Roger "Sam" Wilson
http://artistsofutah.org/15bytes/2010/10/sam_wilson.html 12-29-2010
"Sam Wilson has taught at the University of Utah for over thirty years, so his iconic paintings, densely packed with pop and art-historical figures are familiar to most in Utah's art community. In this, our first installment of a video interview as artist profile, Carol Fulton sat down with the wry and engaging artist to discuss his routine, his reasons for raiding the vaults of art history, and what exactly is going on with his paragraph-long titles."
http://www.lib.utah.edu/portal/site/marriottlibrary/menuitem.350f2794f84fb3b29cf87354d1e916b9/?vgnextoid=bb57520943af7110VgnVCM1000001c9e619bRCRD&vgnextfmt=nomenu 12-29-2010
Sam Wilson was born in Kansas City, Missouri, in 1943; then his family moved west, living first in Golden, Colorado, and eventually staying in the Los Angeles, California area, mostly in Long Beach. He graduated from high school in 1961, an experience he says is "best forgotten. I was too young to be a Beatnik and too old to be a Hippie. I owe my career to Lyndon Baines Johnson. I went to school without much direction. I guess it was partly to avoid getting drafted. I was drafted. After service, mostly in Barstow, California and Viet Nam (Barstow was the scary place), I resumed my education with the crucial G.I. Bill. My education was completed with a Masters from California State University, Long Beach." Currently, Sam Wilson is Adjunct Assistant Professor, University of Utah Department of Art. His varied career includes a number of teaching positions in California and Colorado, being an illustrator for Carl Sagen's Cosmos on PBS, a "Magician" with Paramount Pictures, and working in stage design, construction, and silkscreening for Silent Running for Universal Studios. Wilson's work has been exhibited throughout the Intermountain Region and in California, earning him numerous awards. In ** yr? he spent 16 months doing the interior of the Cathedral of the Madeline in Salt Lake City, Utah. He said, "They let me do 'Wilson' stuff." Talking about his work, Wilson said, since I never could figure out the right way to start a painting, I would look at a piece of 'stuff,' thinking that it may be a way of generating a picture. It's like those horse-cart, chicken-egg questions. Do I collect stuff to paint or do I paint to collect stuff? By way of paint or pencil, I display objects both exotic and mundane on desk tops or in caves. This stuff I use may be replicas of other cultures or junk and tools from my work place. Masks may be people, people are animals or a rock is a place„it doesn't matter. I entertain myself and satisfy my curiosities by accumulating and arranging the items on the surface of the picture in a manner as unpredictable as possible. I believe that these oblique references and nonsense relationships open to me (and you) greater possibilities, more surprises and a justification for such a quiet and solitary entertainment. I use the techniques of realism and illusionism as a medium to present these harmless dramas. The pictures are just hanging around on the wall, I mean they are static. I assume the role of magician to add a helpful tension. The game of what's 'real' or not is a ploy, a device to catch your eye. The final result of this labor would be, for you, a trip with no passport, a contest with no clock and a visual snack without the predictable flavor of a franchised fun house.
Biography courtesy of The Springville Museum of Art.
http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=Roger+%22Sam%22+Wilson&view=detail&id=2A7939187A819A66FADCF3DE27DA168CA0A906AB&first=1&FORM=IDFRIR&qpvt= 12-29-2010
The Madeleine Festival recognizes artist
By Laura V. Sausedo
Intermountain Catholic
SALT LAKE CITY- The artist who created the Cathedral of the Madeleine's vibrantly colored Stations of the Cross was honored with the 2010 Madeleine Festival Award.
Madeleine Arts and Humanities Council chairman Mike Stransky announced that Roger (Sam) Wilson was the recipient of the 2010 Madeleine Award for Distinguished Service to the Arts and Humanities. This award has been presented annually since 1980 as part of the Madeleine Festival of the Arts and Humanities to individuals who have made comprehensive and long-term contributions to the arts and humanities in Utah.
The Most Rev. John C. Wester, bishop of the Diocese of Salt Lake City, presented the award to Wilson at a dinner celebrated at the New Yorker. Michael Stransky, Ruth Lubbers and Joe Marotta were the speakers.
"It was a surprise," Wilson said about the award. "I felt a lot of gratitude."
In addition to painting the 14 Stations of the Cross in 1992 and 1993, Wilson spent 16 months in the 1980s helping to renovate the interior of the Cathedral of the Madeleine.
"When they were restoring the Cathedral they were asking for someone to do the Stations so I applied," said Wilson, a professor in the Art and Art History Department at the University of Utah.
After painting the Stations of the Cross, Wilson took a sabbatical and traveled to Italy with his wife. "I felt that I was a part of a long tradition of painting for the church and it's interesting because for the last 12 years we have been to Italy 11 times and all this started with the stations painting."
He describes his work as based on European, especially Italian, painting. "I do a lot of work but I don't exhibit much," he said.
He has mentored adult students with disabilities for the Art Access Partners program, has taught thousands of students in his college classes and has conducted an artist residency for the George Wahler Veterans Administration Medical Center.
"What I tell students is that as long as you keep on going you'll catch a momentum; it's a matter of not stopping. Eventually it will go in a direction," Wilson said.
Though the stations he painted have been in place for almost 20 years, they still attract attention.
"The paintings are beautiful," said Cathedral of the Madeleine parishioner Mario Silva, after admiring the stations after a recent Sunday Mass. "The colors, the shapes, they make me think of all the journey that God walked for us."