Souls Grown Deep like the Rivers

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Contents

8 President’s Foreword Rebecca Salter PRA 11 Preface Maxwell L. Anderson

12 Stories of Reclamation Raina Lampkins-Fielder 32 Catalogue plates 120 Biographies of the Artists Rebecca Bray | Emma Yau 136 Endnotes 137 Further Reading 139 Photographic Acknowledgements 140 Index

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President’s Foreword This exhibition presents the work of Black

education beyond elementary level, and none

artists who were born in the American South

had access to formal artistic training. Instead

between 1887 and 1965. Instead of taking part

they learned their skills from more informal

in the Great Migration of 1910–70, during which

sources, often family members or friends.

millions of Black people moved to the Northern

It is thus particularly poignant that the Royal

States with the promise of greater economic

Academy is showing their work and thereby

prosperity, they stayed in their native

stimulating discourse about different modes

communities in the South. There they were

of learning and the teaching of artistic skills.

subjected to the harrowing legacy of the region’s

The exhibition was partly inspired by the

history of enslavement. They endured poor

Royal Academy’s Summer Exhibition of 2021,

economic conditions, legalised racism and

co-ordinated by Yinka Shonibare CBE RA,

segregation, lynchings, murder and myriad of

which included many works by artists from

forms of violence. In their work they confronted

Africa and the diaspora as well as African-

not only the historical background of the South

American artists such as Thornton Dial and

but also the realities of economic and social

Mary Lee Bendolph, who are also featured here.

inequalities and racial conflict. Much of their

This brought us into contact with the Souls

inspiration came from everyday life, historical

Grown Deep Foundation in Atlanta, Georgia,

and current events, religion and music, as well

which generously lent several works to that

as African traditions. With limited access to

exhibition. The idea soon came about of

traditional artists’ materials they frequently

organising an exhibition to introduce the

turned to scrap metal, found objects, branches,

British public more fully to the extraordinary

roots, clay, soil and composite materials, all of

collection of the Georgia-based art collector

which they transformed into some of the most

William Arnett (1939–2020), who established

imaginative and powerful artworks of the

the Souls Grown Deep Foundation. Most works

twentieth century.

in the show are being seen in Europe for the

The Royal Academy was founded by a

first time.

group of artists, led by Sir Joshua Reynolds

We would like to express our deepest

PRA, whose aim was to establish Britain’s

gratitude to the President of the Souls Grown

first art school, offering a formalised training

Deep Foundation, Maxwell L. Anderson, and

for artists and architects. This aim has always

to its curator, Raina Lampkins-Fielder, for so

remained at the heart of the institution. Few

readily agreeing to embark on this project and

of the artists in this exhibition enjoyed an

for lending us such an extraordinary number

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of works. Raina’s expertise in the field and

to the Zabludowicz Collection for their loan.

her knowledge of the artists and their work

The exhibition’s elegant design and graphics

have been invaluable in her role as the show’s

are the work of Ian Gardner of ILK Ltd, with

principal curator, in which she has been ably

lighting design by Lucy Record. We hope this

assisted by Emma Yau. We would also like to

handsome exhibition catalogue with an essay

thank the Foundation’s Board Chair, Mary

by Raina Lampkins-Fielder and individual

Margaret Pettway, and Scott Browning,

artist’s biographies by Rebecca Bray and

Director of Collections, for his help with

Emma Yau will serve as a useful introduction

many organisational and practical matters.

to these less well-known artists and their

Max, Raina and Scott also kindly hosted

work. It was designed by Patrick Morrissey

our curators on a memorable trip to Alabama

of Unlimited and the text was copy-edited by

during which they visited Joe Minter’s African

Caroline Ellerby. We would like to thank Peter

Village in America in Birmingham, and Gee’s

Sawbridge, our Head of Publishing and Editorial

Bend for the first Airing of the Quilts Festival.

