By Steve Gilliam, University Relations
Maud Gatewood in her studio. Photo by Michael Zirkle.
When it opens this summer, the new Studio Arts Building at UNCG will bear the name of Maud Gatewood, the late artist who is acknowledged as one of the state’s most important painters.
UNCG trustees named the building for Gatewood, a renowned artist who was a 1954 alumna of Woman’s College (now UNCG). Located on Highland Avenue just off Spring Garden Street, the 99,000-square-foot structure is a North Carolina Higher Education Bonds project and is being built at a cost of $17.6 million. A formal dedication will be held October 5 as part of UNCG’s Founders Day activities.
“There could be no better choice than Maud Gatewood as the namesake for our Studio Art Building,” said UNCG Chancellor Patricia A. Sullivan. “She was a one-of-a-kind individual who graduated from this institution and then went on to achieve national and international recognition for her painting. She was one of the state’s finest artists, and it will be an honor for this university to put her name on a new building that will benefit our art and design students for years to come.”
Maud Florance Gatewood, who died in November 2004 at the age of 70, is considered by art historians, curators, museum directors and collectors as one of the most important painters in North Carolina history. Her namesake, the Maud Gatewood Studio Arts Building is located on Highland Avenue near the Weatherspoon Art Museum, which holds five Gatewood paintings in its collection, and will receive some of her other paintings from her estate. Upon completion, it will house UNCG’s departments of Art and Interior Architecture. Scheduled to be completed this summer, the building will open its classrooms, design studios, foundry, ceramics studio, art gallery and outdoor sculpture garden to students this fall.
At the age of 16, having skipped two grades in school, Gatewood entered Woman’s College where she earned her B.A. in fine arts in 1954. A year later, she completed an M.A. in painting at Ohio State University and later studied at UNCG and Harvard University. Later in her career, she received a Fulbright Scholarship to study in Salzburg, Austria. She exhibited widely in the southeastern United States throughout her career and won numerous awards for her work. Her life and work was chronicled in an hour-long documentary, “Gatewood: Facing the Canvas,” which was produced by UNC-TV.
Will South, curator of collections at the Weatherspoon, said of the artist, “Maud was one of the state’s most fiercely independent artists. She set a standard for both innovation and integrity in her work.”
She had other activities beyond her art. In 1976, Gatewood was elected as the first female member of the Caswell County Board of Commissioners and served as chairperson until 1980. During her tenure, she advocated economic development, land use planning and expanded human resource services for the county. She also served on numerous state, local and national boards and commissions, including the N.C. Association of County Commissioners, Piedmont Triad Council of Governments and N.C. Arts Council.
The Weatherspoon Art Museum held a Gatewood retrospective exhibition in 1994 that covered 40 years of her painting. The exhibition late traveled to five museums throughout the South. Gatewood was honored by UNCG with an honorary doctorate in fine arts in 1999.
