♪ (upbeat opening music) ♪ Hello, I'm Beryl Dakers, welcome to Palmetto Scene !

In the summer of 2020, the Greenville-based Hampton III Gallery held a special exhibit in response to Covid-19.

Twenty of South Carolina's renowned artists participated in the show featuring works all created during the first few months of the pandemic.

In this story we'll see how artists react to challenging times and the role art plays in providing solace, connecting communities, and provoking social changes.

♪ (soft music) ♪ <woman> Growing up in church, we used to sing a song called, In Times Like These.

"We need a savior."

"In times like these, we need an anchor" And I wondered what are the anchors that are holding my artists at this time.

♪ (soft music) ♪ In Times Like These was an exhibition that started in July of 2020 and it featured my artists' works that was done during the time of the pandemic.

♪(flowing music)♪ In the middle of March the gallery closed, I kept thinking about what are my artists doing in the studios and I thought I'm going to contact my artists and see what they produced.

Because even though galleries have been closed, the creations of the artists have continued.

They go into their studios.

They create.

It's part of who they are.

Obviously, we couldn't have openings.

We still don't have openings and can't.

We can have people coming in, one on one and socially distancing, in masks.

But I had to get the message out there.

So I asked all my artists to do a video talking about their work and how this time affected them.

Artists have a creative spirit and they're willing to try.

<Luke Allsbrook> Hi.

My name's Luke Allsbrook.

Welcome to my studio.

<Sharon Campbell> Time lost the meaning that I was used to having for time.

<Julyan Davis> I've been painting the American South now for over 30 years.

<Enid Williams> I'm very interested in how the viewer interacts with my work.

<Paul Yanko> This for me has been a time of reflection.

<Paul Matheny> I did start to look at some elements differently.

What do the bottles mean?

There's a mask.

<Dave Appleman> I like to do is have it look really nice from any angle.

<Stephen Chesley> We are the trees.

We are the glacial ice.

We are the tyrannasaurus.

We are everything.

<Sandra> I also ask as I normally do when I do an exhibition about an artist's statement.

♪ (soft piano playing) ♪ My artists were challenged by this isolation time.

<Tom Stanley> For me, thought processes had been altered.

<Sandra> He had created a beautiful series of work, extremely colorful, positive southern images before all of this happened.

And Tom said to me "My mind and my hand are not working."

<Tom> Something about the air out there.

Whatever was going on seemed to change what I did and how I did it or even wanting to do it.

<Sandra> Tom said to me I'll try Sandy.

<Tom> On a piece of paper, I painted one silhouette tree.

<Sandra> Then he drew another tree.

He looked at this composition as almost like an encyclopedia page documenting trees.

<Tom> One thing I thought about was the loss of legendary singer/songwriter John Prine.

I listened to a lot of his work during this time because his passing was due to the virus.

<Sandra> The last album that he created was Trees Of Forgiveness.

Tom gave the nod to that titling his work Trees Of Forgiveness.

<Jeanet> I was extremely influenced by the sudden event of COVID-19 and I tried to paint the rambling waters and the destruction.

<Sandra> Jeanet Dreskin is the oldest artist that I represent.

She turned 99 a few weeks ago.

<Jeanet> The swirling and the depressing feeling one gets from being wet all the time, from life and activity to death.

<Sandra> You can see the turbulence with the way that she dealt with the waves.

<Jeanet> COVID-19 has had such an influence on everything.

It has affected my paintings, my activities and I'm afraid it's affecting life as we've known it in America today.

<eerie music> <Sandra> And I find that many of my artists, all of them really their hands are a way of their expression and sometimes they don't know what to do with their hands but they pick up their materials and their materials guide them into creating something.

<Alice Ballard> One of the things I found during this pandemic was that making pinch pots, with each pinch of the clay it seemed to absorb some of the anxiety that I was feeling.

<Sandra> She had these beautiful bowls where the glaze was inside and she called them meditation bowls, Lean On Me.

<Alice> Although, it's a very simple idea, Lean On Me, I don't know what I would do without a lot of my friends that I've had to lean on.

<Sandra> There are many different approaches that my artists used in this show.

Some went back to a happier day and brought something forward.

Others dealt with social injustice.

<man> I bought the book called Slavery by Another Name.

There was one photograph about the size of my thumb of a young man tied to a pickax, left in the dirt.

It's horrific to think about.

Hung up like an animal, left in the sun.

<Sandra> The reality of convict leasing which me, as a southern girl, knew nothing about.

<Edward> A writer can write a book, a songwriter could write a song, a lawyer could pass a law, what can a painter do?

