Props: Personal identities in the Portrait Photography of Richard Samuel Roberts

The term “props” brings to mind the objects used in the theater that help establish the meaning of a scene. In this theater context, the word is shortened from “properties,” things collectively owned by a theater group. But could the term also reflect the notion that props show “properties” of a character, offering layers of information and meaning to a viewer.? “Props” is also a slang term, meaning “proper respect.” In this show, we analyze the props in photographic portraits taken by RSR between 1920-1936 to see the way that the “props”—most often objects chosen by the sitters themselves—tell us something about the self-identity of the sitters. The objects chosen often underscore the proper respect due the sitters based on their attainments, but also can give insights—in an otherwise very formulaic genre—into the inner desires and predilections of the sitters. Props thus can help us see beyond the surface, or, perhaps conversely, can reify socially-agreed upon tropes.  

September 3 – December 14, 2019

Richardson Family Art Museum (lower level)
Exhibit Hours: Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday, Saturday: 1 – 5 p.m.
Thursday: 1 – 9 p.m.
Closed on Sunday and Monday

From the haunting novels of William Faulkner to the gritty short stories of Flannery O'Connor, the Southern Gothic literary tradition has exhumed and examined the American South’s unique mystery, contradictions, and dark humor. Beginning in the mid-nineteenth century, American writers, epitomized by Edgar Allan Poe and Nathaniel Hawthorne, sought to reinterpret the Gothic imagination of their European counterparts, dramatizing the cultures and characters of a region in the midst of civil war and its tumultuous aftermath. Decades later, a new generation of authors—including Tennessee Williams, Carson McCullers, and Toni Morrison—wove Gothic elements into their own narratives, exploring the complexities of a changing social terrain and the ancient spirits that linger in its corners. 

With works drawn exclusively from the Johnson Collection, Southern Gothic illuminates how nineteenth- and twentieth-century artists employed a potent visual language to transcribe the tensions between the South’s idyllic aura and its historical realities. Often described as a mood or sensibility rather than a strict set of thematic or technical conventions, features of the Southern Gothic can include horror, romance, and the supernatural. While academic painters such as Charles Fraser and Thomas Noble conveyed the genre’s gloomy tonalities in their canvases, Aaron Douglas and Harry Hoffman grappled with the injustices of a modern world. Other artists, including Alexander Brook and Eugene Thomason, investigated prevailing stereotypes of rural Southerners—a trope often accentuated in Southern Gothic literature. Collectively, these images demonstrate that definitions of the Gothic are neither monolithic nor momentary, inviting us, instead to contemplate how the Southern Gothic legacy continues to inform our understanding of the American South.

September 3 – December 14, 2019

Richardson Family Art Museum (upper level)

Interested in getting involved in the Theatre Department at Wofford? Want to learn more about what’s coming up this season, and about how you can help? Please join us for an Open House on Sept. 3 at 6 PM in the Sallenger Sisters Black Box Theatre! Meet the faculty, staff, and students who make up the vibrant and growing theatre community on campus, learn more about opportunities to get involved both onstage and off, and enjoy some delicious treats while you’re at it!

After the Open House, all are welcome to stay to audition for our fall play, Circle Mirror Transformation, written by Annie Baker and directed by Prof. Dan Day. Auditions will include cold readings from the script, and all auditionees are also invited to prepare and memorize two contrasting, contemporary monologues from American playwrights, no more than one minute long each. Note that monologues are required for all students who are currently pursuing or who plan to declare a major or minor in Theatre; please prepare new material that you have not used for previous auditions, classes, or productions at Wofford. Monologues are optional for all others.

Props: Personal identities in the Portrait Photography of Richard Samuel Roberts

The term “props” brings to mind the objects used in the theater that help establish the meaning of a scene. In this theater context, the word is shortened from “properties,” things collectively owned by a theater group. But could the term also reflect the notion that props show “properties” of a character, offering layers of information and meaning to a viewer.? “Props” is also a slang term, meaning “proper respect.” In this show, we analyze the props in photographic portraits taken by RSR between 1920-1936 to see the way that the “props”—most often objects chosen by the sitters themselves—tell us something about the self-identity of the sitters. The objects chosen often underscore the proper respect due the sitters based on their attainments, but also can give insights—in an otherwise very formulaic genre—into the inner desires and predilections of the sitters. Props thus can help us see beyond the surface, or, perhaps conversely, can reify socially-agreed upon tropes.  