Director, for steering the book to publication

At the Royal Academy, the exhibition

with the greatest sense of calm and patience.

has been curated by Axel Rüger with Rebecca

The exhibition came late into the programme,

Bray, Assistant Curator. The challenges of

and presented a considerable financial challenge.

a relatively short planning period and the

We are therefore especially grateful to the Ford

myriad details of the exhibition’s organisation

Foundation and its President, Darren Walker,

were skilfully managed by Flora Fricker with

who quickly came to our aid. We would also like

Abbie Latham, and photographic rights and

to thank the Souls Grown Deep Foundation for

reproduction were overseen by Caroline Arno.

their financial support as well as Brooke Brown

We would also like to thank Andrea Tarsia,

Barzun and Matthew Barzun, the Mead Family

Director of Exhibitions, and Idoya Beitia, Head

Foundation, and Alison Jacques and Hannah

of Exhibitions, for their support, and the Royal

Robinson. We are grateful too to Charlie Fellows

Academy’s Exhibitions Committee, chaired by

and Jeremy Epstein of Edel Assanti Gallery for

Stephen Chambers RA, for their enthusiastic

their support and for helping us to bring Lonnie

endorsement of the project from the outset.

Holley to London to perform at the opening of

Although most loans have come from the

the exhibition.

Souls Grown Deep Foundation, we owe a debt

Rebecca Salter PRA President, Royal Academy of Arts

of thanks to a few other lenders in the United States: Rand Suffolk, Director of the High Museum of Art in Atlanta; Alex Nyerges, Director of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, and Valerie Cassel-Oliver, who generously agreed loans at short notice; Steve Pitkin, not only for the loans but also for brilliant photography; Mary Lee Bendolph, Essie Bendolph Pettway and Rubin Bendolph Jr; Thomas Scanlin; and an anonymous private collection. In London we express our gratitude to Maciej Urbanek and Graham Fleming for sharing with us their passion for Purvis Young and lending several of his works, as well as

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Preface For two centuries before the American Civil

have been saddled with patronising epithets

War (1861–65), the American South was an

ranging from ‘self-taught’ to ‘visionary’.

agrarian region economically dependent

Twentieth- and twenty-first-century Black

on the enslavement of Black people. The

artists whose ancestors and families left the

Transatlantic trade in enslaved people was

South during Reconstruction (1865–77) and

the primary factor in wealth creation in the

the Great Migration (1910–70) were afforded a

South, but also benefited families in Britain

prospective advantage over those who remained.

from the time of Elizabeth I to the Slavery

Life in major American cities in the North,

Abolition Act of 1833. Enslavement yielded

Midwest and West included proximity, if not

a massive, unremunerated labour force that

guaranteed access to universities, museums,

spawned industries in commodities ranging

galleries and a network of art-world interests.

from sugar to tobacco, cotton, coffee and

Those artists who remained in the South were

corn, enriching traders and enslavers alike.

effectively excluded from this network.

In 2023 we find ourselves reviewing the

‘Souls Grown Deep like the Rivers’ serves

lasting stain of racial oppression through

to introduce the Royal Academy’s audiences

various lenses. The murder of George Floyd

to some of the countless Black artists from the

on 25 May 2020 catalysed a global reassessment

South whose creative contributions warrant

of the persistent legacy of racism, amplified by

assessment. And that assessment must no

Covid-19’s suspension of normal daily life and

longer be in isolation, like curiosities from an

a coincident opportunity for reflection.

undiscovered land. Instead, the particularities

The present exhibition is one of many

and universalities of these works in various

recent exercises to recalibrate our collective

media must be accorded the dignity of art-

social responsibilities. The erasure of artistic

historical evaluation applied to every other

achievements by Black artists from the

art form throughout history – as the products

American South was but one of an infinity

of women and men whose impulses to make

of transgressions spawned by slavery.

objects were informed by their heritage,

Lynchings, murders and sexual violence

contemporary conditions and worldview,

were the most heinous examples of the

and by their talent.

oppression of Black people. But in the

Maxwell L. Anderson President, Souls Grown Deep Foundation & Community Partnership

cultural sphere, the achievements of Black artists who remained in the South went largely unrecognised, and when acknowledged,

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Fig.1 Joe Minter at the entrance to his African Village in America, Birmingham, Alabama

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Stories of Reclamation Raina Lampkins-Fielder

