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March Issue 2004
Spartanburg County Museum of Art in Spartanburg, SC, Takes Look at History of Local Artists' Guild
by Jill Jones
Painting a portrait of a different era, The Artists' Guild of Spartanburg: The Early Years, focuses on the beginnings of the nearly 50-year-old organization in an exhibit on display through Apr. 18, 2004, at the Spartanburg County Museum of Art in Spartanburg, SC.
Exhibits Coordinator Scott Cunningham describes it as a show that is "as much about history as it is about art," telling the story of the Guild through early records, stories and newspaper clippings as well as through the work of early members. Among them are Mary Ellen Suitt, Betty Jane Bramlett and Lois Cantrell, three of the 19 charter members who helped draw up the plans for the organization in 1957 in the basement of Spartanburg art instructor Irma Cook.
Committed to a serious organization, the fledgling Artists' Guild of Spartanburg agreed on such tenants as a rigorous jurying process for members, mandatory attendance at monthly meetings and the production by each artist of a yearly body of "good quality" work. To this end, photography, crafts, printmaking and even sculpture weren't allowed and abstract art was discouraged.
"We were entirely 2-D," says Betty Jane Bramlett, who smiles as she recalls trying to convince that long-ago jury of her peers that sculpture was "serious art." She made her case by invoking the name of Michelangelo, but had less success in relaxing the Guild's early insistence on Realism.
"It was 1957, it was the South, and abstract art was frowned upon," says Mary Ellen Suitt, who served as treasurer of the Guild in its inaugural year and was responsible for collecting the $3 yearly dues.
Lois Cantrell recalls the group as having been very demanding, working by day and painting by night and willing to dismiss anyone who failed to live up to their rigorous standards.
There were few opportunities for artists in Spartanburg in 1957, and the Guild was committed to changing this through a professional - if exclusive - organization. Membership was limited to 25, with each new inductee requiring the approval of the entire organization. They met at the Spartanburg County Library and later at First Federal Bank, critiquing each other's work to become their own worst critics and best supporters.
Some members taught art classes for the Guild, fulfilling one of the organization's primary goals of bringing art to the Spartanburg community. Others focused their efforts on the production of the Artists' Guild of Spartanburg calendar - the organization's chief fund-raising tool. Featuring pen and ink drawings of major historical sites in the Upstate, the calendars provided money toward the establishment of the current Spartanburg Arts Center, home today for many of the county's cultural organizations including the Spartanburg County Museum of Art.
"One of the neat things about putting together a show like this has been documenting these kinds of connections," Cunningham says. "It's important for the history of the Guild and the history of the community." In researching the exhibit, he unearthed a wealth of tidbits about the artists and complex personalities that made up the early Guild, some of which are included as text with the show.
An example is a story about an early work by Suitt - a rare painting of a nude her mother refused to allow in their home. When fellow member and guild founder Frank Coleman hailed the work as "the best thing she'd ever done," the two artists worked out a trade, sparing both the painting and her mother's modest sensibilities. Cunningham was able to borrow the piece for the show from Coleman's estate - a work neither Suitt nor the community has seen in decades.
Although Bramlett, Suitt and Cantrell remain active in the Artists' Guild of Spartanburg, the new millennium finds it a changed organization. Membership is no longer juried or limited to artists and totals close to 200. Funding stems largely from grants and membership in the Arts Partnership of Greater Spartanburg, and includes in the budget a paid executive director. Guild members also show in their own gallery within the Spartanburg Arts Center, and each year host a major exhibition curated by an outside juror – a primary function of today's organization.
By 1957 standards, it's a group that is far more complex and less personal. To Suitt, however, it's a shift that is appropriate. "I think the guild meets the needs of its members today. We've changed."
For further information check our SC Institutional Gallery listings. For info about the Guild call 864/583-2776 or at (www.sparklenet.com/artistsguild/index.htm). To contact the museum call 864/582-7616 or on the web at (www.sparklenet.com/museumofart/).
Jill Jones is an artist, writer and member of the Artists' Guild of Spartanburg and the Spartanburg County Museum of Art Exhibition Committee.
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