Portrait of a Native American #40, Jimmie Lee Sudduth Painting

A portrait of a Native American, wearing traditional dress. Their expression is curious, chin raised and mouth open in not quite a smile. Jimmie Lee Sudduth's first wife was Native American and perhaps served as inspiration for the series of Native American portraits Sudduth painted. Jimmie Lee Sudduth was one of the early masters of southern self-taught art. He was born March 10, 1910 in Caines Ridge, Alabama, near Fayette, where he lived for most of his life. There he worked for years as a farm hand, although even from an early age Sudduth had an affinity for art. "I started drawin' when I was three years old, and I been drawin' ever since," he said. "I always use mud. That's right. And charcoal out of the fireplace. My mama was a medicine doctor, you know. She'd go out and get stuff outdoors, and I'd be drawing on a tree with the charcoal and mud." True to his word, Sudduth painted with whatever materials he happened to have on hand. He would use grasses, berries, and even soot fo