James ’Son Ford’ Thomas: The Devil and His Blues accompanies the eponymous show at Studio Museum and New York University’s 80WSE Gallery, the largest ever devoted to Thomas’ work. Thomas (1926–1993)—a self-taught African-American artist and musician who lived in severe poverty for most of his life—created small, often painted clay busts of friends and family and people he met. “When I do my sculpturing work things just roll across my mind. I lay down and dream about the sculpture,“ he wrote. “That gives you in your head what to do. If you can’t hold it in your head, you can’t…