MAG spotlights folk carver Edmondson

n 1937, William Edmondson, a folk carver from Nashville, Tenn., became the first African-American to be awarded a solo exhibition at New York's Museum of Modern Art. Today, he's being hailed as a pioneer of modernism and one of the most important self-taught sculptors of the 20th century.

Edmondson

The first major traveling retrospective of Edmondson's work opened at the Memorial Art Gallery on September 24 and remains on view through January 7. Organized by Nashville's Cheekwood Museum of Art, The Art of William Edmondson includes 41 limestone sculptures whose subjects range from Biblical sources to popular culture and folklore. Also on view are 43 historic photos of the artist and his work taken by Edward Weston, Louise Dahl-Wolfe, and Consuelo Kanaga.

Born in 1874, Edmondson was one of six children of former slaves. He was nearly 60 years old when he first took up stone carving, inspired, he said, by religious visions. Working with a handmade chisel on limestone block from demolished buildings, he began carving tombstones for Nashville's two black cemeteries and creating fanciful sculptures of animal, human, and celestial figures. It was Dahl-Wolfe's classic photos of Edmondson and his work that caught the attention of Alfred Barr, the first director of the Museum of Modern Art.

During the exhibit's run at MAG, there will be a number of ancillary events, including a family day, monthly concerts, and a series of lectures. Check the Currents calendar in each issue for further details on these events.

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