Posted 14 years ago
Savoychina1
(650 items)
QUEEN STREET
LES 291/3000
Virginia Fouche Bolton (1929 - 2004) was born in Hartsville, SC and moved to Charleston when she was 14. She received her art degree from Winthrop College and began her teaching career at St. John the Baptist Cathedral School, later teaching at Moultrie, Wando and Bishop England High Schools. She was loved by her students who continuously won art awards throughout South Carolina, many of them developing careers on their own as artists and teachers.
During her teaching career, she began to paint professionally and in 1976 , she and her husband Don opened an art gallery to showcase her work on Meeting Street in Charleston. As one of Charleston’s finest artists, her ability to capture the unique throb of the city and some of its citizens won her acclaim. She created paintings with a flow of diffused translucent light. Her sensitive and colorful renditions of cityscapes and flower women have long been favorites of people who visited the city. In 1972, she was the recipient of the Charleston Scientific and Cultural Educational Fund Award, which allowed her to spend two months in Greece to paint. She continued to win numerous local and national awards and was accepted in to the Southern Watercolor Society. In 1981 she received a Masters in Art Teaching degree from Rhode Island School of Design.
She was a very unassuming lady. I was playing violin at a Charleston Symphony rehearsal one evening and a lady asked if she could draw me. She was dressed almost like a "bag lady". I said sure and did not think anything more about it. Later, a friend asked if I saw my picture in Fouche Bolton's studio window. I went and it was a beautiful fresh pastel drawing of me. I bought it and have it still. It makes me feel very special every time I see it.Im sorry to hear of her passing in 2004.
Mike Stewart
Thank you for sharing that story. I would love to have a picture of it if you are so inclined.