Radcliffe Bailey: The Great Dismal Swamp

Radcliffe Bailey is a nationally-recognized painter, sculptor, and mixed-media artist who layers imagery, culturally resonant materials, and text to explore themes of ancestry, race, and memory. The Great Dismal Swamp is the artist’s first solo exhibition in the DC metro area, although he has previously participated in group exhibitions at the Smithsonian, the Corcoran, and the David C. Driskell Center at the University of Maryland

Bailey produces a wide range of mixed-media works including two-dimensional collaged paintings, sculptures, and installations. His work is often made from found materials and personal objects from his past, including traditional African sculpture, tintypes of his family members, piano keys, and symbolic items including keys and pouches. For his exhibition at the Greater Reston Arts Center, Bailey will address his family’s history in Virginia, and the history of the Underground Railroad in the state’s Great Dismal Swamp. 

Bailey’s work in included in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; the Smithsonian Museum of American Art, Washington, D.C.; the Art Institute of Chicago, Illinois; the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Texas; the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri; the Denver Art Museum, Colorado; and the High Museum of Art, Atlanta, Georgia among many others.

Credit: Exhibition overview from museum website