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December Issue 2004
Local Couple Gives $5,000 to Lowcountry Artist To Create New Work
Rembrandt had to eat and so does Bo Sweeny. Artists like Sweeny often struggle while they build their reputations and careers. For centuries, patrons of the arts were the financial backers of painters and sculptors and architects. Rembrandt and Michelangelo couldn't have survived without the nobility and the church.
This year, local artist Robert "Bo: Sweeny has a patron, too.
Art enthusiasts, Donna and Mike Griffith, have established the Donna and Mike Griffith Lowcountry Artist's Fund at Coastal Community Foundation, based in Charleston, SC, to make a grant of $5,000 each year to one local artist to create a work of art. The artist gets to keep the work. The Griffiths are happy just to sponsor it.
"Donna and I love the Lowcountry and we want to help promote the art of people like Bo who find their inspiration here," said Mike Griffith.
The first recipient, Robert "Bo" Sweeny, works at Charleston Place by night and paints when he can in a modest studio in the Confederate Home on Broad Street by day. He was so excited about the award that he completed not one but four large canvases entitled, Be square(d) Four Square(d) Corners, depicting the Four Corners of Law in downtown Charleston. An exhibit of his new and current work will be on display at the City Gallery at Waterfront Park from Dec. 3 - 30, 2004.
Sweeny is known to many in the Lowcountry for his meticulous renderings of Charleston architectural details and facades. His early pencil and charcoal drawings covered the paper with an intricate cross-hatching pattern animated with just a dash of colored pencil. Today, his canvases are imposing acrylic glimpses of the corners, edges, facades and rooftops of local buildings. Sometimes there's just enough to recognize a place. Together, they form an homage to the living, architectural museum that is Charleston.
A transplant from Pittsfield, Massachusetts, Sweeny has made his artistic mark in the Lowcountry and beyond with his work gracing homes from Charleston to Schenectady to Barcelona, Spain.
As a special bonus, the gallery will also be displaying selected works from local artists who received the 2004 Expansion Arts grants given every other year through Coastal Community Foundation. Created in 1988 by local donors, the Expansion Arts Endowment has given out nearly $250,000 in total grants to support the work of new and emerging artists and arts groups and promote excellence in Lowcountry art forms that preserve the cultural heritage of our region.
Established in 1974, the Coastal Community Foundation (CCF) is a public grant making foundation fostering philanthropy for the lasting good of the community in Beaufort, Berkeley, Charleston, Colleton, Dorchester, Georgetown, Hampton and Jasper counties.
Thousands of
families, businesses, individuals and organizations have built
over 360 individual funds and endowments at CCF to benefit specific
charities and/or broad areas of community life education,
basic human needs, conservation and preservation, arts, health
and neighborhood/community development. In its 30-year history,
CCF has awarded more than $35 million in grants and manages assets
in excess of $104 million.
Last year, CCF funds generated over $4.8 million for charitable
programming, community projects, educational initiatives and scholarships.
For further info check our SC Institutional Gallery listings or call the Foundation at 843/723-5736 or on the web at (www.communityfoundationsc.org).
Carolina Arts is published monthly by Shoestring Publishing Company, a subsidiary of PSMG, Inc. Copyright© 2004 by PSMG, Inc., which published Charleston Arts from July 1987 - Dec. 1994 and South Carolina Arts from Jan. 1995 - Dec. 1996. It also publishes Carolina Arts Online, Copyright© 2004 by PSMG, Inc. All rights reserved by PSMG, Inc. or by the authors of articles. Reproduction or use without written permission is strictly prohibited. Carolina Arts is available throughout North & South Carolina.