Barbara McCaskill earns Luce Foundation grant for exhibition of works by self-taught artist Sam Doyle

Dr. Barbara McCaskill, professor of English and an associate academic director of the Willson Center, is the principal investigator of a grant awarded by the Henry Luce Foundation for “Gullah Visions: St. Helena Island Through the Works of Self-Taught Artist Sam Doyle,” an art exhibit that will be mounted at the York W. Bailey Museum of the Penn Center National Historic Landmark District on St. Helena Island, South Carolina.

The exhibit will be curated by Dr. Shawnya L. Harris, Larry D. and Brenda A. Thompson Curator of African and African Diasporic Art at the Georgia Museum of Art.

Sam Doyle (1906-1985) grew up in St. Helena, where he attended Penn School—renamed later to Penn Center—and chronicled the changes to island landscape and culture and the island’s memorable stories and people from Jim Crow through the mid-century civil rights era and integration.

The grant project is supported by Penn Center and UGA staff: Dr. Marie Gibbs, Head Docent, York W. Bailey Museum, Penn Center; Ms. Deloris Pringle, Chair of Penn Center Board of Trustees; and Ms. Angela Dore, research coordinator of Culture and Community at Penn Center National Historic Landmark District, Mellon Foundation multiyear grant.