For generations, Black artists from the southern

remain. There are many diverse areas in the

United States, working with little recognition,

South: from the sandy banks of South Carolina

have created masterpieces whose subjects and

to the Mississippi Delta, from isolated, rural

material often resound with the harrowing

areas like Gee’s Bend and Marion, Alabama,

history of the region – its barbaric practice of

to the urban centres of Atlanta, Memphis and

slavery and the Jim Crow laws. These cruel and

Miami. Most of the work here was made in the

divisive State and local segregation regulations

region of the United States encompassing rural

effectively made Black people second-class

Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi, the so-called

citizens by restricting both their physical

‘Black Belt’, a term that refers to the region’s rich

freedom and their freedom of expression.1

black soil, as well as to its association with the

The works shown here respond to issues

legacies of enslaved African Americans, whose

and themes that, though shot through the lens

forced labour shaped the economic, social and

of the United States, are global in nature:

agrarian culture of the deep South.

economic inequality and oppression, social

The resulting collective body of work is

marginalisation, racial conflict, the uncertain

defined by the artists’ use of recycled and found

political landscape, the environment and the

materials, both mass-produced and organic –

influence of place, and ancestral memory.

from house paint, scrap metal, wooden planks,

Not only are these concerns played out through

rags and textile remnants, old paint tins,

their various subjects, they are also implicit

rusted tools, worn clothing, toys, shoes,

in the materiality of the works themselves.

disused furniture and electronic appliances,

Having for generations been denied access

to driftwood, roots, stone pieces, animal bones,

to education beyond their elementary years,

soil and feathers. This ‘trash’ is transformed

let alone given entrée to tertiary education and

into art through their imagination. A dearth

classical art training, many southern Black artists

of economic resources and a lack of access to

established informal, alternative academies of

more conventional art supplies meant that the

sorts, in which kitchens and porches took the

use of salvaged materials arose out of necessity,

place of traditional lecture halls and studios,

and artists had to make do with whatever was

and the professor was often a cousin, an uncle,

readily available. However, conceptual and

a mother, a grandmother or a family friend.

aesthetic intentions do inform their selection of

These extraordinary artists have lived and

cast-off objects. Although spent and discarded,

worked throughout the American South, where

found objects are imbued with the energy of

their deep family roots and creative connections

their past uses; their history is embedded within

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the materials themselves. In the hands of these

to credit his development as an artist. In search

artists, that which has been thrown away or

of like-minded Black Southern artists, Lonnie

ignored has been reclaimed, reformed, exalted.

Holley met Dial through a former girlfriend,

One may view this reclamation as a metaphor of

acquiring several of his handmade fishing lures

the brutalisation and resurrection of the Black

(mid-1980s; cat. 2) in the process; later, in 1987,

body itself, having been kidnapped, enslaved,

Holley brought Dial’s work to the attention

dehumanised, beaten, worked as chattel, and

of his friend and collector William Arnett –

summarily disposed of. The artist Thornton Dial

the eventual founder of the Souls Grown

asserted, ‘It is exactly the truth that the Negro

Deep collection – who cited his first visit to

has been mistreated in the United States, that

Holley’s home in 1986 as revelatory: ‘[Holley]

he [has] been used.’ His statement is made even

was actually the catalyst who started me on a

more meaningful within this material context.

much deeper search.’ 3 Joe Minter, like Holley at

These artists are storytellers, recounting

the time, created an immersive art environment

2

tales of hardship, oppression, poverty and

in his yard. His was named African Village in

racism as well as joy, creation, faith, resilience,

America (see fig. 1), and was composed largely

family and triumph. Theirs is a story of

of sculptures fabricated from found objects,

transcendence, of the recuperative power of

scrap metal and discarded materials in

recycled – and reimagined – material. By using

metropolitan Birmingham.

repurposed materials, each artist has uniquely

Thornton Dial: ‘My art is the evidence of my freedom’ 4

been able to address these subjects through distinct conceptual and creative practices.

A former steelworker, Thornton Dial was a master assembler and manipulator of metal, An area rich in iron ore, limestone and coal,

and skilled in sourcing both manufactured

all key components in American iron and steel

and organic materials from his environment,

production, the Alabama Black Belt contains

among them tin, wood, rope, salvaged fabric,

a fertile area of artistic exchange and creation.

plant life, discarded plastic objects and other

This manifested itself in the work of a group

non-biodegradable materials. His highly

of artists clustered around Birmingham, led

original artistic output, encompassing

by Lonnie Holley and Joe Minter, and in the

paintings, drawings, assemblages and

adjacent town of Bessemer, led by Thornton

sculpture – often executed on a massive

Dial and Ronald Lockett. Beyond their

scale – is diverse in both medium and form.

