All Female Special Exhibition Coming to The Gibbes Museum of Art

Press Release

Peach Packing, Spartanburg County, 1938, By Wenonah Day Bell (American, 1890 –1981); Oil on canvas

The Gibbes Museum of Art this week announced their newest special exhibition, Central to Their Lives: Southern Women Artists in the Johnson Collection. This exhibition examines the challenges female artists faced during a period in which women’s social, cultural and political roles were being redefined. Central to Their Lives will be on display in the museum’s Gallery 8 from January 17th to May 3rd, 2020.

“Central to Their Lives is a special collection for many reasons,” said Angela Mack, executive director of the Gibbes Museum of Art. “2020 marks 100 years since women’s suffrage, so it was important to the Gibbes to shed light on all aspects of women’s history, and Central to Their Lives is one of those exhibits that illustrates to us how far we have come, especially as women in the South.”

The Central to Their Lives exhibition brings together for the first time the paintings and sculptures of 42 diverse female artists who made significant contributions to the art of the South between the late 1890s and early 1960s. Whether working from dedicated studio spaces, in spare rooms at home or on the world stage, the featured artists made remarkable impacts by fostering future generations of artists through instruction, incorporating new aesthetics into the fine arts and challenging the status quo.

Organized by the Johnson Collection in Spartanburg, the exhibition includes works by leading figures in the Charleston Renaissance, such as Alice Ravenel Huger Smith, Elizabeth O’Neill Verner, Corrie McCallum, Minnie Evans, Anne Goldthwaite, Clementine Hunter and Augusta Savage.

For more information on the exhibition, visit the official website.

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