Self-Portrait with Banjo

Jimmy Lee Sudduth starts his mud paintings by drawing the outline with a “dye-rock,” a soft stone sometimes used by Native Americans to paint their skin. He then fills in the shapes with a mixture of mud, sugar, and paint, and rubs leaves and berries over the top for more color. (Chuck and Jan Rosenak, Museum of American Folk Art Encyclopedia, 1990) Sudduth uses the sugar so that the mud will harden, and sometimes even adds honey or Coca Cola to the mixture. (Nancy Callahan, “Plywood for his canvas, turnip greens for paint, old houses as subject,” The Christian Science Monitor, July 23, 1980) In this image, he applied only three colors to create a vibrant self-portrait. The deep blue of the background and the bright white of the figure’s clothing emphasize the rich, earthy tones of the mud he used to “paint” his skin.

“This is somethin’ new. This is somethin’ the art people ain’t got---in the whole world.” Jimmy Lee Sudduth, quoted in Nancy Callahan, “Plywood for his canvas, turnip greens for paint, old houses as subject,” The Christian Science Monitor, July 23, 1980