about
Jimmy Lee Sudduth

Born: Fayette, Alabama, 1910

Jimmy Lee Sudduth creates his paintings on plywood boards at his small home in Fayette, Alabama. He taught himself to use such materials as mud, plants (Turnip greens, watermelon vine and berries), sugar, coffee grounds and tobacco to serve as “paint”.

In recent years Sudduth has come to use house paint for color, with occasional touches of glitter. His unique approach to both life and art has been featured at the Smithsonian Institution, a 1980 segment of NBC’s Today Show and CBS’s 60 Minutes. He is included in Alabama Art 2000, an international touring project that highlights work of thirteen of the state’s artists.

Sudduth’s themes include architectural forms, animals and human figures. He has painted the Statute of Liberty, seated Indians, self portraits and many renditions of his dog Toto. In 1995 The Society for Fine Arts of the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Alabama presented him with the Alabama Arts Award. This was presented to him because “He has contributed substantially to an important movement in the late 20th Century American art” and because he “has brought many Americans a refreshing perspective on southern life and creativity.”

Sudduth is an artist-in-residence at the New Orleans Museum of Art, a distinction he shares with two other well-known “Outsider” artists, Mose Tolliver and Bernice Sims.