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Governor’s Award lifetime achievement recipient on exhibit in Columbia

Richland Library exhibition includes public artist talks


Select works completed by the decorated artist Philip Mullen from 1996 to 2022 are now on exhibit in the Richland Library through May 7, 2023.

Of the 15 works selected, 14 have never been shown in Columbia, which is Mullen's home. Many come from his private collection. Mullen is scheduled to give two public gallery talks: In 2020, the SCAC honored Mullen's significant body of work with the Governor's Award for the Arts in the lifetime achievement category.

Jason Rapp

Hub Quick Hits: Upstate grants, Lowcountry festival news

Some notable items for your attention as we close out another week...

On Wednesday, Charleston Mayor John Tecklenburg and members of city council announced Charlton Singleton as artistic director for MOJA Arts Festival at a City Hall ceremony. As artistic director, Singleton will assist with the implementation of this year’s festival and guide the artistic planning and program development for future festivals. Singleton, you might remember, is a recipient of the Governor's Award for the Arts in the artist category. Read more about the Yesterday, Chapman Cultural Center announced the #SCartists who received funding as part of the second round of grants in its newest category. The Materials and Equipment Grant was created in 2022 to serve Spartanburg's creative community by providing artists with a new avenue for funding their artistic projects and initiatives. The artists are:
Got arts news? Remember to submit it to The Hub! Got arts events? Listings are free on the only statewide arts calendar—Arts Daily!

Jason Rapp

Gullah Geechee chef and gospel singer to receive 2023 Folk Heritage Awards

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

COLUMBIA, S.C. – For 2023, the Jean Laney Harris Folk Heritage Awards will be presented by the General Assembly to honor a Gullah Geechee chef and a gospel singer whose talents keep the state’s traditional art forms alive.

The two practicing artists and are to be recognized as ambassadors of traditions significant to communities throughout the state. Their traditions embody folklife’s dynamic, multigenerational nature and the way it fuses artistic and utilitarian ideals. The Folk Heritage Awards are managed jointly by the South Carolina Arts Commission and the University of South Carolina McKissick Museum. The 2023 recipients are:
  • Emily Meggett: Artist, Gullah Geechee Chef (Edisto Island)
  • Hampton Rembert: Artist, Gospel Singing (Bishopville)
The Jean Laney Harris Folk Heritage Award is named for the late State Rep. Jean Laney Harris of Cheraw, respected as an outspoken advocate and ardent supporter of the arts and cultural resources of the state. In the fall, nominations are sought from citizens across the state to recognize exemplary artistic achievement/advocacy. An independent advisory panel appointed by the lieutenant governor and president of the South Carolina Senate select the recipients, who must be living and practicing in the state. Up to four artists or organizations and one advocate may receive awards each year. As McKissick Museum Executive Director Jane Przybysz notes, "These artists are masters of longstanding South Carolina traditions. The meals that Emily Meggett prepares daily ensure that the culinary know-how of her Gullah Geechee kin gets passed along to and nurtures the next generation. Hampton Rembert’s gospel singing is a point of community pride and inspiration to all who have been touched by a music tradition that uplifts the human spirit, particularly in times of adversity. We thank them for their dedication to keeping alive the traditions that have become our shared South Carolina inheritance." “The recipients of this year’s Folk Heritage Awards embody South Carolina’s rich artistic traditions and our broad diversity as a people and society,” South Carolina Arts Commission Executive Director David Platts said. “Their crafts connect our modern society to, and honor, South Carolina’s cultural past. They remain vibrant parts of rich tapestries that weave together people and communities across the Palmetto State today. We are all grateful for the way these artists enrich the lives of all South Carolinians.” Recipients of the Jean Laney Harris Folk Heritage and South Carolina Governor’s Awards for the Arts Awards are honored during a broadcast presentation of the South Carolina Arts Awards, expected to air on South Carolina ETV this May at a date and time to be announced later. South Carolina First Lady Peggy McMaster will join Platts and Przybysz to honor award recipients.

