Artists

Maria Martin Bachman wearing a white head covering and dark colored dress

Maria Martin Bachman

Maria Martin Bachman was a 19th-century natural history painter who worked with John Audubon. 

Line drawing of Dave Cockrum

Dave Cockrum

Dave Cockrum is most known for being the creator of Marvel's X-Men characters, Thunderbird, Colossus, Nightcrawler, and Storm.

British painter Thomas Coram painted Mulberry Plantation in about 1800 when the house still had 4,000 acres and two rows of service buildings.

Thomas Coram

Thomas Coram was an 18th-century landscape artist who painted the Mulberry Plantation in Berkeley County, SC.

Color photograph of Matt Cordell

Matthew Cordell

Matthew Cordell is a children's book author and illustrator from Greenville, SC.

Ulysses Dove

Ulysses Dove

Ulysses Dove was one of the most innovative contemporary choreographers of the past half-century.

Three David Drake works of pottery on a sideboard.

David Drake

David Drake lived in Edgefield, SC, as a slave and, after the Civil War, as a freedman who made distinctive stoneware pottery, often engraved with short poems or couplets.

Shepard Fairey wearing a black shirt.

Shepard Fairey

Shepard Fairey is a contemporary street artist and graphic designer. He is known for his Barack Obama "Hope" poster and "Andre the Giant has a Posse." 

Aged daguerreotype of Charles Fraser.

Charles Fraser

Charles Fraser was a Charleston painter who created miniature portraits for people to carry with them.

Pearl Fryar wearing a baseball cap, white shirt, and black jeans.

Pearl Fryar

Pearl Fryar is a topiary artist in Bishopville, SC. His garden has over 1,000 ornate art pieces. 

Jonathan Green wearing a peach colored shirt.

Jonathan Green

Jonathan Green is a contemporary African-American painter and printmaker who was born in Gardens Corner, SC.

Black white photograph portrait of  Edwin Augustus Harleston.

Edwin Augustus Harleston

Edwin Augustus Harleston was an African American portrait painter and businessman from Charleston

Black and white photograph of Elise Forrest Harleston in glasses, necklace and dress.

Elise Forrest Harleston

Elise Forrest Harleston was South Carolina’s first African-American female photographer.

Color photograph of Peggy Hartwell

Peggie Lois Hartwell

Peggie Lois Hartwell is a fourth-generation quilter and educator.

Jonathan Hickman wearing a black and white striped shirt and black lanyard.

Jonathan Hickman

Jonathan Hickman is a comic book writer and artist. He is known for creating the Image Comic Series, The Nightly News, The Manhattan Projects, and East of West.

Anna Hyatt Huntington standing in front of horse sculpture.

Anna Hyatt Huntington

Anna Hyatt Huntington was a well-known sculptor who, along with her husband, established Brookgreen Gardens in Georgetown County as a public garden and figurative sculpture gallery.

Alfred Hutty

Alfred Hutty

Alfred Hutty was a painter during the Charleston Renaissance who worked in etching, oil, and watercolor.

Jasper Johns with a bullseye in the background.

Jasper Johns

Jasper Johns grew up in Allendale, SC, and is an influential contemporary artist in the genres of Abstract Expressionism and Pop art.

Blue Sky wearing a cowboy style straw hat, white dress sitting in a cafe.

Blue Sky

Blue Sky is a contemporary painter and sculptor known for his large murals and public sculptures.

William H. Johnson wearing a cowboy styled hat.

William H. Johnson

William H. Johnson was an African American painter from Florence who painted distinctive modernist imagery of African American life.

A young woman with a red ribbon.

Henrietta Johnston

Working in Charleston, Henrietta Johnston was the first female professional artist in America.

Color photograph of Larry Lebby

Larry Francis Lebby

Larry Francis Lebby was an artist best known for his portraits of former United States president Jimmy Carter, Dr. Benjamin Mays, and Modjeska Simpkins.

Smiling Alicia Leeke

Alicia Leeke

Alicia Leeke is an artist known for her post-impressionistic style and incorporation of Fauvism. 

