Artist John Outterbridge uses found materials to explore identity, family, and community. His assemblage practice began in the 1960s, collecting detritus and turning it into art following the 1965 Watts Rebellion, an uprising that marked a major need for social change and forced residents to face the long history of racial inequality in Los Angeles. Outterbridge’s “Outhouse” outlines the institutionalization of Jim Crow segregation with important dates on its side such as 1896, the year the Supreme Court decided to enforce “separate but equal” standards. Inside are texts and images of the Ku Klux Klan and civil rights demonstrations. “Déjà Vu-Do” features a doll with a cage over its head. The title is a play on words, combining “déjà vu” with “voodoo,” perhaps commenting that the experience of race-based oppression is repetitive. The flag, symbolizing the nation, hangs limply as if heavy and weighing down the gris-gris doll. See Outterbridge’s works on view in the exhibition This Is Not America’s Flag, on view through September 25. 🎫 Get tickets at the link in our bio. ____ John Outterbridge, REVIEW/54—Outhouse, 2003. Mixed media assemblage construction. Collection of the California African American Museum. Gift of the artist John Outterbridge, Déjà Vu-Do, ca. 1979–1992. Mixed media. Craig Robins Collection