About the 2023 Jean Laney Harris Folk Heritage Award Recipients

[caption id="attachment_52743" align="alignright" width="250"] Provided photo.[/caption] Emily Meggett | Edisto Island | Artist, Gullah Geechee Chef Gullah Geechee chef Emily H. Meggett, known by many as “M.P.,” was born in 1932 on Edisto Island, a place she calls “heaven on earth.” Meggett grew up on her grandparents’ farm, where they grew a wide variety of vegetables and kept livestock for butchering. Meggett learned traditional Gullah Geechee dishes standing next to her grandmother using ingredients grown on the farm. She honed her skills in the kitchen of wealthy white family’s Edisto Island house. Miss Julia, the Gullah head chef, had a mantra of “You do it right or you do it over.” Anything that wasn’t up to Ms. Julia’s standards went straight to the trash. Meggett married Edisto native Jessie Meggett and they built a four-room home on one acre of land for their 11 children. From there, she cooked for everyone in her family and, as she recalls, likely more than a hundred area children. Meggett’s family and friends long encouraged her to share her recipes in a cookbook, a novel concept to someone who never used one herself. She eventually relented, and a friend visited her daily to work on one recipe at a time. In April of 2022, Gullah Geechee Home Cooking was published and quickly became a New York Times bestseller. Among Meggett’s accolades is the President’s Lifetime Achievement Award from President Joe Biden. To this day, she wakes around two in the morning with inspiration of what to cook that day for all comers. When the door to her kitchen is open, you know you’ll be fed—no money needed, and no questions asked. [caption id="attachment_52744" align="alignright" width="250"] Credit: Amanda Malloy/McKIssick Museum[/caption] Hampton Rembert | Bishopville | Artist, Gospel Singing Raised on a sharecropper farm in Bishopville, 85-year-old Hampton Rembert has been singing gospel from a very young age. He learned with his family who would sing on Sundays and during family reunions. When he and 10 living siblings were younger, they formed a gospel choir of up to 21 members at one point that would sing at a different church every Sunday evening in Lee and Sumter counties. Rembert worked hard at his professions throughout his life. From working at his church to driving trucks through 28 states, and the lawn services he performs today, he always sang. Singing is one of his greatest joys and an experience that connects him to his family and his faith. His talent was threatened in 1998 with a prostate cancer diagnosis. Rembert had surgery in February, but one month after leaving the hospital, he was diagnosed with oral cancer and went back immediately for mouth and throat surgery. He knew that there was a possibility that he would never talk or sing again, a fear confirmed by his doctors. But Rembert credits the power of prayer from his friends and family for allowing him to testify at his church three months after surgery, and while that might be true, his attitude and tenacity played no small part. It has been 25 years since that diagnosis, and he still sings twice a month at his church and as often as he can with his siblings.

About the University of South Carolina McKissick Museum

The University of South Carolina’s McKissick Museum tells the story of southern life: community, culture, and the environment. The Museum is located on the University of South Carolina’s historic Horseshoe with available parking in the garage at the corner of Pendleton and Bull streets. All exhibitions are free and open to the public. The Museum is open from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturdays. The Museum is closed Sundays and university holidays. For more information, please call at 803.777.7251 or visit https://sc.edu/mckissickmuseum.

About the South Carolina Arts Commission

The mission of the South Carolina Arts Commission is to promote equitable access to the arts and support the cultivation of creativity in South Carolina. We envision a South Carolina where the arts are valued and all people benefit from a variety of creative experiences. A state agency created by the South Carolina General Assembly in 1967, the SCAC works to increase public participation in the arts by providing grants, direct programs, staff assistance and partnerships in four areas: arts learning, community and traditional arts, artist development, and arts industry. Headquartered in Columbia, S.C., the SCAC is funded by the state of South Carolina, by the federal government through the National Endowment for the Arts, and other sources. Visit SouthCarolinaArts.com or call 803.734.8696, and follow @scartscomm on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter for #Arts4SC and #SCartists content.
South Carolina Arts Commission News Release, Media Contact: Jason L. Rapp, Communications Director. jrapp@arts.sc.gov or 803.734.8899

