Hedges Projects

Outsider Art from The Jimmy Hedges Collection
The Aspen Art Fair, Hotel Jerome, July 29-August 2

Jimmy Hedges, III, born into a prominent family from Chattanooga, Tennessee, was a man of enormous and varied interests. Foremost, an artist, he was also a sportsman, Southern folklorist, art dealer and philanthropist.

Hedges was a self-taught artist and began carving wooden songbirds as a teen, then ultimately progressed to monumental wooden sculptures. He cultivated a community of artist peers including Appalachian wood carvers and ceramists which ultimately lead him on a journey to meet hundreds of self-taught, notably Southern African American, artists.

Over the course of nearly forty years, Hedges became one of the most vibrant advocates for Outsider artists through his work with Rising Fawn Folk Art Gallery, which he founded on his farm in Georgia. Also, as a trustee of the Tonya Memorial Foundation created by his grand-father, Hedges was a lifelong philanthropist, which enabled him the opportunity to financially support artists with a sharp focus on social justice and education.

In 2014, Hedges died in an accident leaving behind one of the most substantial collections of self-taught Outsider art, numbering over 2,500 works.

Hedges’ son, Jim Hedges, IV, has carried on his father’s legacy of advocacy and support for self-taught artists. In 2016, the younger Hedges gifted his father’s archive to the Smithsonian’s Archive for American Art, creating the largest collection of research materials on Outsider artists in the country. Likewise, Jim Hedges makes ongoing gifts to major collecting museums around the United States and Europe.

Four primary artists’ work from The Hedges Collection of Outsider Art will be exhibited at The Aspen Art Fair including: Hawkins Bolden, Lonnie Holley, Sara Mary Taylor, Purvis Young and others.

A portion of all sales proceeds from the Hedges Collection shall be donated to Anderson Ranch.