All I can do is paint.

<Sandra> And this painting, which was eight feet long, took up a whole wall of my gallery.

You could see the beauty of the painting and the expertise that Ed Rice has and the horror of the subject matter.

<Edward> Paint with conviction and compassion caused my idea.

<John Acorn> The title of this artwork is A Night at Home.

<Sandra> John he's really one of the most progressive southern sculptors of our time.

<John> This was the symbol of our state, naturally.

<Sandra> It had cut out guns on top of a house and so forth.

<John> This of course is like in a danger zone.

<Sandra> On the road underneath there are these shelves, real shelves.

<John> In our state, we seem to have a lot of incidents that are domestic violence.

<Sandra> Another issue that we're dealing with during this time.

<Man #2> Often three or more generations live in the same space.

The blues is what they live everyday.

♪ (blues music) ♪ <Sandra> Leo Twiggs was one of the first artists to be brought into the gallery.

The gallery has had decades of relationship with him.

His voice has been a huge impact in southern art and beyond, also.

<Leo> Then I decided to put the two paintings together.

<Sandra> In his 80s, Leo still has a strong voice.

<Leo> And then George Floyd was killed.

♪ (guitar music) ♪ <Sandra> There's many issues these days for Leo to consider.

<Leo> They should leave their sheltered spaces and begin marching in the streets.

And I heard their voices and I began another painting.

<Sandra> He has found a way to express himself, not just in the negativism of all of this, but also the hope that we can overcome what we've been dealing with and the injustice.

♪ (music fades) ♪ <Sandra> In times like these, art has a role.

Art can be an avenue for change.

Art can make us see ourselves and how we respond to things.

Art is part of contemplation.

It can be part of solace.

It's going to create something different in each person.

But I think what this show did is to create more conversation, to have an interaction, one on one.

Artist Fletcher Williams is no stranger to challenging the landscapes and politics of his home city of Charleston, South Carolina.

Williams recently invaded the historic Aiken Rhett House with his exhibit Promiseland , Questioning the American Dream.

Who was it meant for, and noting how black people, even today, have not always been included.

Grass is greener on the other side idea and I'm always thinking of white picket fence.

So, I imagine that as this Promiseland Peoples' I guess pursuit of the good life, the perfect life.

A want of just basic comfort, safety, privacy if you want.

Definitely confronted with this work and these ideas and like what they mean to you and how much ownership you take of them how much they're available to other people, like your space and your privilege.

I think, I that's what is kinda teased out in this exhibition.

You wouldn't be confronted with race, I don't think, immediately.

I think the conversation could always get there but as soon as you bring into this space in the American dream, it's unavoidable.

♪ I've always been interested in architecture of historic buildings.

And then for some reason, the picket fence and the idea of American Dream then when I'm out here exploring these rural areas and thinking about what it took for Black people to survive when they don't have a place to learn, they don't have a place to, perform their own music, a place to shop for their own food, I mean you gotta be creative, you gotta adapt.

I'm like, so what did the American dream look like?

And I was like well, what's this picket fence all about?

Taking ownership of those ideas that weren't intended to be taken ownership by Black people, so I think the white picket fence is that.

What really got me interested, I've seen white picket fence not even surrounding some of the most beautiful homes.

I've seen it in yards that aren't even maintained.

I mean, I've seen picket fence attached to wire fences.

I've seen picket fences that are a foot tall, picket fences that are falling over.

I mean, so everybody wants to express that they have some kind of relationship with what this country was intended to offer most people.

And so I find it really interesting to just use that object to my work.

♪ To bring this object into a space that was, you know, void of the American dream for Black people.

I thought it would be interesting conversation to have because this is essentially a prison.

I mean, as grand as it is, I mean I'm not really, I mean it - You're impressed by the grandiosity of it but, then you remember well this was built by the people that are housed in those small quarters in the back and all the wealth amassed from that, that allowed you to create this, this archetype of power, but also, then going back to the fence and then also looking at these brick walls that surround this, we're talking about fear and control and power and as ornamental and pretty as even a white picket fence is, we're still talking about dividing space.

We're still putting space between you and another person.

Even when listening to the audio tour a bit at first, I was like well this is a bit, it's a little joyful, I think there's been some reinterpretation over the years of bringing the Black experience.

I think people can still avoid that.

When you bring artwork in here to then kinda disrupt the space, you confront yours.

There's a different level of engagement that's not happening on a day to day basis in these houses.

♪ When I moved back in 2013, I got this job at a hotel which was a really weird space kind of like those old racial politics at play.

