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View Images USA South

Memphis, TN Henry Speller 1900-1997 Drawings (pencil, pen, marker, etc.), direct observation

Information: Henry Speller was born in the settlement of Panther Bum in the Delta country of central Mississippi. Raised by his maternal grandmother and her husband, Speller dropped out of school at the age of twelve and helped support her when, as a consequence of an altercation with a white employer, her husband was forced to flee the region. Speller grew up working on Delta farms and on the levees of the Mississippi river, where he often drew pictures during his lunch breaks. He left Mississippi for Memphis in 1939. There he worked in a succession of odd jobs-- landscaper, sanitation worker, janitor-and lived within a few blocks of Beale Street, the musical heart of Memphis. In the early 1960s he met Georgia Verges, who also loved to sing and to draw, and who became his third wife. Speller was an accomplished blues musician who played guitar with such legends as Howlin' Wolf and Muddy Waters. Speller turned down offers to leave the region and play in their professional bands. The imagery and insistent rhythms of the Delta blues flow through Speller's work, but his iconography also hints of the social, economic, and racial exclusions he observed throughout his life. The Mary Brogan Museum of Art and Science

	Reference / Links:
	America Oh Yes! Gallery: "Henry Speller" Luise Ross Gallery The Mary Brogan Museum of Art and Science Barbara Archer Gallery Slotin Folk Art Outsider Folk Art
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Bibliography: "Baking in the Sun, Visionary Images from the South" by Andy Nasisse and Maude Wahlman, University of Washington Press, exhibit catalog, 1987. "Museum of American Folk Art Encyclopedia of Twentieth Century American Folk Art and Artists" by Chuck and Jan Rosenak, Abbeville Press, New York, 1990. "20th Century American Folk, Self Taught, and Outsider Art" by Betty-Carol Sellen, Cynthia J. Johnson, Neal-Schuman Publishers, New York, 1993. "Souls Grown Deep: African American vernacular Art of the South", Vol 1, Arnett, et al, 1995. "Self Taught, Outsider, and Folk Art—A guide to American Artists, Locations and Resources" by Betty-Carol Sellen with Cynthia J. Johnson, 2000. "Testimony: Vernacular Art of the African-American South: the Ronald and June Shelp Collection", Cronwill, Danto, Gaither, Gundaker and McWillie, 2001. "American Self-Taught Art: An Illustrated Analysis of 20th Century Artists and Trends with 1,319 Capsule Biographies" by Florence Laffal and Julius Laffal, 2003. Slotin Folk Art Auction Catalog, Masterpiece Sale, November 4, 2006

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