First Posted: 1/15/2009

WINSTON-SALEM - His 1992 Ford van looks like a marraige of the Partridge family bus, The Beatles' yellow submarine and the Scooby-Doo van.
He walks with a banana yellow tie outlined with blue cows and green horses, baggy trousers inlaid with stars and moons, a three-quarter-length multicolored coat that would make Joseph envious and a florescent fedora with a stick-figure American flag at its center.
Colored polka dots are splattered everywhere.
Meet folk artist Sam “The Dot Man” McMillan, a Fairmont native whose paintings were recently on display at the Smithsonian Institute in Washing-ton, D.C.
McMillan will be the guest of honor Tuesday at the Community in Schools' seventh annual fund-raiser. He is unlike other artists, who often see selling their work as selling out.
“I have an unconventional business philosophy, in that I make art so people can sell or buy it,” said McMillan from his Winston-Salem shop. “Paint-ings are made to be sold so they can be appreciated by others. It's better to have pennies in your pocket than to not have any.”
The 78-year-old McMillan knows about shallow pockets. He spent most of his life working tobacco and cotton fields, as a driver and doing other blue-collar jobs. Big money didn't come until he retired.
In the last 18 years, the self-taught artist, who quit school in the sixth grade, developed a reputation as one of the premier folk artists in the nation. He is busy year-round with festivals, shows and workshops. He carries clout in the art world.
“They call me and I get other artists to show up, that's how it works a lot of the time,” McMillan said. “Each year I've got big shows in New York, Atlanta, Alabama and California, and do school classes in places like Detroit, New Jersey, Florida and all over the place.”
Yet, McMillan is just as likely to give away his art as he is to sell it.
“People are always fussing when I give away things,” he said. “But to me that's part of what it's all about, and I guess I can't help myself. I've always lived to the credo that, if you love everything and everybody, everything else falls into place.”

Folk niche

McMillan's art may never be compared to Van Gogh, Michelangelo, Picasso or da Vinci's, but it imitates modernists like Andy Warhol with a simplistic, primitive and inviting style. He says folk art is more about feeling and emotion than technique and complexity.
“It's drawing like in the funny papers, but it's been in big demand and selling like hot-cakes,” McMillan said. “I often teach students who can draw better than me. But I try to get them to use more color and connect to it in ways they have never done before. I want them to touch it with her hearts.”
Without formal training as a painter, McMillan says he tries to teach children and adults to tap into their artistic senses.
“We all have different ways,” he said. “I look at something and draw or paint what's in my head. When I look at what I painted, it represents that object better than a picture because it has a way of taking on a new life that is magnified and expanded.”
McMillan paints what ever he sees - saw blades, furniture, clothing, boots, appliances, bicycles, instruments and toys. He says people often bring him bizarre objects to paint and are vague in what they want, allowing him to create.
“They always like what I do,” he said. “I can't remember one person say they didn't like the work.”
McMillan, who has fath-ered nine children from two marriages, began to lean toward art while working at the Haynes family estate in Winston-Salem.
He received help from art critic Robert Moyer, who introduced his work at major shows, where McMillan became the center of attention. McMillan has customers from across the country.
McMillan continues to grow artistically.
“He's constantly experimenting and exploring, although you'd be hard pressed to understand it unless you took a long hard look at his work,” Moyer said. “What makes it all the better is that Sam works very quickly.”

Taking bids

A few of his McMillan's works will be on the CIS auction block.
Local painters Matt Thompson, Katherine Hewitt and Becca Brown have also donated works. Other items up for bid include Jim Tripp's pottery, “chainsaw critters” from Clyde Jones and handmade jewelry by Lynn Noble.
The cocktail buffet fund-raiser is at the Lumberton home of Richard and Patti Pellegrini, located at 13 Trinity Drive. The Second Time Around Band will perform. Cost for the 7 to 9 p.m. event is $50. For information, call 738-1734.
CIS is in its 12th year as an outreach organization to help struggling students in the public schools. The organization hopes to raise $45,000 from the fund-raiser.
“This is our fund-raiser but also a chance for us to let the public know what we are doing,” said Dencie Lambdin, the executive director of CIS. “We're in 18 schools and have 450 volunteers who last year gave 17,000 hours of their time.”
E.A. Neelon, co-chairman of the annual fund-raiser, said the organization tries to feature Robesonians who have been successful nationally.
“Not a lot of people realize how many of our own go out and make a difference in the world,” she said. “Two years ago we highlighted Drew Levinson. This time I think we found someone just about everyone can relate to in Sam McMillan. He's inspirational and interesting.”