Queena Stovall (December 20, 1887 – June 27, 1980) was an American folk artist. Sometimes called "The Grandma Moses of Virginia", she is famous for depicting everyday events in the lives of both white and black families in rural settings.[1]
Queena Stovall | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | Emma Serena Dillard December 20, 1887 Amherst County, Virginia, U.S. |
| Died | June 27, 1980 (aged 92) |
| Known for | Painting |
| Movement | American Folk Art |
Early life
editBorn Emma Serena Dillard in Amherst County, Virginia, she received the nickname “Queena” from her grandmother because of the way young children would pronounce "Serena". She married Jonathan Breckenridge Stovall, a traveling salesman, in 1908 and the pair had nine children. The family lived in Lynchburg, Virginia during the fall and winter and on a farm near Elon, Virginia during the spring and summer.[2]
Career
editAfter her brother persuaded her to take an art class at nearby Randolph-Macon Woman’s College in Lynchburg, Stovall began painting at age sixty-two. Her instructor there was Spanish artist Pierre Daura, who encouraged her to stop taking classes and develop her own unique style.[2]
Stovall's career spanned less than two decades, and she produced forty-nine paintings.[1] Her art depicted scenes of ordinary rural life such as crop harvests, animal butchering, funerals, jarring for the winter, baptisms, cooking, and livestock and estate auctions. Stovall combined bright colors with attentive details, and would use figures out of magazines and advertisements to understand the composition needed for her paintings. Her first solo exhibition was at the Lynchburg Art Center in 1956. Stovall continued to paint until her health started to decline in the late 1960s.[2]
Legacy
editStovall's work is currently found in family collections, Virginia-area museums such as the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, and other museums such as the Fenimore Art Museum in Cooperstown, New York.[3] The Daura Gallery at the University of Lynchburg holds the largest public collection of Stovall’s work.[1]
Exhibitions and features
edit- An exhibition, Queena Stovall, Artist of the Blue Ridge Piedmont, was mounted in 1974–1975 and traveled to Lynchburg College, in Lynchburg, Virginia, October 6–25, 1974; to the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Museum, Williamsburg, Virginia, January–March, 1975; and to the New York State Historical Association, Cooperstown, New York, April–September, 1975.[2]
- Stovall's paintings were shown at the 1982 World's Fair in Knoxville, Tennessee.[1]
- Stovall's paintings were shown in 1988 at the United States Embassy in Paris, France.[1]
- Stovall's paintings were featured in the 1994 exhibition Grandma Moses' Southern Sisters: Queena Stovall and Clementine Hunter at the Theatre Art Galleries in High Point, North Carolina.[4]
- A major exhibition of Stovall's work, featuring 44 of her 49 paintings and titled Inside Looking Out, The Art of Queena Stovall, was mounted by curators at the Daura Gallery in 2018 and traveled to the Virginia Historical Society in Richmond, Virginia.[5]
- Stovall was featured in the 2019 exhibit Memory Painting: Harriet French Turner and Queena Stovall at the Taubman Museum of Art.[3]
Other media
edit- The 1983 film Queena Stovall: Life's Narrow Space was produced by Jack Ofield.[6]
- Stovall's work was featured the book The Art of Queena Stovall: Images of Country Life by Claudine Weatherford in 1986[7]
- In conjunction with the exhibit Inside Looking Out, the Art of Queena Stovall, Daura Gallery curators compiled a book with the same title.[8]
Cultural
edit- In 2010, Stovall was posthumously honored as one of the Library of Virginia's "Virginia Women in History" for her contributions to folk art.[9]
- In 2017, the Virginia Department of Historic Resources approved a historic marker in her honor, to be erected near the farm where she spent 35 years of her life, the Wigwam.[10] It was erected in March, 2018.[1]
References
edit- ^ a b c d e f Schkloven, Emma (March 17, 2018). "'She'll be forever with us': Amherst County native Queena Stovall subject of exhibit, new book, historical marker". The News & Advance. Lynchburg, Virginia. Retrieved July 14, 2024.
- ^ a b c d Shiflett, Kaitlin (November 9, 2015). "Queena Stovall: A Southern Memory Painter". Lynchburg Museum System. Retrieved July 14, 2024.
- ^ a b "Memory Painting: Harriet French Turner and Queena Stovall". Taubman Museum of Art. Retrieved November 1, 2019.
- ^ Sellen, Betty-Carol; Johanson, Cynthia J. (2000). Self-taught, Outsider and Folk Art: A Guide to American Artists, Locations and Resources (Updated and rev. ed.). Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland. p. 276. ISBN 9780786407453. OCLC 41439642.
- ^ "Inside Looking Out: The Art of Queena Stovall closing October 14". Virginia Museum of History & Culture. Virginia Historical Society. n.d. Archived from the original on October 9, 2018. Retrieved July 14, 2024.
- ^ "Life's Narrow Space". Folkstreams. Retrieved November 1, 2019.
- ^ Weatherford, Claudine (1986). The Art of Queena Stovall: Images of Country Life. American Material Culture and Folklife. Ann Arbor, Michigan: UMI Research Press. ISBN 0835717658. OCLC 13794109.
- ^ "Daura Gallery releases book about artist Queena Stovall, sponsors highway marker". University of Lynchburg. March 1, 2018. Retrieved November 1, 2019.
- ^ "Virginia Women in History: Queena Stovall". Library of Virginia. Archived from the original on January 11, 2010. Retrieved July 14, 2024.
- ^ Schaedel, Sydney (October 24, 2017). "New historic highway marker to honor local artist". The News & Advance. Lynchburg, Virginia. Retrieved July 14, 2024.
Further reading
edit- Jones, Louis C.; Jones, Agnes Halsey (1974). Queena Stovall, Artist of the Blue Ridge Piedmont: An Exhibition. New York State Historical Association..