Jason Rapp

Orangeburg FAC hosts rural creatives exhibition

Creative Connectors: The Rural Experience

  • Wednesday March 8-April 21, 2023

Visual artists, who reside and work in places where fields and trees outnumber roads and street signs, create works that are uninfluenced by trends or movements. And, they may not have much in common with other rural creators. What they often do share is an artistic expression evolved from contemplation and observations that imagination in solitude can produce. Imagination in solitude is what the six artists whose works make up Creative Connectors: The Rural Experience have in common. Even though their styles, media and themes are vastly different, the connectors are their rural expressions. The excitement and delight these juxtaposed pieces bring to this exhibition communicates the same harmony the six artists have for each other and the work they have produced. They came together from across the state to bring their contributing collection to the Orangeburg County Fine Arts Center: Terrance Washington, from Barnwell County, Ian Thomas Dillinger, from Colleton County, James E. Wilson, III, from Bamberg County, Robert Matheson, from Newberry County. Ernest Lee is from Richland County. Rajasekhar Yarraguntla teaches in Barnwell County. “Seeing the artists greet each other with such warmth, helping one another with final preparations before hanging the works, listening to their lively conversations, it quickly became obvious that the Arts Center has a very special show by these confident, energetic artists,” said Vivian Glover, director of community arts and development. “They have an air of excitement around them. Combined, they pull together something current and significant out of South Carolina. And this dynamic came from rural perspectives.” Portions of this exhibition were previously shown at the Aiken Center for the Arts. For this show, several new works were added by artists, including all the works by Robert Matheson. The invitation from the Orangeburg County Fine Arts Center was summed up by Dillinger. “It was encouraging to the group. To have another opportunity to be shown. It inspired me to make new work to be seen.” The exhibition, located at 649 Riverside Drive, Orangeburg, 29115, opens on Wednesday March 8, 2023, and runs through April. 21, 2023. The Artists’ Reception is Wednesday, March 15, from 6-8 p.m., and is free and open to the public. For additional information, call 803.536.4074 or email vglover@orangeburgarts.org. Creative Connectors: The Rural Experience, as an exhibition, is supported and has been encouraged by the South Carolina Arts Commission. The program is funded in part by grants from USDA- Rural Development as well as from a Neighborworks America grant won by the Center for a Better South.
Ernest Lee is probably the best known of the artists having honed his own reputation by painting and selling his pieces in a devised “outdoor street corner gallery.” His iconic dancing chickens are popular and recognizable. For Creative Connectors, he has brought a variety of less seen themes, where his masterly use of colors and visual perspective show a greater, more reflective talent. “Most people know me as the chicken artist. This time I wanted to show my other paintings. Rainbow in the Sky and Deep in the South, two of Lee’s other works are included in the show. “Painting is a privilege and a blessing,” says Lee, who has painted all his life. James Wilson, III, has been a photographer for over 25 years capturing images in deeply rural settings that strike him as unique or as natural phenomena, which he regards as an experience akin to reverence. “I look for something different, uncommon. Something that you won’t see again.” He includes the solitary and long-deserted homes he spots while driving in Pickens County. “Back in the day most people lived in small houses alongside a road. Now they are dilapidated. Ten or twenty years from now they will be gone,” Wilson observes, adding that they are architecturally significant. “Their structures say something about the people who lived there. I try to imagine those lives were during their time, to appreciate how people used their homes.” From a child, Wilson was entranced by clouds and skies. Many of his images illustrate his awe for the changing formations and colors. “I’ve never seen anything as rare as the shifting shapes and colors found in the sky.” His