Stories
Stories
Willoughby G. Walling II: A Learning Experience
Among the 31 works in "Second Show," a recent exhibit of Wib Walling's paintings, one in particular seems to reflect the disparate paths that have brought the artist to this juncture in his life. Titled Self-Portrait, the work is a mixed-media composition of seven separate portraits, painted at different times, in dissimilar styles and moods. "None of these individually captures me, but together they do," explains Walling, a quietly intense man who has been painting full-time for just a year.
A history major at Stanford, Walling went on to earn advanced degrees in divinity, education, and business. His job titles have included urban youth worker, teacher, White House policy advisor, and fundraiser. He remembers an exercise in John Kotter's class at HBS that required each student to come up with a career plan. "I listed quite a few jobs I'd like to have," says Walling. "By happenstance more than anything else, I think I've done just about all of them."
Walling's interest in educational reform runs deep, and when you ask him about his experiences on the front lines of the battle for better schools, he doesn't hide his frustration. "My biggest career goal was to see an urban school district work well, and it still hasn't been done. That's a real tragedy." His most recent school-related job ended in 1995, when he left his position as president of the organization responsible for fundraising and support of the Boston University/Chelsea Public Schools Partnership. "BU made some improvements in Chelsea, but I wouldn't hold that initiative up as a model for change," he observes.
Walling's experiments in art started ten years ago, when he took a set of paints with him on vacation in Montana. "It was a pretty place, and I thought I would try to capture it," he says of the beginnings of what he now terms his "obsession." Since leaving his day job as a fundraiser for the University of Massachusetts last year, Walling has produced about a painting a week from his studio at home in suburban Boston. His wife, Susie, who runs job-training programs for welfare recipients, and his two grown children, both of whom are involved in the arts, have been supportive, notes Walling.
Influenced by van Gogh, Horace Pippin, Basquiat, and Henri Rousseau, among others, Walling aspires to a style that is "between realistic representation and abstraction." He wants his paintings to be marketable and visually pleasing, but he also intends them to be intellectual exercises. The works in his recent show ranged from a pop art portrait of his wife, to paintings with theological underpinnings, to a series of intricate "web" paintings that allow forms and colors to emerge from behind an undulating veil of woven triangles.
In the exhibit's catalog, Walling writes of his desire "to discover or impose a framework on apparent chaos. The paintings portray my faith that life does have a structure or relatedness," he explains, "even if it is only vaguely discernible." As with so many of the chapters in Wib Walling's life, he strongly believes, "every painting is a learning experience."
Post a Comment
Related Stories
-
- 01 Jun 2023
- HBS Alumni Bulletin
Spray Canon
Re: Jeffrey Deitch (MBA 1978); James W. Riley (Assistant Professor of Business Administration); By: Dan Morrell -
- 01 Jun 2022
- HBS Alumni Bulletin
Action Plan: Writing the Next Chapter
Re: Carole Hubscher Clements (PMD 73); By: April White -
- 01 Apr 2022
- New York Times
Nancy Lane Remembered
-
- 24 Mar 2022
- Barron’s
20 Minutes With: CultureWorks CEO Josh Wyatt (MBA 2005)
Re: Josh Wyatt (MBA 2005)