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| The Fulton Four: Walter Fulton Jr., Gloria Fulton Singleton, Vickie Fulton, Jerome Fulton. |
A
current of creative energy flows through one Memphis family and sparks the
imagination of four of the matriarch’s eight children. Decades ago, Willie Bell
Fulton and her deceased husband, Walter Fulton Sr., would discover that
something within four of their artistic children needed to be expressed on
paper, canvas, fabric, furniture, wall, glass, wood or any other surface.
Walter
Fulton Jr. (also known as “Atoosie”), Gloria Fulton, Jerome Fulton and Vickie
Fulton each possesses a talent for either drawing, painting, designing,
illustrating, cartooning, quilting, sewing, upholstering, crocheting, and
simply bringing to life works of art that depict their myriad experiences.
Gloria Fulton
calls their talent a “gift” and added that her parents bequeathed it to each
one of them. “My mother had a thrifty hand; she was creative,” she said. “But
painting and construction came from my dad. For example, I remember him
painting a portrait of my mom.”
Willie Bell Fulton, who
was married to her children’s father for 64 years, busied herself in the early
days cooking, cleaning and sewing clothes to make ends meet in the Hyde Park
community. However, she wasn’t aware at that time that her children were
budding as young artists – with the exception of Walter Fulton Jr.
“The only child
of mine that I really noticed with the talent for art was ‘Tootsie,” Ms. Fulton
recalled. “I saw a creative spirit in him at an early age. He was a different
child. But the others…I was busy at that time taking care of them.”
Now they are
making their own mark as individual artists and collectively as the Fulton
Four.
Walter
“Atoosie” Fulton Jr.:
In
pursuit of opportunities
It
would be futile to try to define Walter Fulton Jr. or attempt to box him into a
single category. He has the skills to move linearly or laterally in the art
world and has no qualms about taking his art on the road or settling for a
stint in a bustling city for artists.
Fulton has
lived in Florida 12 years; New York, 5; Los Angeles, 4 ½; Atlanta, 5; and Las
Vegas, 2 ½. When he’s back in Memphis, he’s painting, drawing, cartooning,
illustrating, designing fashions or sewing clothes and, to no one’s surprise,
preparing to globe-trot to the next city for another adventure.
“All my life,
I’ve been somewhere,” said Fulton, 64, always in pursuit of making a living
even if opportunity isn’t knocking. “You might as well enjoy yourself. God will
provide what you need.”
Although Fulton
generally follows the market that is conducive to his style of art, the thought
he’s had of launching a line of clothing – after designing and manufacturing it
– has not faded from memory since he first learned to sew. He hopes to develop
the idea into a business and employ people.
“I love to
paint and draw, but I would love to manufacture cotton clothes – shirts, pants,
dresses and skirts – and be a viable player in the game (the fashion
industry),” said Fulton, noting that Memphis is the purveyor of cotton, “so why
not use cotton to manufacture clothing?”
Fulton understands the world around him – its
beauty, significance and functionality. “Everything you do has art in it,” he
said. “The only thing is how do you take it and put it on the market.”
When he was
budding as an artist, Fulton received art scholarships from the 10th
to the 12th grade at Douglass High School to attend summer school at
the former Memphis Academy of Art. After graduating high school in 1968, he
received another scholarship to the art school – this time as a bona fide
college student.
Like his
siblings, Fulton has a spiritual side that radiates when he speaks. He
recounted a story that he shared with homeless men, comparing stones to talent.
“I work with
the homeless and often tell them about the story of David, how he defeated the
giant with five smooth stones. I tell them that the stones are talents and that
they have to use their stones to defeat their giants.”
Gloria
Fulton Singleton:
Recycling
discards into works of art
If
art is the explicit purpose of man’s existence on earth, then everything that
Gloria Fulton Singleton sees in her mind’s eye can be transformed or repurposed
as a work of art. She is the quintessential recycling artist who sees beauty
and meaning in discards.
A painter, muralist, interior designer and decorator,
woodworker, upholsterer, art teacher and seamstress, Singleton parlays her
skills into works of art that are useful, functional and appealing to the
homeowner.
“I’ve
always been around creative people,” said Singleton, 62, adding a tagline to
her style of art: “Fulton’s Art & Home
Furnishings.”
The artist
attributes her creativity to her mother, a seamstress; her late father, a
painter and woodworker; and her late grandmother, a shoemaker. She credits her
brothers Walter and Jerome for hewing a path in the arts for her to follow and
esteems Estella Cash, who taught sewing in the Hyde Park community.
