Howard Finster’s Paradise Garden
Summerville, GA
At the age
of 59, Howard Finster--a man with a sixth grade education living in one of the
poorest counties in Georgia--had a vision that changed his life. When he dipped his finger in tractor enamel
while painting a bicycle, the paint took the appearance of a face, and he heard
a voice say the words, “paint sacred art.”
Although he had been preaching at Baptist churches for 25 years, and had
done, by his own count, 28 other occupations, he had no art training and had
never produced artwork. Nonetheless, he
heeded God’s call to paint 5,000 works, and by the time he died 25 years later
he had made 46,991 numbered artworks, exceeding God’s expectations by a wide
margin.
His outdoor
studio and display space, Paradise Garden, was a glorious celebration of God’s
Holy Word interpreted via colorful paintings and zany montages of cast-off
items in Finster’s day. He said, “My
garden is a way for me to get my messages out all over the world. And that’s my responsibility. Someday, sometime people on this planet are
going to realize they need what Howard Finster’s got, whether it’s religion,
whether it’s art, or whether it’s building a Garden.” 
Fast forward to today, 13 years after Howard’s death, and most of his art that could be hauled off and put on a wall is now in the collections of museums like Atlanta’s High Museum of Art or the Smithsonian, or it is in private collections. But, his eclectic dimensional art remains. Winding sidewalks inset with bright mosaics of broken crockery and mirrors, marbles, and unexpected items-- a gun, kitchen utensil or a man’s pipe--lead to whimsical outbuildings, recycled material statuary, and a swampy water garden.
The four-story
sixteen-sided World’s Folk Art Church towers over the garden at forty feet
high. Unfortunately, since Howard had no
architectural training, it has been deemed unstable, despite being divinely
inspired, so we weren’t allowed inside.
The plan is to eventually make it safe for public use, but since there
are no architectural plans, and it was not built according to accepted
engineering principles, it may be a while before we see the inside of this
place. (And where the money is coming from, we have no clue--the admission
charge for us “seniors” was just $3 apiece--and at less than 4,000 visitors a
year, the garden is not a big money-maker.)
On one side
of the church is one of Howard’s favorite quotes: “I took the pieces you threw
away, put them together by night and day.
Washed by the rain. Dried by the sun. A million pieces all in one.” That is a perfect summary of Paradise.
There is a
stack of bicycle parts several stories high, and a house covered with mirrors
inside and out, a pump house made of coke bottles, and a garden wall made of,
well, every religious thing you can imagine, and some stuff you would never
think of, all set in cement in a way that turns out to be surprisingly
charming. 
Here are some of our favorite spots in Paradise:
After two and a half hours strolling through Paradise, we drove about sixty miles east to Jasper, where we stayed at the Woodbridge Inn, which traces its history back to 1880. Our room is in the historic Inn building, right above the restaurant. The owner told us that this was his bed room when he was a teenager.
The Inn is in
Downtown Jasper, which has about three blocks of beautifully restored historic
buildings, with about a third of them vacant.
This seems to be a plague of small town America, no matter where we
travel.
 |
| Oglethorpe Monument in foreground, Woodbridge Inn in background. |
Back to the
Inn, we enjoy a comfy homey room and a fine dinner, including wine and three
courses, and leave having spent less than $100 for our “Bed and Dinner”
accommodations.
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