Museum
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The murals a painter locked in a small room and told nobody about, fifteen minutes from the Biloxi casinos.
Photo: Paul LowryCC BY 4.0
Walter Inglis Anderson lived on this coast, rowed a small open boat twelve miles out to Horn Island whenever he could, and painted what he found there. He died in 1965. When his family opened a room at his cottage at Shearwater that he had kept locked, they found it painted floor to ceiling with a single day, sunrise through to night, worked in imagery that draws on Psalm 104. Nobody had seen it. He had not mentioned it.
That room is why this museum exists and why it is worth fifteen minutes of driving from a Biloxi hotel. The Walter Anderson Museum of Art opened on Washington Avenue in Ocean Springs in May 1991 and holds work by Anderson and by his brothers: Peter, who founded Shearwater Pottery here in 1928, and James McConnell Anderson. The Little Room is preserved as part of the collection.
Anderson is not a gentle sentimental nature painter and the museum does not present him as one. He had a breakdown in the late 1930s, spent periods in psychiatric hospitals and was diagnosed with schizophrenia. From 1945 he made repeated solitary trips to Horn Island, sleeping under his upturned skiff, and kept journals of them — around ninety survive — that combine close biological observation with argument about art and nature. The work that came out of it is fast, bright, patterned and slightly relentless, and it reads as one person's sustained attempt to get the Gulf Coast onto paper.
The museum's holdings extend beyond the walls. Anderson's murals in the Ocean Springs Community Center next door — a cycle including d'Iberville's 1699 landing and the "Seven Climates" — are part of the institution.
The 2005 storm surge reached the family's stored collection, flooding a concrete structure built after Camille to protect it. Much of it was conserved and recovered. That episode is part of the story here now, in a way nobody would have chosen.
From Biloxi, take US 90 east across the Biloxi Bay Bridge and turn into downtown Ocean Springs; the museum is on Washington Avenue, the main street, about fifteen minutes from the Biloxi Lighthouse.
Parking is on-street and in small lots nearby. It is free and it is limited, and on a Saturday or during the autumn arts festival you will be walking a few blocks. That is not a hardship in a town this size.
Walking or cycling across the bridge from Biloxi is possible on the separated lane and takes about half an hour each way to the Ocean Springs shore, plus ten minutes into town. In July, start early.
There is no practical public transport from Biloxi hotels. A taxi or rideshare across the bridge is short and inexpensive.
Horn Island lies about twelve miles off this coast. It is federally designated wilderness, has no facilities of any kind and is reached only by private boat. Anderson went there from 1945 onward in a skiff he rowed himself, often for a week or more, sleeping under the hull and living on what he carried.
Understanding that changes the pictures. The herons, the pelicans, the dune plants and the weather in the work are not studio inventions. They are field observation from somebody who was on an empty barrier island in July with no shade, repeatedly, on purpose.
The journals are the other half of it. Around ninety survive, and they run between species notes, weather, and argument with himself about what art is for. Extracts appear in the museum's displays and they are worth reading rather than walking past.
If you have been to Ship Island, or have looked out from Davis Bayou at the low grey line on the horizon, you have seen the world these paintings came out of. It is the same chain of islands, and Horn is the one nobody lands on.
This works better with children than most art museums, because the imagery is animals, weather and islands rather than portraits, and because the museum runs family programming and hands-on sessions.
The caveats are real, though. It is quiet, it is small, and there is not a great deal of room for a child who needs to move. Under-fives will get more out of the morning at Lynn Meadows in Gulfport.
For anybody eight and upwards it lands well, particularly when paired with the story: a man who rowed himself out to an empty island, alone, and painted what was there. Told that way, the pictures stop being wallpaper.
Pair it with lunch on Washington Avenue and a walk to the waterfront and you have a comfortable half day out of Biloxi that costs very little and is nothing like the rest of your trip.
Straight-line distances, so allow more on the road — the island is long and has one main parkway.
Neighbourhood
Two miles east across Biloxi Bay: galleries, live oaks, a walkable main street and the site of the first French settlement on this coast.
2–6 hoursFree to visit. Galleries are free to browse; the museum and Shearwater are separate.480 ft away
Nature preserve
The only piece of the national seashore in Mississippi with a road to it: oaks, boardwalks, a bayou and a staffed visitor centre.
1–3 hoursFree to enter and to walk. Camping is charged.2.5 mi away
Water feature
The sheltered estuary behind the peninsula, where the shrimp grow up and the fleet goes to hide from hurricanes.
0.5–4 hoursFree. Public ramps, bridges and shoreline access cost nothing, though some ramps may charge for launching.3.3 mi away
Museum
Frank Gehry's metal pods set among live oaks, built to hold the twisted, paper-thin pottery of a man who called himself mad.
1.5–2.5 hoursA modest admission charge for adults with reduced rates for students, seniors and children. Walking the grounds between the buildings costs nothing.3.6 mi away
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A small room at Walter Anderson's cottage at Shearwater that he kept locked and painted floor to ceiling, showing a single day from sunrise through to night in imagery connected to Psalm 104. His family found it after his death in 1965; he had never shown it to anyone or spoken about it. The museum preserves it as part of the collection, and it is the reason most people make the trip.
About fifteen minutes by car: east on US 90 across the Biloxi Bay Bridge and into downtown Ocean Springs, where the museum sits on Washington Avenue. Parking nearby is free but limited. The bridge carries a separated walking and cycling lane, so it is also reachable on foot or by bike in roughly forty minutes from the Biloxi side, which is a pleasant approach outside the hottest months.
A Mississippi Gulf Coast painter, 1903 to 1965, whose brother Peter founded Shearwater Pottery in Ocean Springs in 1928. He had a breakdown in the late 1930s, was treated in psychiatric hospitals and diagnosed with schizophrenia, and from 1945 rowed a small boat twelve miles out to Horn Island repeatedly, living rough and filling around ninety journals. The watercolours and block prints that came out of those trips are the core of his reputation.
Around ninety minutes covers it properly, including the Little Room and the murals in the adjoining Community Center. It is a small museum and denser than its footprint suggests, so an hour feels rushed and three would be too long unless there is a temporary exhibition you want. Most people pair it with lunch on Washington Avenue and make a half day of Ocean Springs.