Central to the photographs of visionary artist Ralph Eugene Meatyard (1925–1972) are family members wearing gaudy latex Halloween masks bought from the local five-and-dime. Witch-like and wart-covered, with gap teeth and exaggerated wrinkles, they all pose for the camera near abandoned buildings or in eerie patches of woods to create a humorous send-up of household snapshots.
Meatyard, an optometrist in Lexington, Kentucky, purchased his first camera in 1950 to photograph his newborn son; years later, he joined a community camera club and began developing his enigmatic work, which was influenced by the offbeat characters in stories by Flannery O’Connor and others.
To celebrate what would have been his 100th birthday, the High Museum of Art in Atlanta presents The Family Album of Ralph Eugene Meatyard, an exhibition collecting the thirty-six original black-and-white photos the everyman artist printed for his first monograph, published right before his untimely passing at age forty-six.
Meatyard’s images have continued to captivate many artists (Cindy Sherman among them), but as High’s photography curator Gregory Harris noted, he lived modestly. “‘Gene’ was a regular American dad. He coached little league, collected jazz records, and was also an innovative photographer.”
The exhibition runs December 12, 2025, through May 10, 2026, at Atlanta’s High Museum of Art.
