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    Seeking: Poetry and Prose Inspired by the Art of Jonathan Green
    Seeking: Poetry and Prose Inspired by the Art of Jonathan Green
    Seeking: Poetry and Prose Inspired by the Art of Jonathan Green
    Ebook115 pages58 minutes

    Seeking: Poetry and Prose Inspired by the Art of Jonathan Green

    By Kwame Dawes and Marjory Wentworth

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    About this ebook

    The best art has the uncanny ability not only to give pleasure to those who view it but also to led to a desire to respond. The best artists are a force for all art, and renowned Gullah artist Jonathan Green's work has inspired a wide range of responses from artists around the world. In Seeking we see how Green's art prompts works of poetry, prose, and memoir. Seeking's evocative power lies in the intimacy of this dialogue, which speaks to the shared sense of landscape and culture that Green stirs in these writers, ranging from close friends and fellow artists from his home state of South Carolina to nationally established authors who regard Green's work as an important cultural institution. The contributors have allowed themselves to be challenged by Green's brilliance, his honesty, his intense spirituality, and his deep love of people. Inspired by a personal quest toward induction into a spiritual community, Green's painting Seeking is rich with history, myth, and truth. The writers in this collection have found fertile ground for their own responses to Green's work, and the result is an engaging and enlivening chorus of celebratory voices.

    Edited by Kwame Dawes and Marjory Wentworth, this collection features eleven color paintings by Green in addition to a preface on the history of the project, information on the painting Seeking, and an artist's statement.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherUniversity of South Carolina Press
    Release dateMar 1, 2013
    ISBN9781611171860
    Seeking: Poetry and Prose Inspired by the Art of Jonathan Green

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      Book preview

      Seeking - Kwame Dawes

      Seeking

      Poetry and Prose Inspired by the Art of

      Jonathan Green

      Edited by Kwame Dawes and Marjory Wentworth

      THE UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH CAROLINA PRESS

      © 2013 University of South Carolina

      All art reproductions © 2013 Jonathan Green

      Published by the University of South Carolina Press Columbia, South Carolina 29208

      www.sc.edu/uscpress

      22 21 20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13

      10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

      Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

      Seeking : poetry and prose inspired by the art of Jonathan Green / edited by Kwame Dawes and Marjory Wentworth.

      p. cm. — (Palmetto poetry series)

      ISBN 978-1-61117-091-7 (hardbound : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-1-61117-092-4 (pbk. : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-1-61117-186-0 (epub) 1. American literature—South Carolina. 2. Gullahs—Influence. 3. Art and literature. 4. Influence (Literary, artistic, etc.) 5. Gullahs—Poetry. 6. African diaspora. I. Dawes, Kwame Senu Neville, 1962–

      II. Wentworth, Marjory, 1958– III. Green, Jonathan, 1955–

      PS266.S6 S44013

      810.9'9757—dc23

      2012033259

      I don't feel weary and noways tired

      O glory hallelujah

      Just let me in the kingdom while the world is all on fire

      O glory hallelujah

      I Don't Feel Weary, from Slave Songs of the United States, 1867

      CONTENTS

      ILLUSTRATIONS

      Seeking

      Chinaberry Lane

      Breath of Earth

      The Gnostic

      Marsh Grass

      Praise House

      Solitude

      Tulips

      Endless Marsh

      Deep Roots

      A Simple Prayer

      Contemplation

      Marsh Breeze

      Corn Field

      Fishing Line

      My Daughter

      PREFACE

      Once you encounter Jonathan Green, you enter into a world that is magical, inclusive, celebratory, and incredibly generous. He has an ability to move mountains—no matter what the odds. Even more than his accomplishments, it is his compassion that defines him. Despite his fame and fortune, Jonathan is literally and metaphorically grounded by the place he comes from. He is a role model to young people throughout the region, and he takes that role very seriously.

      I first met Jonathan through a collaborative exhibit at the Gibbes Museum of Art that included my poetry and his paintings. I fell in love with his work at once and was thrilled when he agreed to let me use his painting Marsh Grass on the cover of my first book of poems. Proving that the world is indeed a small place, the collection included a eulogy of a close mutual friend. Since then we have worked together on a number of projects that focus largely on arts education. Mostly, Jonathan is a warm-hearted friend. I am blessed to know him.

      Everything about the Seeking Project embodies Jonathan Green's deep community spirit—from his initial meeting with Father Francis Kline at Mepkin Abbey, who dreamed of having a painting that would honor the African American slave culture, which is part of the monastery's rich history—to the collaborative poetry and jazz performances, created in response to the Seeking painting five years later.

      The project started in 2003, when Jonathan Green visited Mepkin Abbey in Moncks Corner, South Carolina, to meet with Father Francis Kline, the abbey's revered abbott. Once a rice plantation, the abbey was home to African Americans who were held as slaves. When the two men visited the overgrown, unmarked slave cemetery on the edge of the abbey grounds, Jonathan, who was deeply moved, discovered a deep personal connection to the sacred space. He began to sketch out his ideas for the painting on the spot. What ultimately became the painting Seeking was inspired by Jonathan's childhood in the Gullah community of Gardens Corner, South Carolina, where young people were sent into the woods alone for two weeks to seek the word of God as a rite of passage into the church. Upon their return, the teenagers were questioned by church elders about their insights and feelings. Their answers determined whether of not they were admitted to the church.

      In 2006, just a few days after the death of Father Kline,

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