29 Facts About Morris Graves

Morris Graves was one of the earliest Modern artists from the Pacific Northwest to achieve national and international acclaim.

Morris Graves's style, referred to by some reviewers as Mysticism, used the muted tones of the Northwest environment, Asian aesthetics and philosophy, and a personal iconography of birds, flowers, chalices, and other images to explore the nature of consciousness.

Morris Graves lived and worked mostly in Western Washington, but spent considerable time traveling and living in Europe and Asia, and spent the last several years of his life in Loleta, California.

Morris Cole Graves was born August 28,1910, in Fox Valley, Oregon, where his family had moved about a year before his birth, from Seattle, Washington, in order to claim land under the Homestead Act.

Morris Graves was named in honor of Morris Cole, a favored minister of his Methodist parents.

Morris Graves had five older brothers, and eventually, two younger siblings.

Morris Graves was a self-taught artist with natural understandings of color and line.

Morris Graves dropped out of high school after his sophomore year, and between 1928 and 31, along with his brother Russell, visited all the major Asian ports of call as a steamship hand for the American Mail Line.

Morris Graves then returned to Seattle, and received his first recognition as an artist when his painting Moor Swan won an award in the Seattle Art Museum's Northwest Annual Exhibition and was purchased by the museum.

Morris Graves began his lifelong study of Zen Buddhism in the early 1930s.

Morris Graves's participation was sporadic, but it was there that he met Mark Tobey and became impressed with Tobey's calligraphic line.

In January 1937 Morris Graves traveled to New York City to study with the controversial Father Divine's International Peace Mission movement in Harlem; on his return, in May, he bought 20 acres on Fidalgo Island.

In 1940, Morris Graves began building a house, which he named The Rock, on an isolated promontory on his Fidalgo Island property.

Morris Graves lived at The Rock with a succession of cats and dogs, all called Edith, in honor of poet Edith Sitwell.

Morris Graves was known for his personal charm and bursts of puckish humor, but spent long periods in semi-isolation, absorbed in nature and his art.

Morris Graves's near-isolation was interrupted in the Spring of 1942 when the Museum of Modern Art in New York opened its Americans 1942: 18 Artists from 9 States exhibition.

Morris Graves was finally released from military service in March 1943.

Morris Graves received a Guggehheim Fellowship allowing him to study in Japan, but only made it as far as Hawaii before his entry was blocked by Japan's US military occupation authorities.

Morris Graves spent several months in 1947 painting and learning the Japanese language in Hawaii.

In 1949 Morris Graves sailed to England aboard RMS Mauretania, spending a month as the guest of art collector Edward James.

Morris Graves then spent three solitary winter months in France, sketching and painting the Chartres Cathedral.

Morris Graves adopted certain elements of Chinese and Japanese art, including the use of thin paper and ink drawing.

Morris Graves switched from oils to gouaches, his birds became psychedelic, mystic, en route to transcendence.

Morris Graves returned to Seattle in 1964, living for several months in the so-called Pletscheff Mansion.

In 1965 Morris Graves purchased 380 acres of redwood forest property, around a five-acre lake, in Loleta, California, near Eureka.

Morris Graves hired architect Ibsen Nelsen to design a home which, after numerous technical and financial problems, was eventually constructed beside the lake.

Morris Graves unpacked the "Instruments of a New Navigation" sculptures and completed them.

Morris Graves continued working in his garden, tending his flowers and manicuring the landscape of The Lake.

Morris Graves died the morning of May 5,2001 at his home in Loleta, hours after suffering a stroke.