September 3 – December 14, 2019

Richardson Family Art Museum (lower level)
Exhibit Hours: Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday, Saturday: 1 – 5 p.m.
Thursday: 1 – 9 p.m.
Closed on Sunday and Monday

From the haunting novels of William Faulkner to the gritty short stories of Flannery O'Connor, the Southern Gothic literary tradition has exhumed and examined the American South’s unique mystery, contradictions, and dark humor. Beginning in the mid-nineteenth century, American writers, epitomized by Edgar Allan Poe and Nathaniel Hawthorne, sought to reinterpret the Gothic imagination of their European counterparts, dramatizing the cultures and characters of a region in the midst of civil war and its tumultuous aftermath. Decades later, a new generation of authors—including Tennessee Williams, Carson McCullers, and Toni Morrison—wove Gothic elements into their own narratives, exploring the complexities of a changing social terrain and the ancient spirits that linger in its corners. 

With works drawn exclusively from the Johnson Collection, Southern Gothic illuminates how nineteenth- and twentieth-century artists employed a potent visual language to transcribe the tensions between the South’s idyllic aura and its historical realities. Often described as a mood or sensibility rather than a strict set of thematic or technical conventions, features of the Southern Gothic can include horror, romance, and the supernatural. While academic painters such as Charles Fraser and Thomas Noble conveyed the genre’s gloomy tonalities in their canvases, Aaron Douglas and Harry Hoffman grappled with the injustices of a modern world. Other artists, including Alexander Brook and Eugene Thomason, investigated prevailing stereotypes of rural Southerners—a trope often accentuated in Southern Gothic literature. Collectively, these images demonstrate that definitions of the Gothic are neither monolithic nor momentary, inviting us, instead to contemplate how the Southern Gothic legacy continues to inform our understanding of the American South.

September 3 – December 14, 2019

Richardson Family Art Museum (upper level)

Props: Personal identities in the Portrait Photography of Richard Samuel Roberts

The term “props” brings to mind the objects used in the theater that help establish the meaning of a scene. In this theater context, the word is shortened from “properties,” things collectively owned by a theater group. But could the term also reflect the notion that props show “properties” of a character, offering layers of information and meaning to a viewer.? “Props” is also a slang term, meaning “proper respect.” In this show, we analyze the props in photographic portraits taken by RSR between 1920-1936 to see the way that the “props”—most often objects chosen by the sitters themselves—tell us something about the self-identity of the sitters. The objects chosen often underscore the proper respect due the sitters based on their attainments, but also can give insights—in an otherwise very formulaic genre—into the inner desires and predilections of the sitters. Props thus can help us see beyond the surface, or, perhaps conversely, can reify socially-agreed upon tropes.  

September 3 – December 14, 2019

Richardson Family Art Museum (lower level)
Exhibit Hours: Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday, Saturday: 1 – 5 p.m.
Thursday: 1 – 9 p.m.
Closed on Sunday and Monday

From the haunting novels of William Faulkner to the gritty short stories of Flannery O'Connor, the Southern Gothic literary tradition has exhumed and examined the American South’s unique mystery, contradictions, and dark humor. Beginning in the mid-nineteenth century, American writers, epitomized by Edgar Allan Poe and Nathaniel Hawthorne, sought to reinterpret the Gothic imagination of their European counterparts, dramatizing the cultures and characters of a region in the midst of civil war and its tumultuous aftermath. Decades later, a new generation of authors—including Tennessee Williams, Carson McCullers, and Toni Morrison—wove Gothic elements into their own narratives, exploring the complexities of a changing social terrain and the ancient spirits that linger in its corners. 

