The Dirty South: Contemporary Art, Material Culture, and the Sonic Impulse

This exhibition catalogue to the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts’ The Dirty South: Contemporary Art, Material Culture, and the Sonic Impulse chronicles the pervasive visual and sonic parallels in the work of Black artists from the southern United States.

The Dirty South looks to contemporary southern hip-hop as a portal into the roots and aesthetic legacies that have shaped contemporary art from the 1920s to the present. It features multiple generations of both academically trained and “outsider” artists working in a variety of genres and disciplines, including Thornton Dial, Allison Janae Hamilton, Arthur Jafa, James Little, Michi Meko, Jason Moran, Sister Gertrude Morgan, Sun Ra, Kara Walker, and William Edmondson.

Creating a capacious understanding of southern expression in visual art, material culture, and music, this richly illustrated volume documents the exhibition’s artworks and includes critical essays, poems, artist biographies, and an extended bibliography.

Edited by Valerie Cassel Oliver. Contributions by Regina N. Bradley, Charlie R. Braxton, Andrea Barnwell Brownlee, Kirsten Pai Buick, Jennifer Burris, Valerie Cassel Oliver, Rhea Combs, Park McArthur, Paul D. Miller aka DJ Spooky that Subliminal Kid, Fred Moten, Anthony B. Pinn, Guthrie P. Ramsey Jr., Roger Reeves.