Call Me Crazy
“Call Me Crazy” 48” x 48” (1950s pharmacy papers from Crazy Hotel, acrylic and ink on aluminum panel)
People often ask me where I find the “stuff” that I use in my artwork.
Occasionally, I am on a hunt for something specific, but more often than not, the “stuff” finds me. Sounds a bit crazy, right? Crazy…like the hotel, maybe?
It really was called the Crazy Hotel, or more precisely the Crazy Water Hotel. Several years ago, I stumbled across the six-story abandoned building once known as the Crazy Water Hotel in Mineral Wells, Texas (population 15,000), about an hour outside Fort Worth. The hotel sits near the equally eccentric, twice-as-large Baker Hotel that once attracted celebrities such as Will Rogers, Clark Gable, and Judy Garland, as well as famed outlaws Bonnie and Clyde. The dueling hotels were both built in the 1920s to capitalize on the 150,000 tourists who came annually to Mineral Wells to partake of the “health benefits” of the city’s mineral-rich alkaline waters.
The Crazy Water Hotel, like many other establishments in the town, earned its name from the area waters that purportedly cured an early resident of mental illness. Legend has it that an old woman sat and drank the water at one of the in-town wells all day, inspiring some local children to dub her the “crazy woman at the well.” One day, the woman stood up, claimed she had been healed, leaving the “crazy” legacy for future advertising fodder: "Crazy Water Hotel, Mineral Wells, Texas--Where America Drinks its Way to Health."
The Crazy Water Hotel struggled to compete with the more lavish Baker Hotel, so its owners, Dallas businessmen Carr and Hal Collins, turned their attention to distributing a crystallized version of the water. The Crazy Crystals empire eventually spanned the country in part due to their heavy investment in radio advertising. The brothers purchased a Mexican radio station just across the border to boost their reach, which featured the popular music group “The Crazy Gang,” and introduced Broadway star Mary Martin who sang on the show for free, in exchange for the ability to use the upstairs ballroom for giving dance lessons. (Fun fact: Mary Martin would come back to Dallas in later years to visit her son Larry Hagman, aka J.R. Ewing.)
So what does this crazy history have to do with me?
Spurred by my interest in weathered signage, I explored the decaying buildings of Mineral Wells, taking photos for future inspiration. After learning a bit of the history of the hotels I wandered into an antique store. Tucked in a corner was a small object, something like an old rolodex filled with handwritten pages that turned out to be pharmacy prescription papers from the early 1950s. Hardly legible, the physician handwriting was fascinating, almost like hieroglyphics. Although I didn’t understand the cryptic notation, the quantity and repetition of the papers was mesmerizing. Upon closer inspection, I noticed that the prescriptions were generated by pharmacies or clinics housed in the “Crazy Hotel Building.” The juxtaposition of that location with prescriptions for weekly doses of barbiturates proved too tempting to leave behind, even if I didn’t know what I would do with the papers.
I have used those prescription papers in numerous pieces of artwork over the years. I credit them as an early step towards my current work that explores disintegration as a metaphor for the passage of time, specifically through the lens of outdated textual information. The most recent piece “Crazy for You” is currently part of the “2020: Discovering Repeating Patterns” exhibit on display through April 11 at Spring Street Studios in Houston, Texas. The scale of “Crazy for You” (48” x 48”) accentuates the repetitive nature of these prescriptions—and perhaps our reliance on prescriptive cures— as well as the obscure beauty of “doctor scrawl.” Computer-generated prescriptions (as well as HIPAA regulations) would preclude the availability of anything similar today. For me, the hurried handwriting and the crumbling papers used in this artwork capture the fragility—or futility—of our struggle with aging.
Call Me Crazy / 48” x 48” (acrylic , ink & 1950s pharmacy papers on aluminum panel)
Read more about the Crazy Water Hotel and the current renovation of the Baker Hotel