Dial "M" for Museums

The Smithsonian American Art Museum has collaborated with seventy museums around the nation to bring eight exhibitions in our "Treasures to Go" tour to you!

We culled our premier collection of folk art to create the traveling show Contemporary Folk Art: Treasures from the Smithsonian American Art Museum. Featuring more than seventy magical and approachable works by self-taught artists, Contemporary Folk Art opens tomorrow at The Cummer Museum of Art & Gardens in Jacksonville, Florida.

Top of the Line (Steel) by Thornton Dial Sr. is a standout. This Alabama steelworker made Top of the Line in response to the 1992 riots in Los Angeles. As he followed the news coverage, Dial was struck by how quickly the demonstration of social outrage degenerated into widespread burning and looting of area businesses. Here, figures grasping at salvaged parts of air conditioners, refrigerators, and automobiles suggest the act of looting. Dial believed it resulted in part from the frustration of people who produce "top of the line" industrial goods but cannot afford to buy them.

Source: Lynda Hartigan. Contemporary Folk Art: Treasures from the Smithsonian American Art Museum (exhibition text, Smithsonian American Art Museum, 1999).

Pictured: Thornton Dial, Sr., born 1928, Top of the Line (Steel), 1992, mixed media: enamel, unbraided canvas roping, and metal on plywood, 65 x 80 7/8 x 7 7/8 in., Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift from the collection of Ron and June Shelp.