Artist Victoria Dugger has launched her third solo exhibition, "Freak Flags," at Sargent’s Daughters in New York. The show features six mixed-media works that reimagine the American flag through a maximalist, Southern Gothic lens, utilizing materials like gingham, glitter, nipple tassels, and barbed wire. Drawing inspiration from Jasper Johns’s iconic flag paintings, Dugger’s versions replace traditional colors with hot pinks and bright greens, with several displayed upside down to signal national distress.
The exhibition serves as a subversive commentary on identity, nationalism, and the American dream from the perspective of a Black, disabled woman living in the South. By reclaiming the flag as a product of female domestic craft rather than a purely masculine symbol of patriotism, Dugger explores the exclusion of marginalized bodies from the national narrative. The works, created in 2025, have taken on increased political weight following the 2024 election and ongoing social turmoil during the U.S. semiquincentennial year.