Oct 17, 2015

Bobby Adams, a 69-year old flea market dealer raised in Dundalk, never expected to see his art in a museum. Now Adams, a self-taught photographer, writer and mixed-media artist, is seeing his creative output with new eyes at “The Big Hope Show,” which opened this month at the American Visionary Art Museum. Rebecca Hoffberger, the museum’s director, discovered Adams through another Baltimore original, John Waters. Adams, a hippie in the late 1960s, fell in with the young filmmaker and his renegade collaborators. “Pink Flamingos” was filmed at the Phoenix, Maryland farm where Adams was living. His photographs of those outsider days seem particularly at home at AVAM, the haven for intuitive visionary artists who thrive outside of society’s conventions.

: Bobby Adams, whose work is featured in “The Big Hope Show” at the American Visionary Art Museum, outside his bungalow in Bowley’s Quarters where he produces his artwork and writings. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: Bobby Adams creates hundreds of personalized Christmas cards each year for his friends. His work, including cards, is featured in “The Big Hope Show” at the American Visionary Art Museum. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: Bobby Adams holds one of his humorous Christmas cards, which feature his snapshots and other collage items. He has photos of Divine from his days as part of John Waters’ Dreamlanders film crew. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: “Odie on Line” includes a specially printed and starched t-shirt with a photo of Odie, hung by clothes pins in front of circuit boards. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: Bobby Adams holds an art piece with toy poodles given to him as a gift from a Fells Point artist. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: Mya, a rescue cockapoo, looks up at her owner, Bobby Adams in a room filled with his art and collectibles. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: Visionary artist Bobby Adams created 50 works of art in homage to his beloved toy poodle Odie, including this framed piece called “Love Machine,” arranged with toys and collectibles on a shelf at his home. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: Art pieces, figurines, toys and other collectibles are blended in eclectic displays in his Bobby Addams’ small home in Bowleys Quarters. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: Detail of “I’ll Trade You 19 Ripkens” places Bobby Adams’ toy poodle Odie on baseball cards. Visionary artist Adams created 50 works of art in homage to Odie almost twenty years ago, when he turned 50. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: Bobby Adams holds a commemorative plate of Ike and Mamie Eisenhower on display in his home. It was used in the skull shack scene of the John Waters movie, “Cry Baby.” (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: Bobby Adams listens to a recording of a Johnny Cash singing “I Walk the Line” inside a miniature guitar. The novelty toy is one of the items he is selling at the Fells Point flea market where he has been a vendor for about 20 years. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: Shelves at the home of visionary artist Bobby Adams are filled with knick knacks, sculpture and art made by Adams and other artist friends. The colorful head in the center was a gift to Bob from artist Jim Thompson. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: Bobby Adams walks with his rescue dog Mya behind his home, which overlooks Galloway Creek in Bowleys Quarters. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: “Every Day is Christmas” includes images of Odie combined with Santa below a Christmas tree made from dog food cans. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: “Cereal Dog” with Odie-named cereals, in the living room of visionary artist Bobby Adams. He created 50 works of art in homage to his beloved toy poodle Odie almost twenty years ago, when he turned 50. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: While fellow vendor Sareva Racher, center, chats with Bobby Adams, right, at the Fells Point flea market where both are longtime vendors, customers look at one of his tables of sale items. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: “Sympathy for the Poodle” combines puzzle pieces with a riff from the Rolling Stones “Sympathy for the Devil.” (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: A detail of the scrapbooks created by Bobby Adams, on display in a case at “The Big Hope Show,” which runs through September 4, 2016. Adams has been creating scrapbooks about his life, as well as scrapbooks made as gifts for others, as a way to celebrate life and friendships. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: Bobby Adams, 69, works at his computer keyboard on a poem at home. He has been writing poems and essays since he was young, and has self-published several books. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: “Details at Eleven,” an assemblage that includes a sign and flag from an imaginary Odieland. When visionary artist Bobby Adams turned 50, he created 50 works of art in homage to his beloved toy poodle Odie. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: Bobby Adams discusses his art at a media preview of “The Big Hope Show,” as Rebecca Hoffberger, right, the founder and director of the American Visionary Art Museum listens. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: Bobby Adams contemplates his photographs and art assemblages, which fill an entire room of the “The Big Hope Show” at the American Visionary Art Museum. The exhibit runs through September 4, 2016. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: Bobby Adams, an exuberant outsider artist, poses next to his toy poodles on display at the American Visionary Art Museum. The collection is a loving homage to his own beloved toy poodle, Odie. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: Bobby Adams sorts through books he has for sale at the Fells Point flea market where he has been a vendor for about 20 years. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: Visionary artist Bobby Adams created “Hang in There,” a framed collage and installation made for a friend’s son who loved Star Wars. Adams tries to make a homemade gift for every one of his friends; this one he is keeping temporarily for the friend. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: Bobby Adams makes many scrapbooks for himself and friends. This one has photographs from his period with filmmaker John Waters and his friends, left, actor Divine, center, and a photograph Adams made of two boys that became a best-selling card, right. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

: Bobby Adams, 69, walks with his rescue dog Mya on the dock behind his house, which overlooks Galloway Creek. (Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun)

Adams’ exuberance takes shape in kitschy assemblages, obsessive scrapbooking, mischievous collaged Christmas cards and elaborate collections of talismans of popular culture, all created in his bungalow in Bowleys Quarters. Many of the pieces are conceived as gifts for friends, because Adams’ life, mirrored in his art, is as much about the act of giving as it is about the object itself. For Adams, an astute observer of life’s ironies, connecting with others is transformative. His favorite motto is, “I came seeking friendship, instead I found love.”

Adams, who is by turns gregarious and reflective, has successfully overcome the traumas of a harsh father, a mother who committed suicide, and a compulsive overeating disorder. Yet his work, Hoffberger says, “teaches us that friendship and loving is a high art that reaps great and beautiful rewards.” Bobby Adams will be one of the honorees, for his artistic merit, at AVAM’s 20th anniversary gala on Sunday, November 21.

Bobby Adams, an artist of unusual vision

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