Untitled (Playhouse and Cross)

Drawing on cardboard of a large flower with red and blue petals, with a red barn and blue cross below.

Object Details

Artist/Maker

Nellie Mae Rowe, American, 1900–1982

Date

before 1978

Medium

Crayon and pencil on cardboard

Dimensions

Please contact the Museum for more information

Credit

Gift of Judith Alexander

Accession #

2003.207

Image Copyright

The population of Vinings was in the hundreds when Rowe moved to it around 1930, following her nephew Joe Brown Sr., who had already relocated there. They were part of a small settlement of Black families that relied on a segregated school, two churches, and a cemetery. Her second husband, Henry Rowe, is buried in that cemetery, which was just up a hill from her home. In this early drawing of her Playhouse, she celebrates the cemetery’s proximity and holy presence through the crucifix and radiating floral form in the sky.