Kaela Nurmi
Abstract
Thornton Dial (1928-2016) was a bricklayer, an iron worker, and a carpenter, but today he is most well known as an artist. He spent his life in Bessemer, Alabama where he developed a rich self-taught practice using found objects that had been used and discarded by others to create art. He would join his found materials together and then finish everything in paint, noting that the work, “ain’t finished till you got the feeling that it’s finished.” Dial’s work was largely unknown until the founding of the Souls Grown Deep Foundation in 2010 which led to his art being in museum collections across America.
Glenstone’s collection has two works exemplifying Dial’s use of found objects, The Color of Money: The Jungle of Justice, 1996 and The Art of Alabama, 2004. Both artworks required conservation attention, offering a unique opportunity to delve into a singular Artist’s process while developing individual treatment plans for each piece’s unconventional materials. The Color of Money is an assemblage painting with overlayed found materials, including clothing, plastic toys, faux plants, epoxy, and metal, secured to canvas on wood. The surface is finished with dark green spray paint, with splashes of red, yellow, orange, and blue paint scattered across. The Art of Alabama has three-components: an assemblage sculpture, a wooden box, and a yellow painted concrete statue. The assemblage is made of wood, metal cans, plastic bottles, bones, fabric, and metal scraps, all joined together with wires and paint splattered across the surface. The wooden box is painted, with collaged newspaper clippings on one side. Treatment for The Color of Money needed to address a detached cotton ball, detached and cracked epoxy, and areas of lifting components. The Art of Alabama required a more complex treatment, including stabilizing and filling losses in the concrete statue, consolidating lifting newspaper and fragile paint on the wooden box, and consolidating the lifting paint throughout the assemblage.
The Color of Money includes plastic bags, Splash Zone epoxy, cotton balls, and acrylic paint, all of which I sourced to create mock-ups and carry out extensive testing prior to treatment. With The Art of Alabama, the condition issues were more difficult to re-create with the available resources and instead relied more on my past-experiences treating similar materials. Pulling from paper and paintings conservation, the results of my The Color of Money tests, and conversations with conservation colleagues, I developed comprehensive treatment plans for both artworks. During the treatments, I was confronted with unforeseen challenges – unidentified bones, paint that was stiff and brittle, wood that was significantly deteriorated, and fragile plastics. With each obstacle, I modified my techniques, ensuring I approached distinct materials with the necessary care. The treatments were successful in stabilizing all components, allowing both artworks to be safely exhibited. Storage solutions were modified for better preservation when the works are not on view. These two Dial artworks shared many similarities, but each piece presented its own set of challenges that strengthened my understanding of materials and broadened my conservation toolbox.