Just Above the Water
Just Above the Water
Florida Folk Art
Florida has an abundance of excellent artists whose work reflects the traditions of their many diverse communities. Yet there has been, until now, no major publication that focuses on the state’s visual folk arts and folk artists.
Just Above the Water: Florida Folk Art includes an overall view of folk arts in Florida and individual profiles of over seventy artists, including Mary Proctor, Mario Sanchez, Nicholas Toth, Ruby C. Williams, and Purvis Young. The work of painters, sculptors, master saddlemakers, iconographers, and instrument makers is illustrated here in more than 200 black-and-white and color photographs.
Some consider folk art to be art created by self-taught individuals working in an idiosyncratic style, while others believe it to be the expression of traditional cultural forms. Kristin G. Congdon and Tina Bucuvalas argue that artists of both types express innovation and tradition. In many instances, a close examination of the artists and their work reveals much about Florida’s cultural history. The artists clearly are not naive, simple, primitive, or quaint. Like the work they produce, they are sophisticated, expressing their creativity in relation to complex cultural backgrounds.
Kristin G. Congdon is professor emerita of philosophy and humanities at the University of Central Florida. Her authored or coauthored books include Happy Clouds, Happy Trees: The Bob Ross Phenomenon; Just Above the Water: Florida Folk Art; and Uncle Monday and Other Florida Tales, all published by Unversity Press of Mississippi. Tina Bucuvalas is curator of art and historical resources with the City of Tarpon Springs. She is president of the Florida Folklore Society and served as state folklorist and director of the Florida Folklife Program of the Florida Department of State. She is coauthor of Just Above the Water and South Florida Folklife and editor of Greek Music in America and The Florida Folklife Reader, all published by University Press of Mississippi.
