David Adickes
David Adickes
American, 1927–2025
Birth placeHuntsville, Texas, United States
ActiveTexas, United States
BiographyAmerican, born January 19, 1927, Huntsville, Texashttps://www.houstonchronicle.com/lifestyle/article/artist-david-adickes-died-20769228.php
[Image] David Adickes gives a tour of his warehouse Tuesday, May 18, 2021, in Houston.
Steve Gonzales/Staff photographer
David Adickes, the artist best known for his Texas-sized sculptures of presidential busts and historical figures, died on Sunday night at age 98. He was born in 1927 in Huntsville, where his 67-foot-high statue of Sam Houston still stands, visible from the freeway, to welcome passersby to his hometown.
He was the third of four sons; their father owned an electrical-appliance store, their mother worked as a homemaker and amateur artist. Young Adickes was an Eagle Scout, troop no. 98. As a teenager, he left his East Texas town for Texas A&M University in College Station, where he studied for three semesters before serving in the Air Corps and Air Transport Command. Two years later, in 1947, he enrolled at what was then the Sam Houston State Teachers College to complete his math and physics degrees before setting his sights on art.
At the time of his death, he was considered one of the most visible artists in this region. Adickes’ “We Love Houston, Too” sculpture welcomes visitors at William P. Hobby Airport. His abstract, 36-foot statues of the Beatles have entertained at 8th Wonder Brewery in EaDo since 2017. His American Statesmanship Park, a.k.a. “Mount Rush Hour,” a series of two-ton busts in the likeness of Stephen F. Austin, Sam Houston, Abraham Lincoln and George Washington, stand at the intersection of I-10 and I-45.
Adickes had recently moved into a Houston-area care facility following a stroke in December 2024, which led to age-related health complications. He died at around 10:30 p.m., surrounded by family, including his life partner, Linda Wiley, and his daughter, Mary Adickes Van Pelt.
“I’ve spent my whole life, since I was born, around his art. In my own house and in my friends' parents’ houses,” Van Pelt told the Chronicle. “He always included me. I was an only child, so I was there to christen most of his sculptures, much like a yacht christening. His art surrounded me my whole life.”
Early in his career, her father lived in Paris for two years, apprenticing at the atelier of French painter, sculptor and filmmaker Fernand Léger. That trifecta would eventually take hold in Adickes' own creative practices, too.
[Image] David Adickes with the 67-foot-3-inch-high statue of Sam Houston, the 19th century leader and first president of the Republic of Texas, in Huntsville, Oct. 7, 1994.
Christobal Perez/Houston Chronicle
Later, he taught art at the University of Texas at Austin in 1955. And spent the next summer following along in the footsteps of another French painter and sculptor, this time, the late Paul Gauguin. During another two-year jaunt, he encountered the author James Michener; the two became travel companions and lifelong friends.
In 1962, Adickes married Fort Worth native and Vassar College alum Sandra Cantey. He and his second wife, Muffet Criner, who were married in 1969, welcomed a daughter, Mary Van Pelt nee Adickes, two years later.
Some of Adickes' high-profile collectors included Dominique and John de Menil, and Priscilla and Elvis Presley. He once transformed a neglected warehouse in downtown Houston, on Commerce Street near the edge of Buffalo Bayou, into a nightclub coined the Love Street Light Circus Feel Good Machine. ZZ Top played there in 1969.
Today, the David Adickes Nance Street Studio is just a few blocks away. Adickes, the artist, shifted his focus to public art in the 1980s.
One of Van Pelt's early memories is of “Virtuoso,” a 36-foot-tall, 25-ton outdoor concrete sculptural group that her father installed just outside of the Theater District near downtown Houston’s Lyric Tower in 1983 when she was 10. Before that, she recalls his paintings and smaller works.
“He said many times that we wanted to make a small contribution to the world that would last beyond him,” Van Pelt said. “He really saw that possibility in his paintings and his larger sculptures. That was a driving motivation for him up until the end — how his art would live on.”
Adickes reportedly spent several nights at the White House in 1989, when he began "Winds of Change," an 8-foot bronze of President George H.W. Bush, which is displayed at George Bush Intercontinental Airport. The completed work was unveiled at the 1992 Republican Convention, held in Houston.
His "We Love Houston, Too" sculpture, which used to be on I-10, moved to Hobby airport in January. "It's the smaller one of the series, and we wanted it at Hobby (airport) as a welcome to Houston," said Alton DuLaney, curator of public art for Houston airports. "We're in negotiations to bring the bigger one to Bush airport. David understood that the 'We Love Houston' sculptures are a selfie moment before anyone even knew what that was."
The magic of Adickes, DuLaney adds, is that people enjoy his pieces scattered around the city without knowing much about the man who created them. Once, on a driving tour around town, Adickes handed DuLaney an unexpected souvenir. "He gave me a CD where he performed jazz, and I thought, 'There's no end to this guy's talent.'"
Van Pelt says her father had a wacky sense of humor. He could make jokes and puns easily, which he reportedly did right until the very end.
"It was a striking part of his personality," she said. "He had the strangest and funniest ways of doing something, yet somehow, it always worked."
Kelley Devine, Adickes' studio assistant for the past year and a half, often helped him prepare and finish paintings. She would piece things together by laying out the first layer of paint, prep molds or assist with the conservation of older pieces. Other times, she had lighter duties.
"He wrote a couple of joke books, and had me read them back to him so he could edit the punch lines," Devine said. "I don't wear my nice clothes to the studio, and I tend to be very messy. I have this one pair of pants that look like they could stand up on their own; they're so stiff with paint. Every day, he asked if I was wearing my 'new pants.' Towards the end, he asked me to frame them."
She hasn't yet, though she plans to. Devine remembers Adickes as a good, supportive boss.
As an adjunct professor of graduate and undergraduate sculpture at Houston Baptist University, Devine has shown some of his films and documentaries to her students. And Wiley, his partner, has already donated Adickes' studio supplies to her classroom. "The last video he created about two years ago is something he wanted to share through education. I'm thrilled to do that for him."
Two years ago, the Adickes Art Public Art Legacy Program launched with two goals: to place the third edition of presidential busts, his final comprehensive set, in a publicly accessible park or venue and secure homes for his remaining works.
In May, trial lawyer Tony Buzbee purchased and installed six special selection sculptures at his private Antioch Ranch in Cass County. "I've owned his paintings for some time. I have always liked the 'Sam Houston Statue,'" Buzbee told the Chronicle.
[Image] A George Washington sculpture by artist David Adickes' special selection series were installed at Tony Buzbee's Antioch Ranch in May.
Courtesy of Tammy Greene Dowe/Adickes Art Public Art Program
Earlier this summer, Adickes worked to place the final, complete collection of 43 presidential busts, from George Washington through Barack Obama.
“(David) would love to see them at a public accessible ranch, or city or county park. He envisions the full set would be in wide open spaces complete with water features and maybe even some ponds,” Tammy Greene Dowe, who manages the Adickes Art Public Art Program, told the Chronicle.
Many of the remaining presidential heads, busts and other works are onsite at the David Adickes Nance Street Studio near downtown. A staff runs that, though Adickes sometimes visited, and continued to make art, until the end.
“He really always felt like the show must go on. And I think that the show is absolutely still going on. 'The Beatles' (36-feet tall abstract sculptures of John Lennon, George Harrison, Paul McCartney and a slightly shorter Ringo Starr) have been bought by a major collector and will be placed later this month,” Van Pelt said. “The (president) heads will also find the right space to be enjoyed. His priority was leaving something behind for everybody else after he left.”
July 14, 2025
Person TypePerson
