The Down Home exhibition features a selection of more than 20 prints, photographs, and sculptures created with the enduring traditions of this region in mind. The Huntsville Museum of Art’s permanent collection is rich in artworks produced by living artists with strong connections to the American South.

Artists featured in Down Home include Jim Opasik and his wife, Mary Deacon Opasik, who both rely of found objects to create figurative sculptures. Jim’s whimsical portrait of a lion titled Rare, Please is created with re-purposed kitchen utensils that are transformed so the viewer can experience them in a brand new way. Mary’s wall sculpture Searcher might initially appear humorous, but the artist infuses her assemblage with heartfelt emotion, assembling the word from cast-off furniture parts, aged metals and hardware to comment on aspects of birth and parenting.

Andrew Saftel’s epic Down Home uses found objects and mixed media to explore aspects of Southern culture. Other exhibition highlights include quintessentially Southern images by photographers Nick Gruenberg and Chip Cooper; a series of regionally-inspired prints by Laquita Thomson; a nostalgic mixed media work by Sloane Bibb; and the outsider sculpture of Daniel Troppy.