Dial’s mixed-media work Stars of Everything

geographical proximity, these artists shared thematic explorations of American history

(2004; cat. 1) explores the long history of

and the Black experience – the legacy of

Black creativity by finding inspiration in the

slavery, the Jim Crow laws, labour issues,

symbolic energies of discarded objects and

the civil rights movement and inequality –

their transformation. The work’s central figure –

as well as their use of found and discarded

part American eagle, part buzzard in a suit of

materials reclaimed from their environment.

worn clothing, old carpet and strands of rope,

Like other artists here, they also share

Dial’s markers of social oppression – can be

familial and personal ties and were nourished

understood as a surreal self-portrait: Dial saw

by a profound, decades-long artistic tradition.

himself as a sort of scavenger or ‘pick-up bird’,

Thornton Dial was the older cousin of Ronald

an acknowledgement of his practice of artistic

Lockett, and the mentor to whom Lockett was

recycling. The figure is embedded within a

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Fig. 2 Thornton Dial , Testing Chair (Remembering Bessie Harvey), 1995 Roots, metal, corrugated tin, wire, enamel, spray paint and Splash Zone compound, 195.6 x 167.6 x 144.8 cm.

Collection of the National Gallery of Art, Washington DC. Patrons’ Permanent Fund and Gift of the Souls Grown Deep Foundation

colourful cosmos of stars fabricated from cut

and contemporary events, often tackling these

and splayed paint cans – a satirical statement

moments as they were enacted on the world

about celebrity as well as Dial’s quest to find

stage. Turning to more conventional media –

beauty in the rubble and acknowledgement in

pen, pencil, pastel, watercolour – a drawing such

the art world. As he states, ‘Art is like a bright

as Katrina (2005; cat. 7) is a direct response to

star up ahead in the darkness of the world…

the devastation wrought by the hurricane of

Art is a guide for every person who is looking

that name in New Orleans, Louisiana, which

for something.’

disproportionately affected Black and lower-

5

Dial was raised, in part by his great-aunt

income people, who found themselves displaced

Sarah Lockett. His root sculpture Tree of Life

in their own city. Slavery (2009; cat. 9) and Cotton

(In the Image of Old Things) (1994; cat. 6) was

Field (1996; cat. 8) pay homage to those enslaved

created shortly before her death and relates

Africans in America whose forced labour was

both to her life and her impending passing,

used to fuel the economy of the South.

and to Dial’s own complicated genealogy

Animals often operate as avatars in Dial’s

with its twisting and interconnecting branches

work: the oft-recurring tiger is his personal

recalling a family tree, in his painted assemblage

emblem and an allegory of the African-

of roots and found wood, an old car tyre, wire

American experience, and birds represent

and fabric. An astute observer and a shrewd

freedom in his symbolic lexicon. In Blue Skies:

commentator, Dial was inspired by historical

The Birds that Didn’t Learn How to Fly (2008; cat.

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3), dead blackbirds, fashioned from used paint

subject. In addition, Thornton Sr’s younger

rags and old gloves, are suspended from a

brother, Arthur Dial, similarly embraced a

clothes line. Serving as a signifier of the Jim

diversity of media in his painted wall-based

Crow laws, the hanged, flightless blackbirds,

constructions, including tin, cinder-block

denied their liberty, suggest the lynchings and

pieces, wire, rope, enamel and wood.

racial terror inflicted upon Black people in the work that attests to the struggles and triumphs

Ronald Lockett: ‘Once something has lived it can never really die’ 7

of Black people in a changing America; at their

Born and raised in the Pipe Shop neighbourhood

core, these speak to the essence of our humanity.

of Bessemer, Ronald Lockett (fig. 3) always

South. Thornton Dial presents us with a body of

knew that he wanted to be an artist. When his

The Dial family

classmates pursued a trade after graduation from

With their father as creative patriarch, Dial’s

high school, Lockett followed his own creative

sons Thornton Jr and Richard inherited not

path under the guidance of his artistic mentor

only the family business but their father’s

and relative Thornton Dial Sr, who encouraged

socio-political and artistic proclivities.

