Nellie Mae Rowe facts for kids

Nellie Mae Rowe (born July 4, 1900 – died October 18, 1982) was an amazing African-American artist from Fayette County, Georgia. She is most famous for her bright and colorful drawings. But Nellie Mae also made art in many other ways. She created collages (art made from glued pieces), changed photographs, sewed dolls, and even turned her home into a giant art project! People said she had a natural talent for using colors and shapes together. Her art often showed ideas about her community, family life, and old stories from African-American traditions.

Today, Nellie Mae Rowe is known as one of America's most important folk artists. Her artwork is displayed in many famous places. These include The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Morgan Library and Museum, and the American Folk Art Museum in New York City. You can also find her art at the High Museum of Art in Atlanta, the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C., and many other museums across the country.

Nellie Mae Rowe's Life Story

Nellie Mae Rowe was born on July 4, 1900. She grew up in a farming area called Fayetteville, Georgia. She was one of ten children in her family. People noticed she started drawing when she was very young. Her family faced money problems, so she left school after fourth grade. She began working in the fields with her father, Sam Williams, who had been a slave. Her father also worked as a blacksmith and made baskets. Nellie Mae's mother, Luelle Swanson, was a skilled seamstress and quilter. Her mother taught her how to make dolls, quilts, and small wooden sculptures.

When Nellie Mae was 16, she left the farm. She found the work there hard and not well-paid. Soon after, she married Ben Wheat. They lived in Fayetteville until 1930. Then, they moved to Vinings, a small town near Atlanta. In Vinings, Nellie Mae started working in people's homes. In 1936, her husband died from a heart and kidney illness.

In 1937, Nellie Mae met her second husband, Henry 'Buddy' Rowe. He was an older man who also lived in Vinings. In 1939, they built a home together. Nellie Mae called this home her "playhouse." When Henry died nine years later, Nellie Mae was 48 years old. She then spent all her time focusing on her art.

For the next 30 years, Nellie Mae created many different kinds of art. In the last ten years of her life, her art was shown in galleries and museums. In November 1981, she was diagnosed with a serious illness called multiple myeloma. Nellie Mae Rowe passed away on October 18, 1982, after spending her last weeks in the hospital. She is buried in Fayetteville, Georgia.

Nellie Mae's Artwork

The Playhouse: Her First Art Project

Nellie Mae Rowe's home and yard were her very first art projects. She decorated them with many different things. These included dolls, stuffed animals, and everyday household items. Her home became a place where old and discarded materials turned into art. For example, scraps of wood and even chewing gum became dolls and sculptures. Sometimes, her neighbors didn't understand her art. They would even damage her house or artwork.

Years later, Nellie Mae talked about how she made her art. She said, "I started doing it way ago, right after my husband died. He died in '48 and then people just started to bring in this, bring in the dolls, and bringing me things. I take nothing, you know, take nothing and make something out of it."

Nellie Mae called her decorated two-room house and yard her "playhouse." It was a place for her to create and play. She once said, "I enjoy playing. I ain't trying to keep house now, I'm just a-playing house. I just got my playhouse like I'm come back a baby again." For Nellie Mae, her playhouse was where her amazing creativity could really shine.

One person who visited her house in 1979 remembered it well. They said, "It was a densely packed, mixed-up environment that would make your mouth fall open. Everyone from architects to the local deliveryman would stop and stare, because it was an astounding creation."

Sadly, Nellie Mae's house was taken apart and torn down after she died in 1982. A hotel now stands on that spot. A special sign is there to remember the unique world of art and play that once stood there.

Drawings and Paintings

Nellie Mae Rowe used colors, space, and shapes in clever ways to create fantasy-like scenes in her drawings and paintings. Her early works often showed one main subject. Later, her art became more complex with many figures. Her works from 1980 and 1981 are especially amazing. In these, figures often blend together, and every empty space is filled with images or patterns. Your eyes literally dance around the picture!

Her artwork always tells a story. Nellie Mae wanted to show scenes from her daily life, old memories, and dreams. She painted both realistic scenes and ones that mixed everyday life with fantasy.

This mix of real and fantasy often showed up in the shapes she drew. She often drew human and animal shapes. But she also created "hybrid figures." These were like a dog mixed with a human, a cow mixed with a woman, a dog with wings, or a butterfly mixed with a bird and a woman. Nellie Mae's unique way of using space and perspective also made her art imaginative and fun. Her figures often seemed to float in space, not following real-world rules of size.

In her two-dimensional art, she often included religious symbols like the cross. She was a deeply spiritual Christian and a member of the African Methodist Church. On some of her paintings, she wrote messages like, "Beleave in God and He Will Make A Way Far You" or "God Bless My House." She believed her artistic talent came from God. Some experts also say her drawings of "haints" (spirits) connect to older African-American spiritual traditions that believed in the presence of spirits.

Sculptures and Photographs

Nellie Mae Rowe's sculptures were often dolls or bust-like figures. She made them from old stockings or hardened chewing gum. She dressed her dolls in fancy outfits and gave them yarn wigs and glasses. For her chewing gum sculptures, she would knead used gum into small figures. Then, she would harden them in her freezer and paint them with bright, colorful details.

Nellie Mae also changed photographs. She would color in certain objects or people, or add a patterned frame. This way, she turned regular black and white photos into her own unique art pieces of her friends and family.

Exhibitions

The Studio Museum in Harlem Exhibition Announcement

• Alexander Gallery, Atlanta, GA, 1978-1982.
• Parsons-Dreyfuss Gallery, New York, NY, 1979.
• Hammer & Hammer American Folk Art Gallery, Chicago, IL, 1982.
• Spelman College, Atlanta, GA, 1982.
• Knoxville World's Fair, Folklife Pavilion, Knoxville, TN, 1982.
• Phoenix Art Gallery, Atlanta, GA, 1982.
• Atlanta Women, Nexus Gallery, Atlanta, GA, June 25 - August 8, 1982.
• Nellie Mae Rowe: Visionary Artist, 1900-1982, Lamar Dodd Art Center, LaGrange College, LaGrange, GA, January 1983.
• Nellie Mae Rowe: An American Folk Artist, The Studio Museum of Harlem, New York, NY, October 12 - December 28, 1986.
• Nellie Mae Rowe, Morris Museum of Art, Augusta, GA, 1996.
• Called To Create: Black Artists of the American South, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, September 18, 2022 – March 26, 2023.

Nellie Mae's Own Words

"I don't know what he put me here for, but he got me here for something 'cause I don't draw like nobody. You speak one way, but I come on and say it different. You can draw a mule, dog, cat, or a human person, I'm going to draw it different. 'Cause you always see things different."