Self-taught artist Thornton Dial dies, aged 87

The self-taught American artist Thornton Dial died on 25 January. He was 87 years old.  Born in 1928 to sharecroppers in Alabama’s western flatlands, from childhood Dial created sculptures, drawings and paintings with salvaged materials. His work is known to address social injustices such as poverty and the African slave trade. In the late 1980s, after years of working in a boxcar factory, the artist met the Atlanta art collector Bill Arnett through another self-taught artist, Lonnie