James Edgar Crowe
1931-2004

Story + Photographs by JR Compton

We were saddened by the death of kinetic sculptor James Edgar Crowe, a DallasArtsRevue Supporting Member, friend and longtime supporter of the Texas Sculpture Association.

Examples of James' art may be seen in an illustrated review of his Art of Joy of Art show in Deep Elm, on his DARts Member Page and on the TSA site.

A ceiling full of art and a room full of friends

I attended Jim's memorial party the Friday after his death with historic photographs in mind. As soon as we walked in, we could see that Jim had as many friends as he had artworks crammed there, in the big front room of the late artist and his wife Carol's Duncanville home.

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People and Jim's artwork crowds their big front room

 

I wanted to know and photograph what he was working on in his mind and in his studio during the days just before he died. I spoke with sons and friends and other family, and through the night pieced it together with new and old friends gathered to celebrate his active life.

 

A tiny model of what could have been
a major, floating emphemera

 

James Crowe was best known for his graceful, floating, brightly polychromed mobiles — though he preferred to call them 'kinetic art,' partially to deflect comparisons with Calder, who had obviously inspired him. But Jim's work had gone far beyond.

James' mind and work was always reaching for new horizons as he worked on lots of different pieces and concepts at once in his busy little studio, crammed to the gills — like everywhere else in his home — with current and past work.

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James Crowe's busy studio

 

The Dallas Morning News had planned to visit Jim that Tuesday, but had instead come on Monday. The article appeared later that week as an obituary. Jim died on Tuesday, of breathing complications that had dogged him for years.

 

Pills from the VA Medical Center still on Jim's
cluttered desk — along with family photos

 

There was some hint that the interview may have been too much for his weakened condition, but I'm sure he was excited and happy about the story.

This polaroid on a studio table may show the some of the works in progress just before he died. When I visited, the white curvilinear cut-out shapes had been gathered and stacked into a box.

 

A thick stack of active files next to his desk
attested to his works' popularity

 

Other objects — including a hand-lettered sign on which Jim proclaimed "Conceptual Art Sucks," had been 'neatened' up and and the room partially rearranged. Though it was still densely populated with his art.

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This informal model, combining more colors and shapes, still floated above where Jim's head would be. Not as carefully elegant as the white sail above, but in the studio, still a work in progress, an idea generator, gently suspended like a light bulb going off in his active mind.

The actual, last piece he worked on was a mobile he'd sold years ago to people who had it at their lakeside home. Some of the flat, wood, floating pieces had warped in the humidity, and Jim was replacing them.

Two other, mostly black pieces hanging in the thick of the big living room ceiling were also among his last work. But they were hung in such a dense forest of work, they were almost impossible to separate in a photograpph.

 

 

This vivid red piece, prominently displayed during the wake, has two post-its. One hhas glass artist Jim Bowman's contact information. All-capital letters on the other state, "reproduce this in glass."

Back down the hall, there was a party going on — Jim's idea. He wanted to be celebrated, not memorialized on this occasion, which he'd wanted to be festive and fun.

It was.

One of James Crowe's earliest cut-out wood pieces,
which his son said was done back in 1978

The big show he was working toward — what will probably be a major retrospective at the Irving Arts Center this August — is still on track and should be fabulous.

See you there.
 

Other examples of James' art may be seen
in an illustrated review of his Art of Joy of Art
show in Deep Elm, on his DARts Member Page,
and older work on the TSA site.