Ronald Lockett was an American visual artist, combining painting with three dimensional objects. “Lockett's primary artistic mentor” was the painter Thornton Dial, his cousin. In describing his work, Holland wrote of the influences of “blackness in relation to HIV/AIDS, LGBT life, nationalism, and the racial implications of terms such as "outsider," "self-taught," and "folk" in American art”. His work has been shown in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Ackland Art Museum, and The American Folk Art Museum.