Museum Education

When the Greenville County Museum of Art began collecting Southern art in the early 1980s, there were no other museums focusing on the subject. Art created far from the mainstream centers of New York and Paris was just emerging as a hot topic in the art world. The Museum leapt into uncharted waters, and many other museums and private collectors have since followed.

The Museum defines "Southern art" broadly: it can be art created by a native Southerner, art that depicts the South or an aspect of Southern history or culture, or art that was created in the South by a non-Southern artist.

The collection begins with portraits from the 1700s and continues up to the present day. Art from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries is particularly well represented, and includes examples of landscape, still life, history painting, Impressionism, American Scene, Abstract Expressionism, and Pop Art. Artists include Thomas Sully, Washington Allston, Georgia O’Keeffe, Edward Hopper, Thomas Hart Benton, Andy Warhol, and Jasper Johns.

Although selections from the museum’s collections are always on view, if you are journeying here to see a particular work, it might be wise to check beforehand.