collection consists of images capturing light and hues in the heavens not only in rural environments, but anywhere he travels. Travel is what Rajasekhar Yarraguntla did leaving India in 2014 for the United States finding himself an educator in the most rural sections of Mississippi and Louisiana, before accepting a teaching position in Barnwell County. Still teaching in a remote area, where the nearest stores and businesses are miles away, he is as unique as his art, with his use of flower patterns and colors. Yarraguntla began teaching himself art during his own school days. “I like to experiment with natural materials and to represent nature in my work,” he says of his art, which was recognized by India’s Ministry of Education. “I apply different materials like dried grass sticks and magazines upon acrylics.” Elegant Beauty on hardboard showing an Indian woman styling her hair, uses natural grass culms collected in India, with different precision cuts and colors to form her image. Coming from a culture with thousands of years cultivating the arts in paintings, sculptors, pottery, and textiles, Yarraguntla, is self-assured experimenting with modern, abstract compositions including those of Hindu gods like “Ganesha” and “OM.” He is intertwining traditional and sacred art, from his perspective of the past and present now influenced by his years in the rural South. Terrance Washington, also an educator, has roots entrenched in Blackville. His paintings are a tribute to his affection and devoted appreciation of the artistic beauty his sees. That same sensitivity takes measure of the world from his homebase, especially these parts of the world that can be perilous for a young Black man. Living in rural domesticity doesn’t divert his attention from watchfulness nor the urge to articulate the continued struggle for justice. His works managed to convey aesthetic messaging using rich colors and defining lines. “I see myself as a modern-day Impressionist illustrating what is going on in the world around me.” Washington says he wants to create works that evoke conversations, that prompt people to think especially about the role of art in his time. His colors are bold and alive, and subtle and intimate at the same time. Love 44, Grove Like That, and Woman in Thought, who figure is mother, grandmother, sister, wife, proud but contemplating, draws the viewer into the past and present themes in his work. Robert Matheson digital images celebrate the present but with a broad historical premise that has captured his imagination since moving to Newberry from Utah, via California, becoming engrossed in the history of South Carolina. He agrees that South Carolina, as a state, may have the most significant places and fascinating people of the 50 states. His current focus is the Revolutionary War battles and in particular a battle in Orangeburg. “Fortunately, there were no causalities, but it was a significant battle,” observes Matheson a digital artist. Digitizing prints for his contribution to the exhibition “really pushed the limits of my digital art skills while telling the story of the Surrender of Orangeburg, which to my knowledge has never been illustrated before.” He is excited about introducing a key element of the war for independence to the area. “I hope the community enjoys it and learn a bit about Orangeburg from interpretation. I know I did.” Matheson, who describes his work as “using technology as the paintbrush” noted that the title of the series is Re-Imagining the Surrender of Orangeburg. “I trained an Ai to blend a sketch in my style with descriptions of the American Revolution battle that took place on May 10 and 11, 1781, in Orangeburg.” Ian Thomas Dillinger from Colleton County creates and actively lives the life of an outdoorsman residing in a rural South Carolina setting. Dillinger makes his home beside the Edisto River in Walterboro. A former educator, Ian now farms, does carpentry, and paints inspired by the rural decay and natural beauty of the river and its inhabitants. He is known for his reuse of natural and man-made materials in the creation of his work. Stop Y’all,” a graphic representation of the reappropriation of cast away materials and common place signage in the rural South. “I hope visitors to the Arts Center are intrigued by the experimental techniques I use to demonstrate how art and nature can ingeniously and harmoniously make a statement.”  

