Finally tonight, we're sticking with that history theme.

Before he became one of the most influential artists of the 20th century, Romare Bearden was a young boy spending summers right here in Charlotte.

While he's often associated with Harlem, New York, it was the sights, sounds and stories of the South that deeply shaped his legendary collage work.

Videographer Marcellus Jones helps us explore the Southern roots of Bearden's creativity and how his legacy lives on.

(screen whooshing) - [Romare] When I first began to do collages, I had no idea that I was going to develop certain symbols that have run through my work, like the train, the serpent, the guitar.

But these were all natural things that I saw in the life around Mecklenburg County in North Carolina.

And so much of that life that I lived as a young boy has informed my work.

(jaunty music) - Bearden was born, lived for about three years, just about two and a half blocks away at 401 South Grand Street with his grandparents.

He ran a grocery store, convenience store, and then he moved up to New York.

He kind of never left both in terms of his memories, in terms of family being here.

He would come back and visit on occasion, and especially in his paintings of the 40s.

And then once he started making his collages in the 60s all the way up through the 1980s, Mecklenburg County, Charlotte, the people, the environment, all of those things featured frequently in his work.

- I knew him as a young person, as a child, and I was one of the only nieces who had a real interest in art.

So it was wonderful for us to be able to have access to Romare in that way.

I didn't really know him as a famous artist.

I knew that he was someone well-respected.

I knew that he was always working.

Even when there was company, he was always talking, and working about art.

- I was always a full-time painter.

Even when I was working, I was thinking about it.

A lot of people say, "You must have a great, a more of photographs and things."

No, I don't.

All of the things that I do, if I cut out, I just make up.

And it's really in the way I do my collage now is like drawing or painting.

(jazz music) - It means everything to me to have a park that's not just named after Romare Bearden, but reflects his love of art, color, texture.

You can actually get his history at different places in the park.

And also, for me, it's a testament to his reach and his impact, not just here in my hometown, in my city of Charlotte, but also globally.

(jazz music) - The Romare Bearden Park was a project that came into our office when I was pretty new in my career, so I think it came in around 2002.

It was called New West Park at the time.

And so this one, historically, was the neighborhood of Brooklyn, historic African American neighborhood that had changed so much that it was not recognizable as that.

And so as thinking about what could be meaningful as a foundation for what that park would be, and how it could be bringing community together, it was acknowledged that Romare Bearden, having been born here and having visited here a lot would be a great foundation to sort of build the idea of a park around.

- Being from Charlotte is really, really important to have that influence.

If you haven't read about him, read about him, understand what he was doing, and make it part of your work, absolutely.

- It's a matter of discovery.

If you were a hunter, you couldn't say, I'm going out to shoot a deer, a partridge or sparrow, and this is what life is.

You take what you find, and do the best you can with it.