his use of recycled metals – sheets of which were

Richard Dial’s abstract chair sculpture

provided to him from Dial’s personal cache on

Which Prayer Ended Slavery? (1988; cat. 11),

his property – wood and such non-traditional

constructed of welded steel, wire and paint,

media as industrial sealing compound, to realise

is composed of two registers perched on a

his tableaux. Lockett recalled,

6

metal chair seat: in the lower section he depicts a Black figure being whipped, another being

I told [Dial] I wanted to go to art school and he told

hanged, and a third in chains; above this

me I had the best school of all just making artwork…

devastating scene are kneeling figures in

He helped me to find out that you could take tin or

black and white. This indictment of slavery

barbed wire or different small little metals and make

is at once a stark visualisation of torture and

things out of them. All the pieces that I made are

an invocation. Recalling his father’s furniture

primarily because of him because he helped me to

designs of the 1980s, Richard presages Thornton

keep going on even when I couldn’t afford to buy

Sr’s throne-like chair sculptures of the 1990s,

paint, he had paint and would pour me out blue

including Testing Chair (Remembering Bessie

paint, red paint… He was kind of a big driving force

Harvey) (1995; fig. 2), a homage to his fellow

to where I am today.8

artist, the root sculptor Bessie Harvey.

Following visits to Gee’s Bend, Dial’s and

King of the Jungle (1990; cat. 10) by Thornton Jr is a reflection upon addiction, represented

Lockett’s admiration for the unique quilting

here by chains wrapped around a bottle. The

tradition of the area proved influential upon their

work is composed of a lion’s head, with a chair

practices. Dial, who frequently lauded African-

and table completing the body. Animals figured

American women in his art, acknowledged the

prominently in the symbolic universe of

quilt artist Mary Lee Bendolph in his 2002

Thornton Dial Sr, but whereas the tiger had

mixed-media work Mrs Bendolph (cat. 4).

reigned in his father’s work, Thornton Jr chooses

Bendolph herself returned the salutation in

a lion. Ironically, this work was the result of a

her intaglio print To Honor Mr Dial (2005; fig. 4).

commission proposed by Absolut Vodka for

In Sarah Lockett’s Roses (1997; cat. 13), Lockett

potential advertisements. Thornton Jr’s social

honours the great-grandmother, Sarah Lockett,

critique is evident in his irreverent take on the

who years earlier had opened her home to her

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Fig. 3 Ronald Lockett with Sarah Lockett’s Roses, 1997 (cat. 13) Cut tin, nails and enamel on wood, 129.5 x 123.2 x 3.8 cm.

Souls Grown Deep Foundation, Atlanta

great-nephew Thornton Dial.9 The quiltmaker Sarah Lockett was a seminal figure in his personal development who instilled in Lockett an appreciation of the beauty to be found in the everyday. His placement of painted tin tiles embossed with roses – a poignant offering of love and remembrance – assumes the form of the patchwork quilts of the region, but his use of salvaged metal instead of fabric scraps adapts the genre to his own visual practice.

In Oklahoma (1995; cat. 14), Lockett looks beyond familial relationships to tackle contemporary issues of the time. In April 1995 Oklahoma City was rocked by an explosion

Fig. 4 Mary Lee Bendolph, To Honor Mr Dial, 2005 Colour aquatint, spit-bite aquatint and soft-ground etching on paper, 116.8 x 71.1 cm. Souls Grown Deep Foundation, Atlanta

caused by two American anti-government extremists with white-nationalist allegiances that resulted in the destruction of the Alfred P.

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Murrah Federal Building. This act of terrorism

Holley endured a childhood rife with

killed 168 people, including 19 children attending

hardships in the Jim Crow-era South, working

a daycare programme housed in the facility.

various jobs and living in several foster homes.

In response, Lockett created Oklahoma – part

In 1979 he carved tombstones for his sister’s two

of a larger series – to reckon with the outrage

children, who had died in a house fire, because

provoked by such hateful devastation. Again,

his sister could not afford to buy proper grave-

the influence of the quilt is felt, but here it is

markers, and it was this that brought him to

shorn of the comforting softness implicit in

his role as a conduit for reminiscence and

Sarah Lockett’s Roses. The materials are rough-

storytelling through art. He found the material

edged and rusted, the wire metal grid in the

for the tombstones – discarded piles of a soft,

centre imagining the blasted façade of the

sandstone-like by-product of metal casting –

ruined government building. Lockett’s

in a foundry near his sister’s home. Speaking

indictment is clear: destruction of that

about that catalysing moment, Holley remarked:

magnitude cannot be made whole again,

‘I had been thrown away as a child, and here

the traces of the devastation remain.

