Jonathan Green

Born in Gardens Corner, South Carolina on August 9, 1955, son of Ruth Johnson Green and Melville Green, Jonathan Green graduated from Beaufort High School. He served in the Air Force as an illustrator before enrolling as a textile design student at the East Grand Forks Technical Institute in Minnesota. In 1978 he began his formal study of drawing and painting at The School of the Art Institute in Chicago, Illinois, earning a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in 1982, and then pursued independent study abroad to supplement his formal education. While traveling and visiting museums, Green realized that “the best artists are those who paint what they know best. It took a trip to Switzerland and Mexico to return me to Gardens Corner, South Carolina and begin my body of work ‘Gullah Life reflections’.”

Best known for depicting the people and landscapes of the South Carolina Lowcountry, Green’s art draws on his memories of the Gullah traditions he grew up with and the tales and stories told by members of his extended family and friends.

The publication in 1996 of “Gullah Images: The Art of Jonathan Green” by the University of South Carolina Press, now in its third printing, brought the artist’s work to a wider and more diverse audience. In 1996 he was awarded an honorary Doctor of Fine Arts by the University of South Carolina.

Jonathan Green’s work is represented in numerous private and public collections including the Philharmonic Center for the Arts, Naples, Florida; the Morris Museum of Art, Augusta, Georgia; the Gibbes Museum of Art, Charleston, South Carolina; and the McKissick Museum of the University of South Carolina, in Columbia, South Carolina.