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Five honorees to receive 2023 S.C. Governor’s Awards for the Arts

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

COLUMBIA, S.C. – The South Carolina Arts Commission is happy to announce it will bestow five recipients in 2023 with the state’s highest award for exceptional achievement in practicing or supporting the arts: the South Carolina Governor’s Awards for the Arts.

The SCAC presents the Governor’s Awards for the Arts annually in the spring. The appointed members of the agency’s board of directors vote on panel recommendations for the award. In 2023, the SCAC board approved the recommendations of the following honorees from their respective categories to be recognized for outstanding achievement and contributions to the arts in South Carolina:
  • SPECIAL AWARD: Nigel Redden; Mystic, Connecticut
  • ARTIST: Ray McManus, Lexington
  • INDIVIDUAL: Carlos Agudelo, Spartanburg
  • ARTS IN EDUCATION: American College of the Building Arts, Charleston
  • ORGANIZATION: Aiken Center for the Arts, Aiken
“Recipients are talented, successful, and dedicated. They always represent the best of South Carolina. They give of themselves to ensure access to the arts for all. By presenting them the Governor’s Award, we celebrate their achievements and thank these accomplished recipients for enriching life and culture throughout our state.” SCAC Board of Directors Chair Dee Crawford said. “Making the arts more representative is central to the South Carolina Arts Commission’s mission,” SCAC Executive Director David Platts. “This class of Governor’s Award recipients is notable not just for its excellence, but also for the ways it improves access to the arts. All five of these have made demonstrable efforts to help make the arts in South Carolina more inclusive and accessible.” A committee appointed by the SCAC Board of Directors reviews all nominations. After a rigorous process and multiple meetings, the panel sends to the board a recommendation from each category with a nomination for its approval. Serving on the panel in 2023 were Shani Blann (Lexington), Flavia B. Harton (Greenville), Tamara Herring (Ridgeland), Ed Madden (Columbia), and Regi Strickland (Columbia). Recipients of the South Carolina Governor’s Awards for the Arts and Jean Laney Harris Folk Heritage Awards are honored during a broadcast presentation of the South Carolina Arts Awards, which are expected to air on South Carolina ETV this May at a date and time to be announced later. South Carolina First Lady Peggy McMaster will join David Platts and Jane Przybysz, executive director of University of South Carolina McKissick Museum to honor award recipients.

About the 2023 S.C. Governor’s Awards for the Arts Recipients

Nigel Redden (Special Award) retired as the general director of Spoleto Festival USA in 2021 having rejoined the festival in October 1995 after having previously served as its general manager from 1986 to 1991. Redden was director of the Lincoln Center Festival from 1998 to 2017. He has also served as executive director of the Santa Fe Opera (1991-1995), artistic consultant to Philadelphia’s American Music Theater Festival (1992-1994), and consultant to the chairperson of the New York International Festival of the Arts (1991-1992). He was director of the National Endowment for the Arts’ dance program from 1981 to 1986 and has served on numerous panels for the NEA, regional arts organizations, and various foundations. He is president of the Spaulding-Paolozzi Foundation and serves on the board of South Arts. In 2001 he was awarded the Chevalier of the Order of Arts and Letters and was promoted to Commandeur in 2019. He has received honorary doctorates from the College of Charleston and the University of South Carolina. He is currently the project leader for the Anson African Burial Memorial in Charleston which will honor 36 Africans/African Americans buried in the late 18th century whose bodies were disinterred during the renovation of the Charleston Gaillard Center. Born and raised in Lexington County, Ray McManus (Artist Category) is frequently active in poetry initiatives across the state. He serves as the writer-in-residence at the Columbia Museum of Art. McManus founded Split P Soup, a creative writing outreach program that places writers in schools and communities across South Carolina, and former director of the creative writing program at the Tri-District Arts Consortium that serves Columbia area schools. He coedited a collection