Edwin Augustus Harleston: African American Master of the Charleston Renaissance Arts Movement and Vanguard Civil Rights Leader

We who know the history of the Arts in Charleston are aware of Charleston Renaissance Artists such as Alfred Hutty, Elizabeth O’Neill Verner and Alice Smith.




Boone Hall, by Edwin Harleston

 But today is the Birthday of the greatest and perhaps only African American member of that movement. His name is Edwin Harleston  Born March 14,1882, in Charleston, SC. Edwin Augustus Harleston was one of eight children. His father was a rice planter, a sea captain, and owned a funeral home.

Harleston received a scholarship to study at the Avery Normal Institute in Charleston and graduated valedictorian in 1900. For four years he attended Atlanta University where he played football and sang in a quartet. He relocated to Boston in 1905 to attend the art school of the Boston Museum of Fine Art where he studied under William Paxton and Frank Benson until 1913.

The seven year course was formed under the Beaux Arts tradition and formed the foundation of his style. With a passion for his art, he reluctantly returned to South Carolina to help in his father’s funeral home. It was during this time that he became active in local civil rights groups and eventually became president of the newly formed Charleston branch of the N.A.A.C.P. He led an effort that soon forced the public school system to hire Black teachers.He married Elise Forrest in 1920. She was a photographer , and two years later they opened a studio, which featured both of their works.

Influenced by of much of her work, he developed a highly realistic and academic technique of portraiture; many of his works were commissioned. His patrons included prominent national figures including the president of Atlanta University, philanthropist-Pierre S. Dupont, and the president of the Atlanta Life Insurance Co. Harleston's character studies include The Bible Student (1924), and Miss Bailey with the African Shawl (1930)..

At the request of Aaron Douglass, he assisted in painting murals for Fisk University that depicted a panoramic view of Black history from slavery onward. This work was completed in 1931 the year that he died. Shortly before his death Edwin Harleston received the Alain Locke Prize for portrait painting for his work The Old Servant at an exhibition of the Harmon foundation.



Edwin Augustus Harleston,self portrait


Source: African American Registry