August Library Events and Programs

Special Tour with The Curator | Gibbes Museum of Art |TBA

Friends of the Library (and their guests) are invited to an insiders tour and reception of the newest exhibit at the Gibbes Museum with the exhibit curator, Dr. Dale Rosengarten. This exhibition recognizes African contributions to American history and culture in entirely new ways.

As you walk through the exhibit, you will explore - through the story of the beautiful coiled basket - the history of the region. You'll discover how Africans provided the agricultural expertise and technologies that created prosperity for the slaveholding elite. You'll learn that rice had been domesticated in Africa, as well as in Asia; that Africans who knew how to cultivate rice were worth a premium along the rice-growing coast of the American Southeast; and that so much of the artistic, religious, linguistic, and domestic heritage of Africa's rice growers had survived the transfer to America. Featuring over two hundred objects, including baskets made in Africa and the American South, African sculptures, paintings from the Charleston Renaissance, historic photography, and new video, the exhibition traces the history of the coiled basket on two continents and shows how a simple farm tool once used for processing rice has become a work of art and an important symbol of African-American identity.

This exhibition is organized by the Museum for African Art, New York, in cooperation with the Avery Research Center for African American History and Culture at the College of Charleston, and the McKissick Museum at the University of South Carolina.