Illustrations

Folk artist  Charlie Frye is famous for capturing the scenes he grew up with in Western North Carolina – roosters, rusty trucks, bearded men and churches. He paints bold. He paints fast. I love his work.

Charlie Frye (L): my bearded, paint spattered, folk artist friend who illustrated the Lost Sea Expedition.

I’ve known Charlie long enough to know that when I asked him to paint over 30 paintings about a sea that vanished millions of years ago he’d tug on his paint spattered overalls and say, “Bernie…..have you lost your damn mind?”

Which is exactly what he said.

Then he got busy.

Turtle Island, one of my all-time favorite Charlie Frye paintings. It illustrates the Lakota myth about the creation of the world.
Turtle Island, one of my all-time favorite Charlie Frye paintings. It illustrates the Lakota myth about the creation of the world. Charlie painted it for the Lost Sea Expedition series.

 

Painting the Lost Sea

Over the course of winter, Charlie hunkered down and started slinging paint. Charlie isn’t one of those dainty painters that’s easy to lampoon – the dandy landscape artist that paints and dabs and washes watercolors across an easel.

No, Charlie paints on sheets of plywood, barn tin, shingles and old trucks. Often, these folksy items to be painted (except the trucks) are just thrown down on his studio floor. Charlie will stand over them, smear on the paint with fat brushes and fingers. And gradually, these powerful images emerge.

Here are some of them you’ll see in the Lost Sea Expedition documentary (illustrations by Charlie Frye).

Underwater scene for the Lost Sea
Underwater scene for the Lost Sea, the ancient sea that covered the Great Plains millions of years ago.

 

The Lost Sea stretched from the Gulf of Mexico in to Canada
The Lost Sea stretched from the Gulf of Mexico in to Canada
Ammonites. The shells of these ancient creatures can be found scattered across the Great Plains.
Ammonites. The shells of these ancient creatures can be found scattered across the Great Plains.
Baculites: these creatures were related to the chambered nautilus.
Baculites: these creatures were related to the chambered nautilus.
Pteranadon flying over, what these days, is grassland.
Pteranadon flying over, what these days, is grassland.
Charles Darwin: the Lost Sea Expedition showed my how divisive his legacy remains across broad swaths of America.
Charles Darwin: the Lost Sea Expedition showed me how divisive his legacy remains across broad swaths of America.

 

This 20 foot fish swam over what is now Kansas. Meet the Lost Sea super-predator Xyphactinus (pronounced “Zi fak tin us”.

Thanks for illustrating the Lost Sea Expedition Charlie!

If you’re looking for great folk  art, want to enroll in one of his painting classes or have a commission in mind, you can find Charlie right here at his Folk Keeper Gallery and Antiques  or on his Facebook page.  Ask nicely and he might paint you a vanished sea…