing sculpting. I'm kidding. No, I'm not. (Laughs) Usually, it does depend on the money end of it, but it also depends on deadlines. If I'm coming up for a competitive show and I need paintings, then I'm going to paint. If I'm coming up on a deadline to have a bronze done, then I'm going to do that. You get up in the morning, and it's like "I've got to this get this done, and I've got to get this done." Which one do you do? Some days you get up and say, "I can do this, or I can do that, and I'm 67:00not going to do either one." (Laughter)

Little Thunder: What's your creative process, starting with how you get your ideas?

Anderson: Sometimes the idea is the fascinating part because sometimes the idea is just like, you see these cartoons where the light bulb comes on, and you wonder, "How did that light bulb get there?" That's kind of how your ideas are. They just pop up. Sometimes you can read a legend or a story, and it's just, "This is what I want to do." In my younger years, you could be walking out 68:00through the woods, and you might have a bunch of Blue Jays. "Today, I'm doing Blue Jays." You did whatever nature brought before you. If it snowed, you walk out in the snow and say, "Well, I know how people on the Trail of Tears felt," so you want to express that.

Little Thunder: Looking back over your career so far, what has been an important 69:00fork in the road for you?

Anderson: I guess going full time would probably be one of the major things. Getting the age that I am, it's like retirement. I see people that I went to school with, people not in the art business but they're retiring, and you think, "Will you ever retire?" I don't think artists ever retire. They may not be as 70:00active as they were, and they may not be as prolific as they were, but I don't think artists ever retire. I think it's something that you eat, sleep, and breathe, good or bad. (Laughs)

Little Thunder: When you look back on your career, what has been one of the highlights so far?

Anderson: There's a lot of highlights. I guess just knowing that people 71:00appreciate your work because they don't have to. I often times will get phone calls from people from out of the blue. They'll say "I bought this back in '78 at Santa Fe Market, and it's hung on my wall all these years," and they just have appreciated it. It's amazing to me how you can do something that makes you 72:00happy and it makes somebody else happy.

Little Thunder: How about a low point in your career?

Anderson: Oh, boy. Probably the low point has been the Arts and Craft deal, and finding people that you thought were for you weren't for you, people you 73:00believed in. Like I said earlier, sometimes it seems like a low point, but it's all in how you look at it.

Little Thunder: Is there anything we've forgotten to talk about before we take a look at your paintings, any subjects we haven't covered?

Anderson: The one thing, looking back on my life, is how God has played a role in the different roads that I've gone down, as a little snot-nosed kid playing in the streets and then wind up standing in front of the President of the United 74:00States or people you never thought you'd even get close to but be introduced to. Having all those things happen to you and there's no rhyme or reason for that to happen except God has placed you in certain places and certain times.

I'll never forget I was in a show in San Dimas, California, and we had an auction. You may or may not know who Merlin Olsen was or is, but he was an actor 75:00on Little House on the Prairie and a football player, did a lot of TV stuff, commercials and so on. Anyway, we're having this auction, and my painting comes up, and it's selling for more than it ever should've. The guy that bought it was Merlin Olsen. He came over and introduced himself, chit-chatted, and then he left. One of my artist friends came over, and he says, "You know, he walked up, he bid on your piece, that's all he bought, and he left." I thought, "How great is that? How strange is that?" It just makes you drop your mouth and stand in awe.

Little Thunder: I have to ask for one more story before we look at the art. Which president were you introduced to?

Anderson: Bill Clinton.

Little Thunder: In conjunction with a painting or a medallion, or--

Anderson: Well, the State of Arkansas gave me an award, I guess, and it was cool.

Little Thunder: Very. Okay, we will take a look at your artwork. We're looking at one of your sculptures. What's the name of this one?

Anderson: It's called The Healer. It's a Cherokee medicine man, and on the back side you can see the feathers. It's got a Cherokee eagle wand, and the hands are healing hands. A medicine man, they work with hands. All medical professions have to use their hands to work with medicine. Those are actually my own hands that I cast, so that's kind of interesting, that I used my own hands. These gorgets, the designs, are serpents or rattlesnakes, and they're attached to the 78:00pole, or the stick, on the back. A lot of times, people think of snakes and serpents as being bad things, but it's not in all cultures.

