6 minute read
What is - The Do Good Fund, Inc.?
By Sundi Rose
There are few things less powerful than a photograph, and Columbus’ own The Do Good Fund is harnessing the power of an image to help its visitors make sense of the shared identity created by living in the South. The photographs and images presented by this charitable organization celebrate the lives and traditions of Southerners in ways that seem both familiar and innovative.
The Do Good Fund Inc. is a charity that serves as a lending library of photographs, offering works exclusively from contemporary Southern artists of all walks of life. Founded in 2012 by Alan Rothschild, The Do Good Fund is, “focused on building a museum quality collection of photographs taken in the American South since World War II.”
The collection is extensive and holds photos from some of the most well-known Southern photographers as well as images taken by emerging photographers, including graduate students at the University of Georgia. Most notably, however, are the twenty or so Guggenheim Fellows contained in the collection, which make the gallery one of the most diverse and well-curated collections in the area. In fact, the artist currently on display, Paul Kwilecki, is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship himself.
The mission of The Do Good Fund is to make its 700+ images broadly accessible to museums, eclectic collections, nonprofit galleries, and the art-appreciating public at large. The gallery hopes to get as many eyes as possible on as many of the photographs as possible, making public access a major priority for Do Good.
Eliza Daffin, gallery coordinator and a photographer herself, offered me a tour of the new space on 12th avenue and told me a little about the featured artists currently on display and all the exciting new stuff coming up for the gallery. Daffin knew so much about the photographs hanging on the walls and in the upper storage loft and was quick to offer tidbits about the images and photographers. I thought surely she was reading from note cards, but she is just that enthusiastic about a project which is providing more and more Southerners a chance to see their place immortalized in a photo.
Currently hanging on the walls of the spacious and airy gallery is the “Close to Home” exhibition with work from Jimmy Nicholson and Paul Kwilecki. The installments feature black and white photos of their shared hometown of Bainbridge with Nicholson’s work extending into images of his travels around the Southeast and the Florida panhandle.
Nicholson is a protege of the other artist on display, Paul Kwilecki, whose careful eye was trained on the small-town life of Decatur County, chronicling the day-to-day lives of his neighbors and friends.
In addition to artists such as these, The Do Good Fund has hundreds of other photographs in a bright and rustic space upstairs, just waiting to make their way to institutions all around the Southeast. Walking around all the photos of the diaspora of the Southern experience was both poignant and grounding, as I saw the many faces of the treasured Southern culture so many of us value.
In addition to the work currently on display, The Do Good Fund also works to connect the artists with the public through a series of talks and exhibitions. During these interactions, the photographers can offer depth to the experience by giving insight into their own inspirations and process. Nicholson came in early November to discuss the very photographs currently featured in the gallery, offering new dimensions to what you can see in the frames on the wall.
On November 19th, The Chattahoochee Riverkeeper’s Rivers and Land, organized by Henry Jacobs, featuring Columbus’ own Fred and Cathy Fussell will appear. The exhibition is themed around local rivers and tributaries of the nearby South. Cathy is an accomplished
quilter, whose work contemplates the kinship between Southern waterways and the communities which depend on them. Her husband, Fred, is a photographer, painter, and writer whose work focuses on the people of the American South. Their work will be on display from late November through the holidays.
The Do Good Fund gallery has been open to the public since May of this year and its mission is to offer new interpretations of the life and experience of the contemporary south. While the themes and motifs continue to change from artist to artist, the heart of the collections is meant to honor our shared pride of place.
What is so special about this particular entity, beyond its value as an agent for Southern art, is its capacity to connect the art with the subject matter. Prioritizing the reciprocity between the art itself and its focus, the various collections speak to the heart of what makes Southern culture unique and precious.
Harry Crews was a renowned Southern writer who wrote about the biography of place. He often mused about what an artist’s job is, and it feels particularly applicable to the work in the collections of The Do Good Fund gallery. He writes, “The [artist’s] job is to get naked. To hide nothing. To look away from nothing. To look at it. To not blink. To be not embarrassed or shamed of it. Strip it down and let’s get down to where the blood is, the bone is.”
The Do Good Foundation is open to the public at 111 12th Street suite 103 on Wednesday through Friday from 1 to 5 pm and Saturdays 10 to 3 pm. You can browse the collections not currently on display on their website thedogoodfund.org or email dogoodfund@gmail.com