Joe Light

1934-2005

Joe Light, a self-taught artist, was born in Dyersburg, Tennessee in 1934.  He attended public school through the 8th grade then enlisted in the Army in 1951, but was discharged in August of that year after injuring his arm.  After leaving the army, Light was jailed several times, once for assaulting his father and once for armed robbery.  In jail, Light converted to Judaism. He spent 8 years in the penitentiary in Nashville, and when he was released in 1968, he moved to Memphis, married, and had 10 children. He sold bric-a-brac and secondhand items at flea markets and fairs.  Around 1975 he began to paint his signs, to make driftwood sculptures, and finally, in mid-1980, to make paintings.  Light once clarified the public side of his work, what has engendered some resentment in the surrounding neighborhood, when he remarked, “It’s not about making people mad.  It is about sharing what I know.”  Light’s work, usually executed with house paint on wood or cardboard, was characterized by bright colors and simple forms of birds and fish, human figures, and landscapes and the occasional portrait of Elvis Presley. His career exploded after he met William Arnett.  Arnett said, “When I found Joe Light, I thought, ‘This is one of the great artists of America’.  I just wanted to help.  He had no self-esteem.”  Joe Light’s work is included in High Museum in Atlanta, the Smithsonian American Art Museum, and more recently, was included in the Metropolitan Museum in New York.