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Found Art:
Cover Artist Bill Hemerling

 

by Jamey Landry

They used to say, “Life is Better at Sears.” If you ask our cover artist, Bill Hemmerling, he might say life is better after Sears.

“I worked there for 35 years,” Bill says. His job was to travel throughout Louisiana and set the store displays and other merchandising efforts in a time when retailing didn’t mean big-box stores. Using an eloquently simple vocabulary that itself echoes his simple but eclectic art style, Bill explains that the job changed, and that later motivated him to become an artist. In his early retail career, he notes, he was encouraged to show more artistic freedom in setting up displays. As retailing became more price driven, and design was dictated by rigid “design books” created in Chicago, it was evident to Bill that his enthusiasm was waning. “They finally made me retire because it wasn’t fun anymore,” he says, true to his nature of using words carefully chosen to never intentionally say or do an unkind thing to anyone.

Bill’s retirement came about four years ago. The Ponchatoula resident found himself with nothing to do—and all day to do it. On his daily jogs along U.S. 51 in Ponchatoula, he would pass the Louisiana Furniture and Art Gallery and look through the window at a particular bare spot on the wall near the store window. After pondering about it for days, he asked shop co-owner Carol Siekkinen if he could make a painting for her to hang on the wall there. Smitten by Bill’s charm and unassuming demeanor, she agreed, not knowing what to expect. Even Bill was unsure what he would create. But it would change his life.

A self-admitted former hippie, Bill’s lifestyle even to this day is one of, shall we say, thrift. He is attuned to finding new life for that which others cast aside, as evidenced by his first painting, created from well-seasoned boards and leftover house paints that people were only too happy to get rid of. “I used house paints and boards because I didn’t have any money then,” Bill explains. When he presented Carol with that first painting, a near silhouette of a young black girl in light summer clothes, she immediately recognized the genius in the composition’s utter simplicity. It sold within days of its first display.

That first painting four years ago was a watershed event, as collectors began to take notice of Bill’s work. His “Sweet Olive” series is Bill’s signature style, an apparent evolution of his first painting. In his characteristic humbleness, Bill, who is white, explains his initial trepidation over his painting studies of black people. “I didn’t want to offend black people and make them think I know all about their world. It was just easier to paint them. Where I lived I was around black people all the time and so that’s what I knew. But most of them have responded well and can even see themselves in my paintings, so it’s cool with them.”

Encouraged by the work’s success at her store, Carol and her husband sponsored Bill’s first booth at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival. Needless to say, Mr. Hemmerling was introduced to the world, and the world responded. Carol claims Bill’s work set a Jazz Fest record that first year, and equaled or bettered it the following three years. The Jazz and Heritage Foundation took notice and commissioned Bill to produce the official poster in 2005, although he didn’t know it at the time.

Ever protective of her client’s sensitivity, Carol says that, at the time, had he known he was creating the Jazz Fest poster, Bill probably would not have completed the task. “He didn’t know how to take criticism then. It would have devastated him if they had directly asked him for changes, because he would have thought it meant they didn’t like the painting,” Carol laboriously explains. So Bill worked on the original art, which is on a 4-by-8 sheet of recycled door skin, making improvements to the theme based on what he thought were Carol’s suggestions. “She got me on that one, but look how cool it came out,” he says, with his typical modest pride.

Although he says he was fortunate enough to attend a Catholic school in Chicago that allowed a daily art period, Bill really has had no art instruction. “We worked with coloring books and crayons,” he recalls. “I used to trace the pictures and color them and turn them in as my own. I think the sisters knew they weren’t mine, though.”

Although he can now afford new materials, Bill continues to paint with leftover house paints and wood stains onto found objects. “It’s the hippie thing,” he says. Sheets from a New Orleans hotel, table leaves, countless doors, boards, and even furniture from his house have all become Bill’s canvases. When his brother Bobby impulsively cut the top off his car to make a convertible, Bill painted on the cast-off top. “I got two paintings out of that one,” he says, noting that he painted on both sides of the former top.

Bill will tell you he doesn’t understand art, but he knows what he likes. As his early success began to build and the floodgates of his creativity burst open, he frequently borrowed the art encyclopedias from Ponchatoula’s public library and studied the works (“I really just looked at the pictures”) of other artists. Armed with that exposure and appreciation of some of the true masters, he has created a series of 12 Sweet Olive studies in his own interpretations of selected masters from Van Gogh to Matisse to Picasso. This series will be auctioned off soon to benefit the rebuilding of hurricane-damaged Xavier University in New Orleans.

To meet Bill is to instantly understand his work. Always dressed in clothes borrowed or second hand, he is comfortable enough with himself to be genuinely more concerned with the comfort of others. His brother Bobby, who was also a self-professed hippie, lived with him after his retirement from retail and shared in the joy of Bill’s newfound success. Sadly, Bobby recently passed away from brain cancer. It is evident that Bill is happy that he could ease his brother’s suffering. “Before I had all this money, I couldn’t have afforded to take care of my brother. But from people buying my paintings, I was able to buy him a hot tub and pay for his care, and I was glad to do it. Our sister lived in Arizona and she died, too. There was nothing I could do about that then, but I was able to help Bobby, and I’m glad.”

Bill’s work is on display exclusively at the Louisiana Furniture and Art Gallery at 495 S.W. Railroad Ave. in Ponchatoula. Call 386-0471, or visit www.billhemmerling.com for more information.