One of the things I ask people about is the fact that all the medical professions have a serpent wrapped around a pole. You would think, "Why would that have anything to do with the medical profession? Where did that come from?" When you look in the Bible in the book of Exodus, there's a story of the Israelites going through the desert, and they are cursed by snakes. The snakes 79:00bite the people, and a lot of them get sick and die. There's a great concern, so God tells Moses if he will sculpt a serpent out of bronze and put it on a pole, and if they look upon the serpent, they'll be healed and be cured from the bites of the serpent.

It has to do with faith. They didn't have to touch it. They didn't have to do anything but look upon it, and they would be healed. They could be hundreds of 80:00yards from it, or they could be ten feet from it. It didn't matter. All they had to do was look. So that's why, in most medical professions, the serpent with the pole comes from the book of the Bible.

Little Thunder: You can really see those collage elements in this one. How about this piece?

Anderson: This is a piece I'm working on right now. I really haven't titled it yet. It's still not finished, but it has to do with the Cherokee legend of the hawk and Uktena. Uktena was a mythical serpent creature, kind of a dragon-type 81:00figure. You can see I'm working on that over there in the foreground. The main concept behind the story is the battle between good and evil, how man has had to battle between the two. It tells of two great hawks that had a nest in a cave, and they had their young that they were rearing inside of the cave. The people were concerned about that.

The hawks were raising their young in this cave, so they decided they wanted to get rid of this danger. They sent a medicine man into the top of the cave, and they proceeded to have him swing back and forth until he was able to drop inside the cave. He was able to get inside, get the young birds, and push them out of the cave. When they fell from the cave, they fell into the water where the Uktena was, and then the Uktena proceeded to devour the young hawks. When the hawks came back, they decided that the Uktena had came and stolen their young, 83:00so they flew around and came down and grabbed the Uktena and pulled him up into the air and proceeded to tear him into pieces.

As he fell from the sky, the pieces of Uktena fell from the sky, it made great indentions in the earth. That's why we have, I guess you would call them, meteor indentions and such in the earth. Supposedly, it's a real place where the cave is.

Little Thunder: Is it in North Carolina?

Anderson: I believe it's in Tennessee.

Little Thunder: Do you want to talk about this painting?

Anderson: This is an owl painting that I did. It's interesting that a lot of Indian cultures have legends or myths about owls. Some cultures find them acceptable, and some find them highly unacceptable. When I did this piece, I had some artists that found it unacceptable, but one of the things is unless people are made aware of these different superstitions or different beliefs, then how 85:00can people be made aware of it if they don't know? In Cherokee culture the owl is considered witchcraft or bad medicine. It's interesting.

I was watching, I don't remember exactly what it was, it was a program, and the person that was in this particular program was a Native American, but in his hat he had an owl feather. You might say, "Well, how did you know it was an owl 86:00feather?" If you've been around owls, you know which are owl feathers and which are not. Usually the owl deals with--you have good and evil. They each have their own symbolism, so if you see somebody wearing an owl feather, you know that they're not afraid of it, so they must be accepting of it. If they are accepting of it, you might take that as a warning sign that you don't want to mess with that person. So therefore it's kind of an identification.

Now, if you're not familiar with that aspect of the culture, you might be accepting of it if you're of another tribe, not knowing that you are dealing with something you shouldn't be dealing with, but the only way you can know that is to know different cultures. I have been criticized at times for painting different cultures, but unless you are made aware of it--

I was watching a program today. It was talking about body language. If you get in somebody's face and start talking to them, in American society, that means you're getting ready to fight or you're angry with somebody, but in Middle 88:00Eastern countries, that's the way you talk to people. If you don't do that, then you're insulting them. You have to know who you're talking to, and you have to know what's appropriate and what's not, but unless you're aware of it, you don't know. You have to be accepting. If there's a culture that accepts the owl, you have to know that. If you're afraid of it and you're in their culture, you've insulted them. If you don't know that they accept the owl, are you just going to 89:00walk in an insult somebody? I would hope not. Now, if you do it intentionally, then shame on you. (Laughs)

Little Thunder: It illustrates the expressionistic, the splashes of color. It's definitely one of the styles that you're known for.

Anderson: It was interesting when I did this. The week that I finished it, there was a story in the local newspaper that came out that a barn owl had been nesting in a Lowe's store. Rather than get rid of it, they left it in the store because it had two babies and it was getting rid of the mice in the store. So 90:00the good Lord made owls for a reason.

Little Thunder: Thank you so much for your time today, Troy.

Anderson: You're welcome.

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