of writing responding to historical photographs from South Carolina archives. He is the author of five collections of poetry. His first was selected for the S.C. Poetry Book Prize and published in 2007 and a fifth, Last Saturday in America, will be published by Hub City Press in 2024. His poems and prose have appeared in numerous journals and anthologies of Southern and Irish-American writers. McManus earned his master’s in poetry and his doctorate in rhetoric and composition from the University of South Carolina. Now an English professor at USC Sumter, he teaches creative writing, Irish literature, and Southern literature. He is division chair of both arts and letters and humanities and social sciences and director of the school’s Center for Oral Narrative. Carlos Agudelo (Individual Category) has been Ballet Spartanburg’s artistic director since 1991. Among his choreography are classic and contemporary favorites; some of these have been performed at Piccolo Spoleto Festival, Columbia, Greenville, Greenwood, and Rutherford County, North Carolina. Under Agudelo’s direction in 2012, Ballet Spartanburg formed a resident professional company comprised of a diverse group of dancers from across the world. For 10 years, it has performed from Spartanburg to North Carolina, Texas, and Las Vegas, in the process staging more than 85 presentations of his choreography. The native of Colombia, Agudelo began his training in Florida under the direction of Ruth Petrinovic. He received a scholarship to study at the Harkness Ballet School in New York City and danced with the Israel Classic Ballet in Tel Aviv and the International Ballet de Caracas. Alvin Ailey coached him in Ailey’s ballet, The River. He also danced with Ballet Hispanico of New York. Mr. Agudelo received the 2021 Civitan Servant’s Heart Award for the community of Spartanburg and the 2022 Spartanburg Citizen of the Year awarded by the Spartanburg Kiwanis Club. In 2018, Ballet Spartanburg was awarded the S.C. Governor’s Award for the Arts in the organization category. Real-world implications led Charleston’s School of Building Arts to become the American College of the Building Arts (Arts in Education Category) in 2003. A 1968, a warning came that American artisans in the traditional building arts were aging out of the job market. As school systems cut traditional crafts training, no new generation was being trained to create or repair, restore, and preserve American architectural, historic, and cultural treasures. Then, owners of historic Lowcountry properties had to look to Europe to find artisans who could repair and restore damage after Hurricane Hugo.  A group of Charleston’s preservation leaders created ABCA as a unique higher education experience that fills a gap. ACBA was the first to combine old-world apprenticeship training with a liberal arts core curriculum. ACBA students graduate with the skills to practice their trade and broad liberal arts foundation that allows them to design while leading their fields. They understand not only how to do something, but to think critically within the context of their specialization, manage a business, and communicate effectively with clients. ACBA students have trained through a wide range of community service projects, restoring or creating from the Oval Office back to the Lowcountry. Making art more inclusive and accessible is a high priority for Aiken Center for the Arts (Organization Category). Staff and board of directors use this lens to make the vision a reality for the 40,000 people who come through its doors yearly. Three galleries change exhibitions every six weeks. ACA staff work to incorporate each exhibition into their ongoing educational programs, making a cohesive experience for the community. ACA provides instruction from local artists and musicians, enabling community members to find a creative voice through lessons, camps, workshops, and classes—with scholarships available. ACA works closely with the Aiken County public schools. A program brings Aiken Head Start 4K students into the gallery, and ACA places authors and artists in schools as the arts that are integrated to connect learning and life. Further, ACA serves individuals with cognitive and physical disabilities in its community. Youth summer workshops and year-round adult workshops provide for the development of communication skills, teamwork, and decision making at no cost to participants, and art experiences relating movement and painting reach the Alzheimer’s/dementia community.