Black and white portrait of James Legaré

James Mathewes Legaré

James Mathewes Legaré was a poet, inventor, and artist from Charleston, SC.

Brooklyn Mack in mid dance dressed as a gray, white, and orange dodo bird.

Brooklyn Mack

Brooklyn Mack is a danseur from Elgin, SC.

Color photograph of Mary Jane Manigault

Mary Jane Manigault

Mary Jane Manigault was a Seagrass Basket Maker from Charleston, SC.

Robert Mills and his wife Eliza both wear dark 1800s clothing

Robert Mills

Robert Mills was one of the first Americans to become a professional architect.

Toro y Moi wearing a light grey jacket singing into a silver and black microphone

Toro y Moi

Chaz Bear, known professionally as Toro y Moi, is a singer, songwriter, record producer, and graphic designer. 

Color photograph of Steven Naifeh

Steven Naifeh

Steven Naifeh is an artist and Pultizer Prize-winning biographer of Jackson Pollock and Vincent van Gogh.

Drawing by Inez Nathan-Walker, Woman with Yellow Hat, ca. 1977, mixed media: pencil and colored pencil on paper, Smithsonian American Art Museum.

Inez Nathan-Walker

Inez Nathan-Walker was a folk artist from Sumter, SC.

Ment Nelson

Ment Nelson

Ment Nelson is an artist and illustrator. His hometown and surrounding places often influence his art.

A smiling Kitty Black Perkins wearing a magenta-colored shirt. To her left is the First Black Barbie in red clothes with a gold necklace.

Kitty Black Perkins

Kitty Black Perkins was the Chief Designer of Fashions and Doll Concepts for Barbie.

A man and a young boy.

Richard Samuel Roberts

Richard Samuel Roberts was one of South Carolina's most famous photographers in the 1920s and 1930s. Many of his photographs captured the life of African-Americans living in the South.

Self portrait in oil of William Harrison Scarborough.

William Harrison Scarborough

William Harrison Scarborough was a portraitist and miniaturist.

Philip Simmons wearing blue overalls, standing in his forge.

Philip Simmons

Philip Simmons was a nationally acclaimed Charleston blacksmith.

Photograph of Alice Ravenel Huger Smith on August 19, 1944.

Alice Ravenel Huger Smith

Alice Ravenel Huger Smith was an artist during the Charleston Renaissance known for her watercolors and woodblock prints.

ND Stevenson speaking into a black mic.

ND Stevenson

ND Stevenson is the creator of She-Ra and the Princess of Power and Nimona.

Black and white photograph of Lily Strickland

Lily Teresa Strickland

Lily Strickland was a composer, painter, and writer from Anderson, South Carolina.

Anna Heyward Taylor

Anna Heyward Taylor

Anna Heyward Taylor was an artist active in the Charleston Renaissance who became well-known for her woodblock prints.

Oil portrait of Colonel Barnard Elliott, Jr. by Jeremiah Theus, circa 1776.

Jeremiah Theus

Jeremiah Theus was a painter from Switzerland who came to Charleston and became a well-established portrait artist, painting many people from Charleston society families.

Smiling Leo Twiggs next to one of his colorful paintings

Leo Twiggs

Leo Twiggs developed the Fine Art Department at South Carolina State University.

Elizabeth O'Neill Verner

Elizabeth O'Neill Verner

Elizabeth O’Neill Verner was an artist and major figure of the Charleston Renaissance.

William Aiken Walker wearing a black hat.

William Aiken Walker

William Aiken Walker was a painter from Charleston, SC who specialized in rural farm and plantation scenes.

Painting by John Blake White of General Francis Marion Inviting a British Officer to Share His Meal

John Blake White

John Blake White was a painter and playwright from Berkeley County. He is best known for his painting of Francis Marion.

Cecil Williams drinking from a water fountain labeled Whites Only

Cecil J. Williams

Cecil J. Williams is a photographer best known for his photography documenting the Civil Rights Movement in South Carolina.