Aug 21, 2024 — Continuing
Three Mighty Gamecocks features works in various media by Corrie McCallum (1914 – 2009), Jasper Johns (born 1930), and Grainger McKoy (born 1947), all of whom graduated from high school in Sumter, South Carolina.
McCallum, a Sumter native, graduated in 1932 from Sumter High School, after which she enrolled at the University of South Carolina, and later studied at the Boston Museum School of Art. In addition to sustaining her career as a painter and printmaker, McCallum pioneered art education in the South, teaching at the Gibbes Art Gallery, Telfair Academy in Savannah, Newberry College, and the College of Charleston. In 1960, she became the first professional Curator of Art Education at the Gibbes.
Johns graduated as the valedictorian of his 1947 class at Edmunds High School, which was known as Sumter High School until the 1939-1940 school year. After attending the University of South Carolina, he relocated to New York City, where he gained prominence in the mid-1950s for his paintings of American flags, targets, alphabets, and numerals (“things the mind already knows,” as Johns famously said). He is considered one of the most influential painters of the Post-World War era and America’s preeminent living artist.
McKoy graduated in 1965 from Edmunds High and has spent most of his life in Sumter. After studying architecture and biology at Clemson University, he joined his knowledge of the sciences with his uncanny skills as a carver, draftsman, and painter to achieve unique sculptures that fool the eye and defy gravity. His works are found in major public and private collections, most notably at Brookgreen Gardens and the Greenville County Museum of Art.