About the South Carolina Arts Commission

The mission of the South Carolina Arts Commission is to promote equitable access to the arts and support the cultivation of creativity in South Carolina. We envision a South Carolina where the arts are valued and all people benefit from a variety of creative experiences. A state agency created by the South Carolina General Assembly in 1967, the SCAC works to increase public participation in the arts by providing grants, direct programs, staff assistance and partnerships in artist development, arts industry, arts learning, creative placemaking, and folklife and traditional arts. Headquartered in Columbia, S.C., the SCAC is funded by the state of South Carolina, by the federal government through the National Endowment for the Arts, and other sources. Visit SouthCarolinaArts.com or call 803.734.8696, and follow @scartscomm on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter for #Arts4SC and #SCartists content.
South Carolina Arts Commission News Release, Media Contact: Jason L. Rapp, Communications Director. jrapp@arts.sc.gov or 803.734.8899

Jason Rapp

Charleston artists wins North Charleston Arts Fest 2023 poster competition

The city of North Charleston Cultural Arts Department announced Christopher Dotson of Charleston as the winner of the 2023 North Charleston Arts Fest Poster Design Competition.

[caption id="attachment_52409" align="alignright" width="300"] Forms in a Landscape | Christopher Dotson | Acrylic | 2023 | Click image to enlarge.[/caption] As the winner of the statewide contest, Dotson’s acrylic painting, titled Forms in a Landscape, will be used to promote the 2023 North Charleston Arts Fest, taking place May 3-7. In addition, the artist was awarded a $500 cash prize and the piece has become part of the City of North Charleston’s Public Art Collection. Forms in a Landscape was one of 62 entries from 33 artists working in 12 cities across South Carolina that were submitted for consideration for the 2023 North Charleston Arts Fest Poster Design Competition. The “hieroglyphic” painting contains symbols that represent different animals, plants, and forces in nature, creating a world that is organic, spontaneous, and mysterious. “Raindrops, dew drops, and tears swirl their way through a landscape that is filled with colorful life,” Dotson explains. “Everything is unbound, but every form is linked to the other forms around it. Each form has its own identity, but every form is the genesis of the idea for the forms that surround it. It is an ecosystem.” Much like the other works in his Natural Instincts series, the painting was made to be experienced, not understood. “Above all else I want to create beauty in a pure form. Nature is the inspiration for that," Dotson said. Dotson earned a BFA from Appalachian State University in 1996. His paintings have been featured in a number of juried and group exhibitions throughout Charleston and Boston as well as on the CBS series "Reckless" and the Netflix series "Outer Banks." He is currently represented by Mary Martin Gallery in Charleston. Learn more about the artist at dotsonart.com. A collection of Christopher’s paintings works will be on display at Park Circle Gallery (4820 Jenkins Ave., North Charleston) May 3-27, 2023. The exhibit will feature Forms in a Landscape along with several other recent works in acrylic and oil. Admission and parking are free. The public is invited to meet the artist at the gallery at a free reception on Friday, May 5, 2023, from 5-7 p.m. T-shirts and posters featuring the winning design will be available for purchase during the festival.
For more information about the North Charleston Arts Fest or other competition and exhibition opportunities, contact the city of North Charleston Cultural Arts Department at 843.740.5854, email culturalarts@northcharleston.org, or visit NorthCharlestonArtsFest.com.

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Hub Quick Hits: #SCartists in the news

Headlined by Ranky Tanky

A couple #SCartists were in our in-box from weekend news reports.

The Hub thought these were worth sharing to readers...
  • Grammy Award-winning Charleston band Ranky Tanky added their second such award last night! They are award in the same category as in 2020, Regional Roots Music Album, for Live at the 2022 New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival. Big congrats to the band, which features S.C. Governor's Awards recipients Quentin Baxter and Charlton Singleton. Read the Post & Courier's coverage here (subscription possibly required).
  • Aldwyth, the 87-year-old legend, is staying relevant with a new exhibition in North Carolina. The Gregg Museum of Art and design is featuring the State Art Collection artist. From TechncianOnline: "This is Not: Aldwyth in Retrospect brings together 70 years worth of mononymous artist Aldwyth’s painting, embroidery, assemblage and collage work. Exhibit curator Mark Sloan said the exhibit was something of a capstone both for Aldwyth and for himself, marking 23 years of the pair’s collaboration." The Jameson Wolf piece is a joy to read.
  • Closer to home, WLTX in Columbia profiled Orangeburg artist Floyd Gordon. His experience coming from a family of 13(!) sharecroppers informed his art, which he's been completing for 75 years.

Got arts news? Remember to submit it to The Hub! Got arts events? Listings are free on the only statewide arts calendar—Arts Daily!

Jason Rapp

Examining the life and artistry of enslaved S.C. potter David Drake

On Sunday, Feb. 19, the Peace Center will host what may be the year’s best opportunity to celebrate the art and lives of South Carolina’s most distinguished Black artists, both living and deceased.

S.C. Governor’s Award recipient and poet Glenis Redmond, joined by MacArthur Fellow and literary historian P. Gabrielle Foreman, will lead a discussion of the collaborative book, Praise Songs for Dave the Potter. Featuring the art of internationally acclaimed Gullah painter Jonathan Green and Redmond’s poetry, Praise Songs for Dave the Potter examines how South Carolina slave David Drake has inspired visual artists and poets who claim him as an artistic ancestor. One of the country’s most accomplished 19th century potters, David Drake was a South Carolina slave in the Edgefield District. His pots—many inscribed with song and verse—are treasured artifacts by collectors and museum curators across the U.S. Redmond and Foreman will lead a discussion of Praise Songs, and books will be available for purchase and signing afterward. Tickets are $15 and all are welcome. Click here for more information.

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Fort Mill teen’s art to ‘pop’ in Charlotte

All around Charlotte. On billboards and such.


It would appear today is Youth Day on The Hub.

