Greenwood Art Center Gullah Spirit Release

Art Center Gullah Spirit Release
Like the tall grasses that come from Lowcountry marshes, and their fibers used in ages-old sweetgrass baskets, two striking exhibitions on view at The Arts Center of Greenwood through March 3, 2023, are interwoven with the vivid culture and living history of the Gullah people.
The first exhibition, titled Gullah Spirit: Jonathan Green, features 33 original paintings characterized by the Charleston artist’s dazzlingly vibrant color palette depicting Gullah people going about their everyday lives with earnestness and joy. Many will recognize his images of Gullah women in colorful dresses and wide-brimmed hats, sometimes perched in tree swings or with umbrellas.
“Over his 40-year career, Green’s work has inspired fashion, dance performances, ballets, and theatrical performances,” Arts Center director Sylvia Martin noted.
Those in the Gullah community are descendants of enslaved West Africans who worked on rice, indigo, and cotton plantations from North Carolina to Florida. Gullah culture exemplifies the tenets of their cultural origins, which valued spirituality, community, respect for their ancestors, and a strong reverence for nature.
“The Gullah arts of today are the product of skills handed down over generations in America. They were mostly utilitarian crafts such as creating colorful textiles for clothing, making cast nets for fishing, and weaving baskets for harvesting,” Martin explained. “One of Green’s iconic images is a painting titled ‘Sweetgrass Carriers’ which depicts Gullah people collecting grass used in their crafts. His work comes alive with its endearingly rich compositions and brilliant use of color.”
The adjacent exhibition, titled Sewn by the Sea, is a stunning collection of sweetgrass baskets hand-woven by Gullah artisans. Widely coveted by collectors and Lowcountry tourists, the baskets are said to be so tightly woven that they can hold water. In actuality, the baskets are not woven by typical techniques. Instead, artisans use the West African technique of “coiling” in which the sweetgrass is bundled and coiled in circular fashion. Other plant fibers, such as pine needles and palmetto fronds, may be added for color and design.
The lead sponsor for the parallel exhibitions is South Carolina Humanities, where officials surmised that displays of Lowcountry art usually are concentrated along the coastal areas like Georgetown and Hilton Head. Such exhibitions are seldom seen in the Upstate, so this exhibition is a gift to residents who may be unable to trek to the Lowcountry. It affords residents an opportunity to learn about the diversity and interesting, multifaceted history of South Carolina.
As part of the exhibition, Victoria Smalls, executive director of the Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor will present a community lecture on the Gullah Geechee Legacy at 5:30 p.m., Thursday, February 2, 2023. The lecture will be immediately followed by a reception from 6 – 8 p.m. The exhibition, lecture, and reception are free and open to the public.
The mission of South Carolina Humanities is to enrich the cultural and intellectual lives of all South Carolinians. The not-for-profit organization presents and/or supports literary initiatives, lectures, exhibits, festivals, publications, oral history projects, videos, and other humanities-based experiences that reach more than 250,000 citizens annually. South Carolina Humanities receives funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities as well as corporate, foundation, and individual donors. It is governed by a volunteer Board of Directors comprised of community leaders from throughout the state.
For further details, visit artscentergreenwood.com or find the center on Facebook.