THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, September 24, 1994 TAG: 9409240277
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B2 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: NEWPORT NEWS LENGTH: Medium: 77 lines
You can't miss Anderson Johnson's house as you drive down Ivy Avenue.
The outside is painted with Bible verses and decorated with portraits. The front door says ``Anderson Johnson, Artist.''
Inside, all you see are paintings - on the walls, on the floor, hanging on strings from the ceiling - 2,000 in all, by Johnson's reckoning.
Johnson's home is also his art gallery, studio, musical stage and church.
Earlier this month, though, the city told Johnson to find another home. He has 1 1/2 months to move out before the wrecking ball arrives to begin clearing the way for a recreation center.
The house has been in Johnson's family for nearly half a century, but Johnson, 79, has agreed to give it up. ``I'm not fighting this,'' he said. ``Whatever they do, I'll work with them.''
The home, which doubles as Faith Mission church on Sundays, is one of 14 Ivy Avenue properties standing in the way of the recreation center. Some of the homes are vacant. Some are run down, boarded up and overgrown with weeds.
The city plans to buy them all for $450,000.
Ronnie Burroughs, the city's parks and recreation director, said he's never heard of Johnson or his self-taught painting and preaching. But art connoisseurs have: They've seen his work in galleries and books, in a public television documentary and in the 1993 Virginia Power calendar.
Johnson fans who've heard about the pending destruction of his home aren't happy about it.
``The way he has arranged his artwork, you call that type of thing an environment. The house itself really is a work of art,'' said Ann Oppenhimer, president of the Folk Art Society in Richmond.
``The sad thing is, it's not just his house. This is happening over the country. It's hard to preserve these places. They're just disappearing,'' she said.
Burroughs said Ivy Avenue was chosen by a residents' committee from among several possible sites for the new recreation center. ``It's within walking distance to the most people,'' he said.
People are struck by the unusual lettering on the exterior of Anderson's house. It's the interior, however, that Oppenhimer and others believe is so precious.
The first floor is covered with Johnson's paintings. They cover every millimeter of wall space and are stacked three and four deep along the floor and some benches. They ones that hang from the ceiling are painted on both sides.
Some of Johnson's paintings are done in oils, some in house paint. Most portray people, both famous and anonymous.
Johnson works upstairs, then moves the finished paintings downstairs, where art lovers occasionally drop in. The room includes church pews for his small congregation. In the back corner are his instruments: a keyboard, tambourines, guitars, all part of his Sunday services.
``I've been drawing since I was 18 and preaching since I was 8,'' Johnson said. ``At first, I was just preaching to the trees, but eventually people started to listen.''
Johnson has mixed feelings about being forced from his home. The city is paying him $18,900 for the church building, plus $33,700 for the house next door, which he uses for storage.
But Johnson's not entirely unhappy about the move. Ivy Avenue has become crime-ridden in recent years. Last month, someone fired a gunshot through his second-floor window.
``I'm sad in a way. I was used to this street. But maybe this will get me living somewhere else, where it's safer,'' Johnson said. ``Maybe it's God's plan.'' ILLUSTRATION: ASSOCIATED PRESS photo
Artist-preacher Anderson Johnson is philosophical about the pending
move from his art gallery/church/home.
by CNB