Artworks

Joe Massey (1895-?)

Self-taught and outsider artist Joe Massey is best known for the series of drawings he made while serving time in prison for murder. Little is known of the artist before his life in prison. Massey was born in Texas in 1895. While attempting to kill his first wife, Massey killed the wrong woman and was sentenced to 10 years in prison in Little Rock, Arkansas. However, Massey escaped, remarried, and began living as a fugitive. After two decades of freedom, Massey killed his second wife, and was sentenced to life in prison in Columbus, Ohio. It was there that Massey spent the rest of his life, and created his entire oeuvre of writing, drawings, and poems.   

Massey’s work is characterized by its variety of boldly drawn figures in absurdist scenes. Men perform gymnastics atop unrecognizable creatures, people argue under personified suns, bodies blend together, and strange mammals avoid the teeth of reptiles. But despite the sometimes unsettling content of Massey’s work, and Massey’s own violent history, his drawings possess an unthreatening charm. By pairing his abnormal dynamics with cartoonic expressions and punchy text, Massey exposed a strange lighthearted-ness within his practice. For years since his death, Massey’s work has ignited conversation on the separation between art & artist, and the nuances of morality in the outsider art canon. Massey’s work can be found in several prominent collections and institutions, including the New York Public Library, and more.