Who is Cloyde Wiley?
His name is "Cloyde, pronounced like "Floyd," only
with a "C." In spite of the fact that he’s the third
consecutive Cloyde William Wiley, people usually
manage to mangle his name, calling him Claude,
Cloud, Clyde, Clod, Clive, Will, Joe, and a few
stranger variations. But keep this quiet man
straight in your mind, as he is doing memorable
work. Wiley is an artist whose primary format is
photography. His specialty, and his passion, is to
artistically and truthfully document life on and
around the Chesapeake Bay.
Wiley spent his early childhood wading the Virginia
backwaters of Urbanna Creek, often with live soft
crabs in his pants pockets. As he grew into a gangly
young man, he drove his prized 1931 Model A Ford,
which he still owns, to and from Middlesex High
School in Saluda. Although he left for college and
the life beyond in the late 1960s, the nostalgic
rhythms of the small port town continued to shape
his life. Although largely consumed by his career at
Central Virginia Community College (CVCC) in
Lynchburg, from which he retired in 2005, he
maintained a constant connection with Urbanna.
Life has a way of throwing other requirements at
your feet, and Wiley admits that staying focused on
his "Bay Project" was a challenge. And, he has been
actively working on it since 1989. But, the work
really started to take off when, in he moved his
sail boat from Smith Mountain Lake back home to
Urbanna, where he slipped it, until several years
ago when he returned to buy a gorgeous little slice
of Heaven on Perkins Creek.
During his 35-year teaching career at CVCC, Wiley’s
work has been included in the permanent collection
at the Virginia Museum of Fine Art and many private
collections. He has had countless exhibitions and
awards for his photography, and was recently
featured in BaySplash Magazine.
Wiley’s sailing trips usually comprise two main
objectives. The first is to find memorable subjects
to photograph. The second is the search for the
perfect crab cake. He admits a real love for sunrise
on the boat, enjoying freshly perked coffee brewed
on the boat’s alcohol stove.
While sailing is pretty much a seasonal pleasure,
the photography is year-round. At CVCC, Cloyde
taught students of all ages and backgrounds
everything in photography from how to frame those
first shots in a single lens reflex camera to
advanced photography, photojournalism, color
photography, and advanced darkroom techniques. And
when digital photography and printing reached a high
enough quality, he was learning, practicing, and
teaching it ahead of the crowd.
In his latest exhibits, Wiley has shown startlingly
beautiful prints, many of them archivally produced
digital prints, of seascapes, lighthouses, vintage
boats, watermen, bay festivals, and light playing on
the water.
A photograph of Grog Island that he made in 2002 is
now much in demand, especially since Hurricane
Isabel nearly destroyed the tiny island north of
Windmill Point in Fleets Bay. Of the trees pictured,
when he returned to photograph in the summer of
2004, only about 12 remained alive. "Unlike many of
the nostalgic images captured, this was destroyed by
nature, not man," he commented.
After several years of restoration, Wiley enjoys a
waterview porch in Urbanna, his favorite morning
spot to sip coffee and watch the Great Blue Heron,
turtles, and muskrats navigate the water and its
edges.
A unique man, this Cloyde Wiley. He is fun,
thoughtful, organized, and creative, with a
wonderful gift for the meaning beneath the image,
the story behind the picture. This is the kind of
depth that separates the technician from the artist.
This is what causes Wiley’s work to rise the top,
like sweet cream.
"This is not a retirement," Wiley emphasized of his
recent departure from CVCC. "It is finally time to
concentrate on my life’s goals that for so long have
been only partially realized." |
