Dudley Carter

Will Redmond's most famous artist have a park to call home?

© By Lyn Fleury Lambert (2007)

A local journalist lamented in print near the close of the 20th Century that nowhere on the bustling Eastside was there a place where one might journey for nostalgic or sentimental reasons, no special spot where one could boost a sagging spirit or renew a sense of soul. A reader responded, suggesting that indeed there was such a place, a little green jewel of a place, on Leary Way in Redmond, known by the uninspired moniker of Slough House Park.

In 1992 artist and centenarian Dudley Carter, adjudged by many to be the Eastside's most treasured artist, internationally

known and loved, died, leaving behind a marvelous legacy at Slough House Park. Dudley.s bequest included his art studio, fashioned in the manner of a native Haida dwelling, and a group of monumental wood sculptures of the sort that brought the sculptor to international prominence. But perhaps most importantly, Dudley Carter bequeathed to us a sense of primordial spirit . a spirit noted by some to be a perfect antidote for obsession with corporate life and high technology. That spirit permeates the place where Dudley Carter lived and worked and died.

The woodsman cum artist, born in Canada in 1891, first excited the art world in 1932 when the new Seattle Art Museum purchased his 11-foot axe-hewn cedar sculpture, "Rivalry of the Winds". (Now on display at the Redmond Library.) For the next 60 years he enjoyed a highly prolific and profitable career as a monumental wood sculptor. Many of his works continue to proclaim their Northwest-Coast-Native-inspired beauty throughout the Puget Sound landscape. His "Legend of the Moon," interpreting a myth important to the Coast Salish who long ago peopled this land we now call home, has greeted visitors to Redmond's Marymoor Park since 1978.

In 1987, King County boldly appointed 96-year-old Dudley Carter their first Artist-in-Residence and gave the old master the key to the 1950s rambler located on property purchased as part of the Sammamish Trail right-of-way. Until Dudley moved in, the home had been used off and on for art classes, yoga classes and the like.

Prior to the county's acquisition, the property belonged to a noted horticulturist and his family. In the mid 1950s, Dudley Carter had built a home and studio on acreage he and his wife owned on the Bellevue-Redmond Road in the wilderness that is now Redmond. He lived and worked there for about 40 years. When in his 80s, Dudley sold the property, havingbeen told he could expect to remain there the rest of his life. That didn't pan out, however, and at the age of 94 he found himself without a home. That's when Dudley Carter fans got busy and successfully lobbied King County to establish him as Artist-in-Residence.

Dudley fulfilled his role vigorously, welcoming the public from daybreak to dusk, seven days a week. Thousands made the pilgrimage to Slough House Park -- apprentice artists came to advance their skill; collectors found treasures to enhance their homes and gardens; tourists ventured in to check out a man with a unique heritage and an art form unfamiliar to them; developers sought sculptured spirit for their projects; media people - writers, photographers, painters, radio broadcasters, TV crews, film-makers came, recognizing in him a worthy subject; young children with their parents and teachers enjoyed his fanciful creations and his stories of the ways of life that prompted those creations; elders came,hoping to comprehend how it can be possible .to be alive and well and working so dynamically at one-hundred. Dudley graciously welcomed all.

After a brief illness the much revered artist died in his sleep in the Slough House residence, just a month short of his 101st birthday. Later, talented native Haida artist Ralph Bennett arrived on the scene, determined to do what he could to sustain the legacy of this white man who helped preserve and advance the art and culture of Northwest Coast indigenous people.

With the approval of King County, Ralph moved into Slough House and picked up the mantle of Artist-in-Residence. Ralph, with an energetic group of supporters, went to work, creating his own fine carvings, generously sharing the art, the stories, the culture of his people . and in so doing, maintained the little forested park as a delightful place for pilgrimage until 1998 when the county abruptly decided to close the premises.

Meanwhile, admirers of Dudley Carter and his art were working with corporate entities and withLeonard Garfield, then manager of King County.s Office of Cultural Resources to preserve Dudley.s legacy. Garfield prepared a proposal for a Dudley C. Carter Northwest Arts andCultural Center at Slough House Park. Dudley's Haida House studio and a renovated or redesigned residence would accommodate a succession of artists-in-residence. A sculpturegarden would showcase the grouping of monumental Carter works acquired in 1995 by arts patron Marvin Boys. Other sculptures would join them as circumstances allowed.

With funding for parks hard to come by, King County Council declined to implement the plan and a prime piece of spirit-filled property along with Dudley Carter's unique Haida style studio and four fine artworks sit there while Nature does what Nature does to take back to herself those wonderful woodworks. Thankfully, a number of Dudley Carter's irreplaceable works are preserved elsewhere, appropriately displayed in museums, libraries, schools and other public venues. Those at Slough House Park cry out for similar attention.

Is it too late to claim the legacy endowed to us by Dudley Carter? Have we lost the chance to redeem a very special place for pilgrimage while we let government bureaucracies slowly grind their gears? Time will tell. Or will it take eternity?

Dudley Carter is the subject of a book in progress, "Remembering Dudley," by H. Mary Sikkema and Lyn Fleury Lambert.