Piccolo Spoleto 2006 Presents: A Retrospective of paintings by William McCullough

Charleston SC - The City of Charleston Office of Cultural Affairs presents a retrospective exhibition of work by Southern painter William McCullough, which will be on display from May 20th to August 12th, 2006 at the City Gallery at Waterfront Park. The exhibition will showcase Mr. McCullough's work from past and present and will open in conjunction with the 2006 Piccolo Spoleto Festival.

The paintings will take the viewer from the farms of rural South Carolina to the studio lofts of New York City, and from the mountains of Western North Carolina to the changing urban landscape of Charleston in a visual journey through over 30 years of McCullough's professional career. This extraordinary collection of paintings transports you through the life of one of the South's most important Contemporary Realist painters.

About William McCullough:
After growing up in rural Williamsburg County, McCullough left his family farm for Manhattan to pursue a career as a professional artist. In New York in 1968 he met Robert Brachman, a former student of Robert Henri, George Bellows, and Edward Hopper. Brachman taught a direct and non-sentimental realistic style of painting despite the fact that representational art had been completely dismissed by the art critics of this time. McCullough was also a frequent visitor to the home of John Koch, a renowned representational painter who critiqued the young artist's work and served as mentor and friend. The artist Daniel Greene, an instructor at the Art Student's League, was influential to McCullough's style and McCullough worked for a time in Greene's New York Studio.

Following the tradition of Edward Hopper and Andrew Wyeth, McCullough and his classmates created landscapes and urban interiors with figures and spaces solidly defined and classically rendered. According to Gerold M. Wunderlich, "In this climate, these younger post war artists believed that portraying subject matter in factual terms could break new ground. By capturing the information that their eyes and senses supplied them, new methods of observing nature could be discovered." Further, in the words of Robert Brachman, "tradition must be learned, if for nothing more than to find how to break it intelligently."

In 1973 McCullough returned to the South and began painting landscapes of the Appalachian Mountains and teaching painting at the Tryon Fine Art Center in Tryon North Carolina. In the 1980's he moved back to South Carolina and the family farm, focusing on painting the agrarian landscape and shortly thereafter began working for the Gibbes Studio School in Charleston South Carolina. In the late 1980's the old city began to experience a shift in the cultural and ethnic make up of many of its downtown neighborhoods. McCullough used his skill of non-sentimental realistic painting to document the vanishing urban communities. These paintings in addition to his masterfully composed, painterly landscapes and still-lifes grew his reputation as one of the leading realist painters of the South. Today his work is represented in many corporate, private, and museum collections throughout the U.S.

Today McCullough divides his time between his studio above the 53 Cannon St Gallery and his farm in Kingstree and although his work is steeped in the traditions of classical realism, he remains deeply connected to the culture, landscape, and traditions of the South.

The City Gallery at Waterfront Park is owned by the City of Charleston and managed by the Office of Cultural Affairs. It is located at 34 Prioleau Street and is open Tuesday - Friday, 11:00am - 6:00pm and Saturday and Sunday, 12:00pm- 5:00pm. Admission is free. For more information please contact the gallery at (843) 958-6484 or HYPERLINK "mailto:citygallery@ci.charleston.sc.us" citygallery@ci.charleston.sc.us.

For More Info or set up an interview with William McCullough, please contact : Catherine Heitz New, (843) 958-6484, citygallery@ci.charleston.sc.us or Currie McCullough, (843) 853-2004, currie@53cannon.com