Persons of the Year – Art: Jesse Lott
Lott was best known for his approach to sculpture and collage art, which he referred to as “urban folk art” or “urban frontier art. ” The sculptural technique, represented here, is a combination of the natural resources of the urban community along with the skill of a trained artist and the attitude of the primitive.”
In his book “Collision: The Contemporary Art Scene in Houston: 1972-1985,” writer, curator, and educator Pete Gershon wrote, “What really set Lott apart was his skill at turning trash into treasure.”
Jesse Lott was a Louisiana native but grew up in Houston’s Fifth Ward, where he got his start after being discovered as a teenager by artist John Biggers, best known as a muralist with works of his own throughout Houston. Biggers was also an educator who had traveled extensively to Africa for art. Biggers passed away in Houston in 2001.
Lott was also a co-founder of the Project Row Houses, along with Rick Lowe and other artists.
It transformed the social environment in the Third Ward, Houston’s oldest African American neighborhood that lacked affordable housing, by providing low-income residents with refurbished houses.
Lott’s indelibility in Houston as a pioneer and artist is solid. In 2016, he earned a Lifetime Achievement Award from Art League Houston.
Houston artist Angelbert Metoyer had known Lott for many years and became a close friend. Metoyer described an encounter that embraced the work of Lott.
Metoyer, while working on a project, recalls an episode with Lott.
“A train came by and started blowing the horn,” Metoyer says. “And he (Lott) started laughing, but I couldn’t hear anything because of the train. Right when the train horn was blowing, it started raining in this one spot where we were painting. And Jesse looked at me. He started laughing, saying, ‘Well, go ahead! Now God is painting with us.”
“My first instinct was to move the paintings before they got messed up because we were painting with ink and watercolor,” Metoyer says. “But Jesse said, ‘Leave it there’. He turned around and got something to drink out of the studio. We came back, and the rain stopped.
“And we left the work out there to dry, said Metoyer.
“As a curator, I appreciated the wonderful integrity of his work — the honesty that combined humor with this monumentality,” Wardlaw tells PaperCity. “That always struck me. When you saw a piece by Jesse Lott, instantaneously, you knew it was him. He carried his genius so lightly, and he put all of that effort into his work.
“He was so accomplished in so many ways that he didn’t even talk about.”
Lott has a documentary by 14 Pews Founder Cressandra Thibodeaux entitled “Jesse Lott: Art & Activism,” along with students from her 14 Pews Film Academy.
In the documentary, Lott describes importantly the power of art.
“When you do a work of art, you have a greater possibility of reaching more people than when you write a book. Because the history books will be burned, and the history will be mistold.
“But the art is there to be interpreted by each person, every time they look at it. You can tell many, many, many different stories with one picture.”