“If you wanted
something, you made it, painted it, or recycled what you had,” said Singleton,
drawing her experiences from her youth while growing up in a household of nine
other family members. Those early influences, however, would enable her to
harness her creative energies.
“I like a
beautiful, peaceful and cohesive environment. That’s what I strive for,” said
Singleton, who works with children at Mustard Seed Studio teaching them the art
of sewing, crocheting and knitting. Her ultimate goal is to teach children and
employ women.
Singleton
graduated from Douglass High School in 1970 and afterward matriculated at the
School of the Art Institute of Chicago, the Ray Vogue School of Fashion Design
in Chicago, the Tennessee Technology Center at Memphis to study carpentry, and
the University of Memphis.
Her current
focus is on art and home furnishings.
Jerome
Fulton:
Recreating
the Old South in multi-media
There’s
a little history and antiquity in the artwork that Jerome Fulton creates. He’ll
take you back to the Old South and elsewhere, where life for African Americans
is seen through a kaleidoscope in cotton fields and roving landscapes, where
multi-colored, multi-patched quilts are suspended from clotheslines while a
slight breeze nip at their fringes, and where the blues reverberates from
guitar strings.
“I’ve
always been fascinated with Africans, the drums, and their music. It’s part of
who we are. It’s in our bloodline,” said Fulton, 60, whose varied images of the
Old South speak the language that he conveys on paper, canvas and through
various found objects that comprise some of his wood constructions.
It was during the summer months in Clarksdale,
Miss., that images of southern life would emerge and eventually become a focal
point in some of Fulton’s mixed media paintings and drawings. An aunt, he said,
lived in Clarksdale and visits there would open his eyes to a new world, which
stirred his interest to recreate the era’s enduring legacy – albeit good or bad
for African Americans.
“It
was in Clarksdale that I learned to appreciate music, experience the great feel
of country air and love for southern folks,” said Fulton. “The first sunset
that I saw at the age of 8 inspired me to always look for beauty in colors.”
Fulton
is a graduate of Douglass High School. He’d dreamed of creating beautiful works
of art on paper, but discovered a watercolor technique that he’d borrowed from
his instructors – watercolorists Dolph Smith and Fred Rawlinson – at the former
Memphis Academy of Art (Memphis College of Art), where he graduated in 1976.
“I
love watercolors,” said Fulton, who took what he learned from his instructors
and breathed new life into the fluid technique of watercolors by inserting,
transferring or adhering photographic images of rusty shacks, people and
building to a watercolor board.
After
college, Fulton lived in Chicago for 28 years drawing and illustrating and returned
to Memphis 5 years ago to give us a history lesson on southern culture.
Vickie
Fulton:
Communicating
through patchwork quilts
Hand
gestures and a radiant expression frames Vickie Fulton’s face when she expounds
upon her newly discovered talent for quilting. It had been a long time coming –
an innate ability that was once dormant – but the creative urge to speak
through her quilts has emboldened her and awakened the artist within.
“When
I’m sewing quilts, I’m singing, meditating, praying, and listening to God, and
trying to solve the world’s problems,” said Fulton, 58, who took three quilting
classes from Anne Harper and Andrew Hayes at the Josephine K. Lewis Center for
Senior Citizens at the corner of Bellevue Boulevard and North Parkway.
However,
before finding solace in stitching quilts, Fulton taught in the Legacy Memphis
City Schools for 25 years. She’d devoted considerable time in the classroom
teaching the curriculum and imparting to her students a sense of history from
an African-American perspective.
Although
the field of education was foremost Fulton’s passion, it is quilting that
piques her interest of late and imbues her with sheer joy. “I’m still in the
line of education,” said Fulton, who delights in designing each quilt in a way
that educates, that tells a story.
For example, in
“Secret Code Quilt,” the artist stitched a colorful patchwork using images of
African American slave quarters and abolitionist Harriett Tubman, each
juxtaposed against vibrant colors symbolizing secret messages that were
deciphered by slaves seeking to escape to freedom via the Underground Railroad.
“When I wake up
in the morning, I start quilting and don’t stop until the night,” said Fulton.
“In my sleep I’m sewing. I’m always thinking about new projects. My spirit and
soul are in my quilts. They are like children.
“It’s therapy
to me. I’m engrossed in thought on each piece,” said Fulton, noting that she
hasn’t sewn since high school but picked it up in a snap. “I love it. It’s a
lost art. And my goal is to bring it back.”
Fulton
graduated from Northside High School in 1974, from Southwestern Christian
College in 1976 with an associate’s degree in social work, and from Lipscomb
University in 1979 with a bachelor’s of art in social work.
