We were recently in South Carolina for a family reunion. While having dinner at Soby’s in Greenville, we meet Patrick Mulcahy who introduced us to Black Mountain College. Patrick is working on a documentary about this progressive college that operated from 1933 to the mid 1950s. During the first decade of Black Mountain College, my grandfather, Albert Ives, taught summer botany classes in nearby Cedar Mountain and Highlands, NC for Greenville's Furman University. Here is a summary of Black Mountain College adopted from a PBS site.
For a short time in mid-twentieth century Black Mountain, NC became a hub of American arts. Founded in 1933, the school was a reaction to the more traditional schools. The school believed that a strong liberal and fine arts education must occur inside and outside classes. Combining communal living with an informal class structure, Black Mountain created an environment for interdisciplinary work that had a major impact on the arts and sciences of its time.
The first professors included artists Josef and Anni Albers, who fled Nazi Germany after the closing of the Bauhaus. Their progressive work in painting and textiles attracted students from around the country. By the forties, Black Mountain's faculty included some of the greatest artists and thinkers of the time: Walter Gropius, Jacob Lawrence, Willem de Kooning, Robert Motherwell, John Cage, Alfred Kazin, Merce Cunningham, and Paul Goodman. Students found themselves at the locus of such innovations as Buckminster Fuller's Geodesic Dome, Charles Olson's Projective Verse, and some of the first performance art in the U.S.
By the late 40s, word of what was happening in North Carolina had started to spread throughout the country. With a Board of Directors that included William Carlos Williams and Albert Einstein and impressive programs in poetry and photography, Black Mountain had become the ideal of American experimental education. Its concentration on cross-genre arts education influenced programs at many major American institutions. Charles Olson and fellow poet, Robert Creeley attracted Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg. Students included painters Kenneth Noland, and Robert Rauschenberg.
In 1953, as many of the students and faculty left for San Francisco and New York, those still at Black Mountain saw the shift in interest and knew the school had run its course. Realizing that they had essentially achieved their goals, they closed their doors forever.
Other related sites:
Black Mountain College Museum and Arts Center
North Carolina State Archives - Black Mountain College Collection (with a great photo gallery)
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