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Jill Hendrix
Fiction Addiction
864-675-0540
info@fiction-addiction.com
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Book Your Lunch with South Carolina artist Mary Whyte 

Greenville, SC, November 16, 2012 - Book Your Lunch with South Carolina artist Mary Whyte on Tuesday, December 18th, at 12:00pm at The Lazy Goat in downtown Greenville. Tickets are $25 each and must be purchased in advance at http://www.bookyourlunch.com or by calling Fiction Addiction at 864-675-0540.

South Carolina artist Mary Whyte's Down Bohicket Road (University of South Carolina Press, hardcover, $49.95; and paperback, $29.95) includes two decades worth of watercolors depicting a select group of Gullah women of Johns Island, South Carolina, and their stories. Bestselling Southern author Pat Conroy says, "The extraordinary work of Mary Whyte, who could easily be named the first visual poet laureate of South Carolina, is astonishing on the very face of it." 

In 1991, following Whyte's recovery from a year of treatment for cancer, she and her husband moved to a small sea island near Charleston. In this remote corner of the South, Whyte first met Alfreda LaBoard and her devoted group of seniors who gathered weekly to make quilts, study the Bible, and socialize in a small rural church on Bohicket Road. Descendants of lowcountry slaves, these longtime residents of the island influenced Whyte's life and art in astonishing and unexpected ways.

Whyte soon began a series of watercolors depicting these women, honoring their lives and their dedication to family and faith. As her friendships with these women grew, their matriarch Alfreda LaBoard claimed Whyte as her "vanilla sister." Alfreda's World, a collection of Whyte's detailed watercolors and poignant recollections of the women at the senior center, was published a decade later, drawing attention and support from the community to the small church on Bohicket Road.

Down Bohicket Road continues the story of Whyte's relationship with these extraordinary women, following the passing of Alfreda, against the backdrop of the ongoing commercial development of Johns Island. For Whyte, the heart of this community remains in the simple homes clustered along Bohicket Road, in the island's winding tidal creeks, and in a small church where eighteen hardscrabble women gather in fellowship each week. In her book Whyte illustrates that both watercolors and friendships can be the unpredictable results of an abundance of blessings. As shared through touching words and vibrant paintings, Down Bohicket Road celebrates a unique way of coastal life and a remarkable friendship that transcends all barriers--even death itself--in praise of the unifying power of art.

All royalties from the sale of this book benefit the Hebron Saint Francis Senior Center on Johns Island. 

Watercolor artist Mary Whyte is a teacher and author whose figurative paintings have earned national recognition. A resident of Johns Island, South Carolina, Whyte garners much of her inspiration from the Gullah descendents of coastal Carolina slaves who number among her most prominent subjects. Her portraits are included in numerous corporate, private, and university collections, as well as in the permanent collections of South Carolina's Greenville County Museum of Art and the Gibbes Museum of Art in Charleston. Her paintings have been featured in International Artist, Artist, American Artist, Watercolor, and American Art Collector, L'Art de Aquarelle, and numerous other publications. Whyte is the author of Alfreda's World, a compilation of her Gullah paintings, as well as Working South, paintings and sketches depicting the essence of vanishing blue-collar professions from across the South, and instructional books, An Artist's Way of Seeing and Watercolor for the Serious Beginner. Her work can be found at Coleman Fine Art in Charleston.