Happy Shack
Artist
Beverly Buchanan
(American, 1940 - 2015)
Date1987
Medium5-color lithograph on paper
DimensionsImage: 15 × 22 1/2 inches (38.1 × 57.2 cm)
Credit LineMuseum purchase.
Object number1994.7.4
On View
Not on view
Copyright© Estate of Beverly Buchanan.
The images and text contained on this page are owned by Telfair Museums or used by the Museum with permission from the owners. Unauthorized reproduction, transmission or display of these materials is prohibited with the exception of items deemed “fair use” as defined by U.S. and international copyright laws.Label TextBeverly Buchanan grew up in Orangeburg, South Carolina, moving to New York City to attend Columbia University where she received a master’s degree in parasitology and public health. Despite acceptance to medical school, Buchanan decided to pursue art, bolstered by her classes at the Art Students League and encouragement from her mentors Romare Bearden (1911–1988) and Norman Lewis (1909–1979).
Buchanan worked in many artmaking modes including painting, sculpture, printmaking, video, photography, and land art. She depicted shacks often as small-scale assemblages made of various materials building on themes of identity, place, and memory, usually related to the rural South. These depictions were inspired by her childhood in the South and later by the time she spent in Macon (1977–1985) and Athens, Georgia (1985–2010). Buchanan explained that there is a human element to her representations of the vernacular architecture, noting: “I consider my shacks portraits. It’s the spirit that comes through the form.”