James "Buddy" Snipe – American Folk Art & Framing

The last born of twelve children, Buddy Snipe was born in 1945 in Macon County, Alabama, and still lives nearby.

As a child, he made toys for himself and the other children out of whatever he had at hand. He also made wagons and wheelbarrows out of tree limbs and scrap lumber. He sold them to neighbors. Later, Snipe worked as a pulpworker, a logger, a farmhand, a dishwasher, and he fixed things for people—broken furniture, sagging doors and fences.

About 45 years ago, he started to make Sculptural assemblages from roots, tree limbs, vines, scrap lumber and anything else he could find that triggered his imagination. He also paints pictures on scrap lumber and tin and frames them with some of his found objects.

He incorporates the elements of high art: line, form, texture, balance, color, while also remaining uninhibited by the norms of those elements. Mr. Snipe adds rhythmic improvisation & narrative which bridges the worlds of Primitive and Modern art in completely original ways.