You've certainly seen our earlier post about the finalists of the state Poetry Out Loud competition, right? Now we bring you news from the visual arts, as Fort Mill student Haley Horner is hitting the big time in Charlotte. Horner is one of 20 members of the ArtPOP Street Gallery artist class of 2023. Founded by a former outdoor advertising exec, ArtPOP brings art to the masses with unused billboard space, newsstands, digital screens in airports, and at mass transit stations. That's $7 million in ad space around Charlotte, some half a million impressions, and a $500 honorarium for the 20 artists in the class. But Horner gets more. The Fort Mill High senior is a painter focusing on visual art studies, and she will receive a $1,500 scholarship toward those. Check her out on Instagram: @haley.ayana.art, and remember you heard about her on The Hub first. (Yes, that's her featured artwork above.)  

Jason Rapp

S.C. Arts Commission announces six Emerging Artist grantees

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

COLUMBIA, S.C. – Six emerging individual #SCartists are benefitting from grants and career mentorship courtesy of the South Carolina Arts Commission’s Emerging Artist grant in FY2023, providing them valuable development as arts entrepreneurs.

The SCAC defines emerging artists as being at an early stage in their artistic career development with no basis in age. Six South Carolina artists were selected to each receive Emerging Artist grants ranging in amount from $1,500 to $1,800 from the SCAC in the current fiscal year (2023). They are:
  • Zeynep Gedikoglu of Clemson (multimedia sculpture)
  • Jordon Mack of Orangeburg (visual art)
  • Amanda Nicole of Liberty (music/composition)
  • Jessica Swank of Easley (photography/sculpture)
  • Shaquelle-Elijah Wiley of Columbia (music/performance)
  • Rolf Anthony Young of Charleson (mixed media)
In addition to financial support, artists benefit from mentorship and professional support facilitated by the SCAC and Deputy Director Ce Scott-Fitts. The combined benefits are intended to deepen artistic practice and foster artistic excellence; encourage career growth, advancement, and sustainability; and provide professional development and opportunities for collaboration.
  • “I'm so grateful ... not only for the funding but also for the community, accountability, and access that it will provide to this new group of southern artists,” Easley-based photographer and sculptor Jessica Swank
  • Charleston mixed media artist Rolf Anthony Young anticipates growth from his participation. “Receiving the grant not only fills me with more confidence in my art practice but connects me to a valuable network of grant winners who inspire me.”
  • Music artist Shaquelle-Elijah Wiley said it is overwhelming to be recognized this way. “I intend on representing the state with class and innovation,” he said.
The SCAC awards a new cohort of emerging artists each fiscal year. An online gallery of representative works by this class is available now on SouthCarolinaArts.com: https://www.southcarolinaarts.com/artist-development/programs/emerging-artists/ Individual artists who reside in South Carolina and fit the criteria of an emerging artists are encouraged to apply for the FY24 round of the Emerging Artist grant now. An applicant coaching session via Zoom is scheduled for Feb. 22, 2023 to offer advisement on the process of applying. Registration for the coaching session and full grant guidelines are available at https://www.southcarolinaarts.com/grant/emerging-artist-grants/. The deadline to apply for FY24 funding and mentorship is April 12, 2023.

About the South Carolina Arts Commission

The mission of the South Carolina Arts Commission is to promote equitable access to the arts and support the cultivation of creativity in South Carolina. We envision a South Carolina where the arts are valued and all people benefit from a variety of creative experiences. A state agency created by the South Carolina General Assembly in 1967, the SCAC works to increase public participation in the arts by providing grants, direct programs, staff assistance and partnerships in artist development, arts industry, arts learning, creative placemaking, and folklife and traditional arts. Headquartered in Columbia, S.C., the SCAC is funded by the state of South Carolina, by the federal government through the National Endowment for the Arts, and other sources. Visit SouthCarolinaArts.com or call 803.734.8696, and follow @scartscomm on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter for #Arts4SC and #SCartists content.
South Carolina Arts Commission News Release, Media Contact: Jason L. Rapp, Communications Director. jrapp@arts.sc.gov or 803.734.8899

Jason Rapp