I was building something out of unwanted things in memorial of my little nephew and

Lonnie Holley: ‘Thumbs up for Mother Universe’

niece. I discovered art as service.’ 10

It is difficult to find a more apt modern-day

Keeping a Record of It (Harmful Music) (1986;

embodiment of the Renaissance man than

cat. 16) fuses Holley’s imaginative use of found

the artist and musician Lonnie Holley. His

objects with his work as a musician and social

multidisciplinary artistic practice includes

commentator. In the 1940s and 1950s, music

painting, sculpture, photography, film-making,

made by Black people was considered ‘dangerous’

sound, song-writing and performance, and he

to the sensibilities of white America, with white

moves fluently between all these expressive

parents fearful that their children would be

forms. Concurrently he is a teacher, philosopher,

corrupted by exposure to it. Holley uses a

oral historian, collector and storyteller. To

salvaged phonograph top, a broken record

enter Holley’s world is to recognise that the

and an animal skull as material to critique this

various disciplines in which he works are all

notion. Ever the archivist, he is quite literally

interlinked in a seamless whole of consummate

keeping a record of the racist assumptions so

communication. A committed environmentalist,

often heaped upon Black self-expression.

his appreciation for the Earth – or as Holley

Spirit of the Man by the Chicken House Door

refers to it, ‘our Mothership’ – is made clear in

(1984; cat. 15) is a testament to some of Holley’s

his personal motto ‘Thumbs up for Mother

principal concerns, among them preservation,

Universe’, as well as in his lyrics and his

recollection, transformation and eventual

selection of materials. Be it near his Atlanta

rejuvenation. The work’s poetic visual narrative

studio or on his travels, Holley reclaims that

summons the memory of his grandfather,

which has been left behind. Bits of wire, fabric,

whose favourite old wooden chair still bears

disused furniture, antique objects, shoes,

the physical traces of the patriarch, with a

boxes, wood, roots, grasses, twigs all form

rusty metal can hanging from the side. Leaning

the foundation of his visual work (fig. 5).

against the empty chair is the dilapidated door

Acknowledging the history and the power

of the chicken house with the silhouette of his

inherent in castaway objects, Holley’s stated

grandfather elegantly carved along the top edge.

goal is to make work that encourages people

Profiles of male and female heads recur

to understand how we are all connected.

throughout Holley’s work. Carved in wood

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or sandstone-like by-products, emerging as

is informed, in part, by his roots in Birmingham,

spectral forms in his paintings, and sculpted

Alabama, the steel- and iron-manufacturing

in metal wire, they reorient the viewer to

capital of the South, an industry propelled by

consider a past or a projected human presence,

Black labour. Commenting on Copying the Rock

to recognise the humane.

(1995; cat. 19), he states, ‘We people have had a hard time, but we struggled through it. Now we

The Growth of Communication (2022; cat. 20), a new work, was inspired by the history of

are in a new time, computer-operated machines

Orford Ness on the East Anglian coast as

drive us. All of that brings us new problems, we

a landscape-laboratory for technological

can’t just copy the past. We got to deal with the

innovation. The work utilises salvaged materials

new. Sometimes it’s like living in hell.’ 12 In The

and draws upon the narratives that Holley

Growth of Communication, a wooden milk crate

assembled in Britain during his artist residency

contains an obsolescent rotary telephone from

in Suffolk. His interest in and critique of

which a tangle of metal and electrical wires and

technology can be observed in other works and

cables emerges, forming silhouettes of faces.

11

Fig. 5 Lonnie Holley in his apartment in Atlanta, Georgia, 2021

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Shooting upwards, the cables liberate themselves from the confines of the box and the detritus of our electronic age, to form a cluster of faces on top of the crate. The work reminds the viewer that true communication transcends technology and, like Holley’s use of roots and wood in his work, these wires, like driftwood, carry with them their own stories, possess their own histories, and yet allow us to be teleported beyond the technological cacophony to find ourselves. These ancestral tendrils connect us to our past, embrace our present, and allow us to find salvation in our shared future.