I mean my title was houseman and then you had, you know, young White woman work front desk and you have all kind of back house people who were, I mean, Black women two, three times my age doing laundry.

I was like this feels like somewhat of a plantation here.

I also drove the shuttle so I was transporting guests to and from Market Street downtown and during those trips you know I'm kind of, one, I'm educating myself on the history of the city.

Ok, we're going past all the cathedrals, like some important buildings, like I'm directing them to certain restaurants because they're coming down here for southern food and southern food and Black culture and I also started to interact more with the kids who make roses.

They're the stewards of that craft.

I mean they know the craft and it's a way to make money and they're really good at it.

I mean to whittle that thing that quickly and then they carry around this palm under their arm.

I was really impressed.

Just appreciating the craft behind it and kind of the whole ecosystem around, a whole economy around palms, roses and then the kind of folklore behind that, a symbol of everlasting love dating back to the Civil War.

I don't know if anyone really has confirmation of that, but it's certainly embedded in the, in the object, in the rose.

So when I started seeing signs that called them roaming peddlers, I'm just like that's a bit insidious, especially when you have tourists who come here.

Who's gonna take the time to discern between someone who's a part of a program and someone who isn't?

That's asking a lot of people who come here.

So essentially, they're just going take the easy route.

We're just not going to buy from any of them because they're probably all criminals.

And so I thought it was absolutely important to kind of revise that language, which of course, I don't believe the city adopted, but just to, you know, I present them as artisans and they have the right to be here, create and sell in these places, which for Charleston is absolutely useful to tourism.

I mean, this is something people take away with them.

This is one of the few items.

There is a lot of things you can take with them.

You can have your receipt from a restaurant or your pass from taking a water tour, but your interaction with Black people, you take away the rose that grew from a palm, the palmetto tree here, there's so much symbolism embedded in that.

It's so meaningful and so I just I didn't think they had the support that they should have from the city for being such a huge contributors.

I mean Black people have never been the sole beneficiaries of their contributions to America and we're gonna see that being played out in this city where we're celebrated for tourism in the beauty and history, I can't.

We gotta, we gotta do something about that.

They're the women who sell wildflowers down at Broad Street.

There's a story about the peanut man who was kind of pushed out too but the city mobilized behind him and of course there the city retracted their statements and allowed this person to come back.

There's no reason that if we are aware of history we don't want history to repeat itself, why are we then criminalizing these kids, these Black kids for selling roses?

Charleston always takes like these little tokens of Black culture, like holds them tight and cherish them, but I think there's a way for me to take something like that subverted and use the beauty of it, the allure of it and then draw people into issues that I think Charleston still hasn't grappled with yet.

It was a lot of crime and I think misrepresentation of Black people too and so I started doing these drawings that were probably, I guess graphic of certain shootings.

I would use kind of like historical motifs in the drawings.

But I knew that people would see the rose from afar, that the frames were very ornate and so I would capture their attention that way and then bring them into this imagery that wasn't so beautiful.

And that's been kind of my strategy but it's subversion in response to like the Charleston landscape, the traditionalism of it.

A lot of my work is very symbolic, very metaphorical but that piece in particular which I consider Rose Shroud was being made, I kind of can see that idea around the same time of Emanuel and Walter Scott too.

So, I've always been kind of compelled to create work that memorialized Black people.

And so I used the palmetto fronds, the leaves, as the base of it and then I wove three thousand roses into.

I wanted to really represent the Lowcountry landscape whether be it walking path through the center of it or the waterway but definitely invoke South Carolina.

Well, this lays on top of tin sheets, which are from a freemen's cottage which for me are very figurative, there you know the scale, just the size and orientation of them look like bodies to me.

And so, I then kind of in this procession laid this shroud on top of these which then lays on a base that's inverted picket fence and then we can tie the idea of American dream and the history of that so it's all kind of packed into this one piece.

I'm always in the back of my mind looking for a way to push the craft and always looking for new ways to utilize and kind of bring it into this larger art canon.

Cause you typically see just the rose independent of anything else.

It's not used in a large piece of work but to apply it, to use it as social critique it's not very common.

So, that's really packed into that piece that started in a moment where I was really reflected on like again a traumatic time in Charleston's history.

♪ I don't even try to control it.

I know this is going to bubble to the surface when I'm like composing different sculptures.

My work always seem to fall in place because I'm constantly letting my environment inform me, which of course is Black history, American history, the kind of challenges embedded within that, the creativity and adaptation of people to survive here, so there's a bit of mortality always embedded in the work.