With works drawn exclusively from the Johnson Collection, Southern Gothic illuminates how nineteenth- and twentieth-century artists employed a potent visual language to transcribe the tensions between the South’s idyllic aura and its historical realities. Often described as a mood or sensibility rather than a strict set of thematic or technical conventions, features of the Southern Gothic can include horror, romance, and the supernatural. While academic painters such as Charles Fraser and Thomas Noble conveyed the genre’s gloomy tonalities in their canvases, Aaron Douglas and Harry Hoffman grappled with the injustices of a modern world. Other artists, including Alexander Brook and Eugene Thomason, investigated prevailing stereotypes of rural Southerners—a trope often accentuated in Southern Gothic literature. Collectively, these images demonstrate that definitions of the Gothic are neither monolithic nor momentary, inviting us, instead to contemplate how the Southern Gothic legacy continues to inform our understanding of the American South.

Props: Personal identities in the Portrait Photography of Richard Samuel Roberts

The term “props” brings to mind the objects used in the theater that help establish the meaning of a scene. In this theater context, the word is shortened from “properties,” things collectively owned by a theater group. But could the term also reflect the notion that props show “properties” of a character, offering layers of information and meaning to a viewer.? “Props” is also a slang term, meaning “proper respect.” In this show, we analyze the props in photographic portraits taken by RSR between 1920-1936 to see the way that the “props”—most often objects chosen by the sitters themselves—tell us something about the self-identity of the sitters. The objects chosen often underscore the proper respect due the sitters based on their attainments, but also can give insights—in an otherwise very formulaic genre—into the inner desires and predilections of the sitters. Props thus can help us see beyond the surface, or, perhaps conversely, can reify socially-agreed upon tropes.  

September 3 – December 14, 2019

Richardson Family Art Museum (lower level)
Exhibit Hours: Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday, Saturday: 1 – 5 p.m.
Thursday: 1 – 9 p.m.
Closed on Sunday and Monday

Props: Personal identities in the Portrait Photography of Richard Samuel Roberts

The term “props” brings to mind the objects used in the theater that help establish the meaning of a scene. In this theater context, the word is shortened from “properties,” things collectively owned by a theater group. But could the term also reflect the notion that props show “properties” of a character, offering layers of information and meaning to a viewer.? “Props” is also a slang term, meaning “proper respect.” In this show, we analyze the props in photographic portraits taken by RSR between 1920-1936 to see the way that the “props”—most often objects chosen by the sitters themselves—tell us something about the self-identity of the sitters. The objects chosen often underscore the proper respect due the sitters based on their attainments, but also can give insights—in an otherwise very formulaic genre—into the inner desires and predilections of the sitters. Props thus can help us see beyond the surface, or, perhaps conversely, can reify socially-agreed upon tropes.  

September 3 – December 14, 2019

Richardson Family Art Museum (lower level)
Exhibit Hours: Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday, Saturday: 1 – 5 p.m.
Thursday: 1 – 9 p.m.
Closed on Sunday and Monday

From the haunting novels of William Faulkner to the gritty short stories of Flannery O'Connor, the Southern Gothic literary tradition has exhumed and examined the American South’s unique mystery, contradictions, and dark humor. Beginning in the mid-nineteenth century, American writers, epitomized by Edgar Allan Poe and Nathaniel Hawthorne, sought to reinterpret the Gothic imagination of their European counterparts, dramatizing the cultures and characters of a region in the midst of civil war and its tumultuous aftermath. Decades later, a new generation of authors—including Tennessee Williams, Carson McCullers, and Toni Morrison—wove Gothic elements into their own narratives, exploring the complexities of a changing social terrain and the ancient spirits that linger in its corners. 

With works drawn exclusively from the Johnson Collection, Southern Gothic illuminates how nineteenth- and twentieth-century artists employed a potent visual language to transcribe the tensions between the South’s idyllic aura and its historical realities. Often described as a mood or sensibility rather than a strict set of thematic or technical conventions, features of the Southern Gothic can include horror, romance, and the supernatural. While academic painters such as Charles Fraser and Thomas Noble conveyed the genre’s gloomy tonalities in their canvases, Aaron Douglas and Harry Hoffman grappled with the injustices of a modern world. Other artists, including Alexander Brook and Eugene Thomason, investigated prevailing stereotypes of rural Southerners—a trope often accentuated in Southern Gothic literature. Collectively, these images demonstrate that definitions of the Gothic are neither monolithic nor momentary, inviting us, instead to contemplate how the Southern Gothic legacy continues to inform our understanding of the American South.

September 3 – December 14, 2019

Richardson Family Art Museum (upper level)