Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
The first comprehensive overview of an important genre of American art, Souls Grown Deep explores the visual-arts genius of the black South. This first work in a multivolume study introduces 40 African-American self-taught artists, who, without significant formal training, often employ the most unpretentious and unlikely materials. Like blues and jazz artists, they create powerful statements amplifying the call for freedom and vision.
Table of Contents
Map -- An introduction to other rivers -- Life behind the wall : a call to respond / Andrew Young -- An artist goes back to the ocean / Lonnie Holley -- In pursuit of new freedoms / John Lewis -- More than previously imagined / Howard Dodson -- Vernacular art : a palpable expression / Roger Cardinal -- "I always wanted to be free" / Vincent Harding -- Beyond Borobudur / William Arnett -- African roots, American branches : tradition and transformation in African American self-taught art / Babatunde Lawal -- The African artist / Roy Sieber -- Tradition and continuum in African American folk art / Jack L. Lindsey -- The hidden charms of the Deep South / Paul Arnett, William Arnett, Robert Hobbs, Theophus Smith, Maude Southwell Wahlman -- William Edmondson : the geometry of vision : the work of William Edmondson -- Eldren M. Bailey : whitewash -- Vernon Burwell : le garage ravi de Rocky Mount : an essay on Vernon Burwell -- Root sculpture : tornadoes inside eggs -- Ralph Griffin : "then the whisper put on flesh" -- Bessie Harvey : "God is the artist" -- Bessie Harvey -- The root sculptures of Thornton Dial : a newtork of ideas -- Lonnie Holley : pulling on the root --Jesse Aaron : nobody leaves empty-handed -- Ulysses Davis -- Leroy Almon -- Herbert Singleton : secular and sacred -- Big Al and J. P. Scott : folk art in New Orleans -- Dilmus Hall : blue hands -- Steve Ashby -- Archie Byron : anatomically correct -- James "Son" Thomas : inside the jook joint : blues and sculpture in the life of James Thomas -- Juanita Rogers : mud woman -- Jimmy Lee Sudduth : cutting to the slice -- Bill Traylor : mysteries -- The word in their hands -- Gertrude Morgan -- Nellie Mae Rowe : inside the perimeter -- Minnie Evans -- Clementine Hunter -- Anderson Johnson -- Contemporary African American folk portraiture -- Sam Doyle : the news from Frogmore -- Mose Tolliver : picture maker -- "Tree roots, that's what I started with" -- Lorenzo Scott -- Theodore Hill -- J. T. McCord -- Half-told tales : some thoughts on African American self-taught art as narrative -- Arthur Dial : "a record of what went by" -- Luster Willis : templates -- Henry Speller : handy man -- Georgia Speller : folk theory : laughing with Legba -- George Andrews : "the Dot Man" -- Frank Jones : drawings from the devil house -- William L. Hawkins : photographic memory -- Alyne Harris -- Richard Burnside -- Royal Robertson : night vision -- Sandy Hall : a look at myself -- John B. Murray : the handwriting on the wall -- Painting out of a corner -- Notes on African American vernacular art in the age of globalization / Jerry Cullum -- Revolutionary democratic art from the cultural commonwealth of Afro America / Amiri Baraka -- Self-taught art and the conscience of museums / Maxwell L. Anderson.