Well I guess the Shroud piece has significance now the nine bouquets of roses, the picket fence.

I mean this is, and also this stuff it's just not been challenged in a long time.

So, it just makes sense.

I mean it's not that difficult you know if you put the stuff in your work the conversation immediately starts, and that's kinda where we're at.

This is a good time to have an exhibition that speaks about race and politics and how we write history, how we revise history, how interact with history, how we preserve history.

I kind of struggle with it sometimes of not wanting my work or just me being a Black artist to be protest but that's just the nature of it.

♪ That's just always going to be a part of my conversation.

And I understand that, and so yeah these spaces and putting this work out here and having civic engagement in mind is important and is a part of the work and coming into spaces like this we can keep the conversation going and get people a point of entry into the conversation through art is incredibly useful.

♪ Black artists and art activism are one in the same.

It's unavoidable and you have to embrace it.

♪ Our last story comes from our digital series "The Scoop".

With over 4.7 million acres of farmland, South Carolina has a robust agricultural industry leading to a unique food culture.

We took a poll and asked our audience, "What's a recipe or dish that defines who we are as South Carolinians?"

Well, you may be surprised to hear its boiled peanuts, the official state snack.

Before I even had teeth, and the women who tended the nursery would take the boiled peanuts out of the shell and much them with their fingers and put them into my mouth.

So even before I was able to chew them myself, I've been eating boiled peanuts.

So we are Boiled Peanuts Y'all, and we've been selling boiled peanuts for about six and a half years.

When COVID hit, we had a lot of our markets and festivals shut down, and we pivoted to internet deliveries.

So we set up our website, and now people can order boiled peanuts to be delivered fresh to their door every other week in Florence and Columbia.

When Erin and I first started boiling peanuts, I knew that I could take my peanuts to her and she would be a good source of quality control because she had been eating them since she was a baby.

We get the dry raw peanuts.

They're only from the State Farmer's Market.

We go through bushels a week.

Boiling peanuts is actually really interesting.

A lot of people don't know the boiler's perspective, like the actual guy boiling your peanuts.

He's got to sit with the pot for like, 20 to 24 hours.

He keeps the fire right.

He keeps the water right.

He keeps the salt right.

It's kind of like a ritual of sorts.

It's like a big cauldron, and you get to just think whatever you want and make all this like, oh, all these peanuts are going to be super awesome and make everybody happy, and you just boil that, and you just think that, and you just put that into the pot, and then it happens.

You got boiled peanuts.

[cheers and applause] The main reason why boiled peanuts are a Southern thing or specifically a South Carolina thing, is that they were boiled fresh in the locations that they were grown.

So originally people started growing the peanuts and boiling them at the end of the season, and so that's why you'll only find them in states that grow peanuts.

So we noticed that a lot of people that love boiled peanuts seem to come from all walks of life, and we started thinking about why is that, and we kind of think that it's really, it sounds kind of funny, but the boiled peanuts really feed the soul.

They do that in a lot of different ways.

They are a really nourishing food, and it's really different than a lot of food we get nowadays.

It's nice to eat this unprocessed, slow-cooked food that's so satisfying.

There's also a unique thing about eating boiled peanuts, which is that you have to slow down when you eat them.

People really enjoy being in the moment of eating the boiled peanut, which is really different than a lot of other snacks.

It's more than a snack.

It's an experience.

[dinner bell ringing] Time for boiled peanuts, y'all!

Wow, for more stories about our state and more details on those stories you've just seen, please visit our website at palmetto scene dot org.

Of course, don't forget to follow us on social media Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

@SCETV Hashtag PalmettoScene.

We leave you with tonight's "Palmetto Postcard" from the majestic Angel Oak tree of the Lowcountry.

For Palmetto Scene, and all the folks here at ETV, I'm Beryl Dakers.

Good Night, and thanks for watching!

It's always interesting, when people first get here, when they walk around the gift shop and all of a sudden they see the entire north side of the tree which doesn't have any limbs in the way, their reactions are really interesting, jaw dropping and you hear a lot of wows and things like that.

Even small children get real enthusiastic to get near the tree.

♪ It represents I think the history of the Lowcountry in its own way.

This tree has been here a lot longer than the colonists, the interesting thing to me is that this was also an Indian site.

I occasionally find arrowheads here.

We believe the tree is between four and five hundred years old probably closer to 500.

The species of the tree is Virginia Oak.

It covers about almost 18,000 square feet as far as the foliage which is almost half an acre, which is pretty incredible for one tree.

♪