Arianne King Comer was drawn to St. Helena Island after studying textile design and indigo dyeing in Nigeria. The rural sea island bridged Arianne’s knowledge of traditional African arts to its American counterpart, the arts of the low country Gullah culture.
To learn more about Arianne and her batiks, click on the videos below.
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Native Americans called it "tree hair." French colonists changed it to "Barbe espagnole," or "Spanish Beard," to ridicule the Spanish conquest of the Americas. Spanish moss survives as its common name...
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Several generations of the St. Helena community attended the historic Penn School, established as one of the first schools for freed slaves. In the 1950s and 1960s, the site served as a safe retreat...