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Artist: Howard Finster (American, 1916-2001)
A Baptist minister and a self-taught artist. Finster's work combines and comments on the intersections of Christian theology, recounts in history, and popular culture. His paintings and sculptures include a wide range of bizarre subjects, including angels, aliens, and historical figures such as George Washington and Elvis Presley. Finster was a Baptist minister and used visions that he believed were divine inspirations from God as inspiration for his work. One of Finster's most well-known pieces was a garden installation, the Paradise Gardens. This garden featured models of inventions made by mankind, with the goal of making models of everything humans had ever invented set within a Garden of Eden space. He was also known for designing album art for many roack-and-roll bands such as the Talking Heads and R.E.M. Today, his works are in the collections of the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington D.C., the High Museum of Art in Atlanta, and the Philadelphia Museum of Art, among others.