The message in the material Their early lives shaped by segregation and living in economically deprived circumstances,

Fig. 6 Commemorative plate depicting the Virgin Mary, owned by Mose Tolliver. Souls Grown Deep Foundation, Atlanta

most artists here had to find alternative means to obtain both education and art materials. Their ingenuity is revealed by their circumvention of this hardship and scarcity of supplies to realise

Hobo – are in dialogue with both comic books

significant works of art. Some turned to more

and Pop Art. The often audacious sensuality

conventional media and tools when these were

found in Georgia Speller’s nudes, such as

available; when acrylics and watercolours were

Untitled (1985; cat. 26), was rendered in

impossible to acquire, house paint was in large

watercolour and pencil. Her husband Henry

supply. Mose Tolliver frequently employed

Speller made use of easily acquired markers,

readily available house paint as his preferred

crayons and pencils in his fanciful pictorial

medium, with repurposed supports such as

documentations of local life, for example

Masonite, metal trays, tabletops and found

People Looking at a Man on a Motorcycle (1987;

pieces of wood. His propensity for invention

cat. 27).

Likewise, commonly found art supplies

extended to his hanging devices, which were often fashioned from metal pull-rings from tin

comprised the palette for Nellie Mae Rowe’s

cans. His subjects ranged from unusual animals

exuberant drawings and hand-coloured

and humorous erotic vignettes to idiosyncratic

photographs of friends, neighbours, fantastical

self-portraits (1987; cat. 25) and figures, both

beasts and colourful flora displayed in her art

real and imagined, as in Mary (1986; cat. 24),

studio, which she christened the ‘playhouse’.

whose source was a commemorative plate

She was herself a recurring subject in her work,

resting on his mantelpiece (fig. 6).

both figuratively and symbolically. After a cancer diagnosis, Rowe explored her impending

Painted enamel animated the whimsical, vibrant works of Joe Light, whose landscapes,

passing in a series of remarkably poignant,

such as Blue River Mountain (1988; cat. 30),

autobiographical drawings. One of her final

portraits like My Main Man Dan (1988; cat. 31)

works before her death, Pocketbook (1982; cat.

and self-portraits – in which Light recasts

47) is a stark personal portrait of her eventual

himself as his avatars the Birdman and the

journey to the Promised Land. Like that of the

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Fig. 7 James ‘Son Ford’ Thomas on his porch with clay heads, 1973

ancient Egyptians, who took elements from

and his fingers as brushes to depict the local

their terrestrial existence with them into the

Caines Ridge Baptist Church (1986; cat. 35)

afterlife, Rowe immortalises her closest personal

and the skyscrapers of Atlanta (1988; cat. 36).

possession, her purse. Framed with drawings

A native of Yazoo County, Mississippi,

of dying flowers, her Pocketbook is a striking

the artist and musician James ‘Son Ford’

surrogate for both her spiritual presence and

Thomas (fig. 7) turned to the sediment found

her physical absence.

at the bottom of the Yazoo River, the lower hills

Many artists sourced art-making materials

around Greenwood, and the area around Leland

directly from the landscape, harvesting grasses

and Black Bottoms – where red ‘gumbo’ soil

and plants, plucking berries for natural pigments,

could be found in abundance – for substance

mining the soil for clay, and uncovering

and inspiration. He was attracted to the high

naturally formed tree branches, driftwood and

clay content in gumbo soil to create his intimate

roots collected from forests and along the banks

sculptures. Thick and sticky when wet, it proved

of rivers and streams. The son of a traditional

an exceptionally versatile and highly malleable

medicine woman who gathered roots, herbs and

sculpting material. Known as ‘Son Ford’ –

weeds for their healing properties, Jimmy Lee

a nickname from his childhood, given his

Sudduth was schooled from a young age in the

penchant for modelling Ford tractors out of

arts of conjuring and harnessing the creative

clay – Thomas continued to use his moniker

power of plants. He used blackberry juice, mud

as a celebrated bluesman playing in the

and grasses from his native Fayette, Alabama,

Mississippi Delta. He learned both to sculpt

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