Jonathan Green, born and raised in the South Carolina Lowcountry, has enjoyed a remarkably successful career for nearly fifty years. His work can be found in major museum, corporate, and private collections around the world.

He is the recipient of many honors for his art as well as for his social, civic, and cultural activities, among them an honorary doctorate in fine arts from the University of South Carolina; the Elizabeth O’Neill Verner Award for Lifetime Achievement from the South Carolina Arts Commission; the Key of Life Award from the NAACP; and the Order of the Palmetto, the highest civilian honor awarded by the governor of South Carolina.

One of the most influential and important painters of the southern experience, his interpretation of Gullah culture and African American life has earned him critical acclaim. He is particularly renowned for his use of vibrant color as a symbolic and emotional element in his work.

The Morris Museum holds the largest collection of his work, and the present exhibition includes three newly acquired silkscreen prints, bringing the total number of paintings, prints, and sculptures to forty-one.

Green’s art has been incorporated into ballet, music, theater, literature, and documentary films. His set and costume designs for the 2016 Spoleto Festival USA production of Porgy and Bess earned praise from the press and public alike. Complementing the present exhibition (and in celebration of the artist’s upcoming seventieth birthday), the Morris Museum is presenting the South Carolina Ballet’s production of Off the Wall and Onto the Stage: Dancing the Art of Jonathan Green at Augusta’s Miller Theater on March 13.

A concurrent exhibition of portraits of the artist at work appears in the SRP Auditorium on the museum’s first floor, through June 29, 2025.