Cash for cluckers’ paintings
may rock art world
BY HARPER SCOTT CLARK
TELEGRAM STAFF WRITER
SALADO — Bucka-bucka-buckabuck-
brrrAWWK!
The clucker cotillion begins its
mornings at Lonnie Edwards’ art studio on
the banks of Salado Creek with a hen, four
chicks and a rooster dancing in circles on
the surface of a newly stretched canvas.
Edwards, 72, drizzles acrylic paint on the
canvases in rhythmic waves, streaks and
splotches similar to a Jackson Pollock
work. Then the birds strut their stuff.
First they leave the impressions of their
claws and footprints in the pigment.
Hopping around they transfer all the colors
of the rainbow into the pristine white areas
of the canvas as they cluck and cackle their
way to neo-impressionist fame.
Edwards appears to be in
perfect simpatico with his colleagues.
They are, he said, expressing their feelings.
Edwards, an artisan who has
spent much of his lifetime
fashioning objects in metal,
recently took a departure from
hammering iron and bronze on
an anvil to painting, using his
chickens as his paintbrushes.
The dots, blips and slash
marks the birds leave are a
type of pointillism, Edwards
said. The finished canvas is a
hybrid. Edwards’s part of the
composition is abstract expressionism
— also called action
painting — and the birds’
efforts come under the neoimpressionist
school.
The cacklers have adopted
certain airs since donning
berets and embarking on artful
careers. Plain farmyard names
like Henny Penny and Rennie
Rooster have been dropped for
monikers with more panache.
Some include Spanish names
to reflect the flair of their
Southwest environment.
Pollo Picasso, Gallina
O’Keefe, J. Gallo Pollock and
Fowl Monet make up the
Salado Creek palette society.
How did Edwards get the
idea to employ cacklers as
paintbrushes?
During an interview in June
about his work in metal,
Edwards was asked about the
colorful hens that ran into his
open-air studio from outdoors.
They appeared to watch
intently as he worked at his
anvil.
“I said then that I bred them
for their vibrant multi-hued
patterns because I wanted to
paint them one day. But it
wouldn’t be paintings of the
chickens. It would be paintings
by the chickens.”
Edwards’ comment ended up
in the Temple Daily Telegram.
Dallas restaurant magnate
Gene Street heard about
Edwards’ project from family
members in Salado and
checked the story out online.
Before retiring, Street owned
a major interest in more than
250 restaurants worldwide that
included El Chico Restaurants,
The Spaghetti Warehouse,
Good Eats Cafe and the Black
Eyed Pea, and today is a partner
in a cable television show
called Cheaters — a late night
show that tracks down unfaithful
spouses and life partners
with a private detective.
“Lonnie is a pretty creative
guy,” Street said. “He’s done
some things for me in the
past.”
He called Edwards and gave
him seven canvas sizes.
“I said, ‘Lonnie, I want
seven white backgrounds with
colorful chicken feet and I
don’t want to talk to you anymore
about it. Just call back
and tell me what the price will
be. When you are finished I
will come get them.’”
Street said they agreed on a
price in the thousands
although the exact amount is a
confidence.
“I’ll put Lonnie’s finished
works in a bedroom in my
house that has no art,” Street
said. “It’s all white so I need
some color in it. I’ll call it my
chicken room.”
Edwards said he had to come
to terms quickly with how to
get chickens to do their part. It
could be worse than herding
cats, he said.
He built a portable chicken
coop 3 feet wide, 6 feet long
and 18 inches high. It had no
bottom and could be placed on
a table over two newly
stretched canvases. All he had
to do was open a door and pop
Pollo Picasso inside.
A second table was fashioned
with a glass top. This
allowed the photographer to
get a bird’s eye view from
below of the painting process.
But it had a second purpose.
When the chickens had completed
their work, Edwards
would place a fresh, white
canvas face down on the wet
paint design. He would press
firmly and pull an impression.
“It’s basic lithography,”
Edwards said.
Edwards is a stickler for
treating his colleagues with
respect. When chickens were
brought out of the cage, he
washed off their feet in tepid
tap water before putting them
on the ground.
In the beginning he feared
his associates might leave their
own editorial comments in the
design. So he fashioned diapers
from plastic bags. As it
turned out, he didn’t need
them. A trial run indicated the
birds were too engrossed in
dabbling in their art to think
about leaving anything extra
on the canvas.
Street said years ago he started
collecting Andy Warhol
paintings. He also has original
photos of Elvis Presley and
many of the old rockers.
“I might do a one-man show
at one of the Dallas galleries
with Lonnie’s pieces so that
our Salado boys are a little
more well-known in the circle,”
Street said.
Tyler Fletcher, an art aficionado
who is also a rare
book and antique dealer in
Salado, said the concept has a
bohemian quality.
“I believe this will resonate
in the demimonde of the art
world,” Fletcher said.
Is Edwards the first to create
chicken art?
“I don’t know that to be a
fact,” he said. “You always
find out later that somebody
else came up with your unique
idea before you,” he said.
“Great ideas often mix on the
same palette.”
WHICH CAME FIRST?
FIRST CAME MAN
Lonnie Edwards
FIRST CAME MAN
prepares a canvas for his
chickens to walk over
using a technique first pioneered
by Jackson Pollock
in the 1950s. Abstract
expressionism became
known as “action painting”
because interaction
between the artist and the
medium created the feel of
movement.
THEN THE CHICKEN
THEN THE CHICKEN
O’Keefe, J. Gallo
Pollock, and Fowl
Monet make up the Salado
Creek palette society.
The four pullets complete the
The four pullets complete the
painting process by standing
over a Lonnie Edwards
masterpiece and placing
their pointillist work on a
canvas prepared by
Edwards in classic abstract
expressionist style. The
hybrid style creates a medley
of colors jetting around
the canvas.
looking good harper…i like it. want chicken painting.
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