Portrait Of Aaron Douglas — Edwin Augustus Harleston

Portrait of Aaron Douglas


edwin augustus harleston (1882 - 1931)

Edwin Augustus Harleston (1882-1931) was a Charleston artist known for realistic portraits of African Americans, inspired by classical styles. A founding NAACP leader & excluded from the Charleston Renaissance, his work captures Black life and herita

Gibbes Museum of Art (Charleston, United States of America)

Discover American art at Charleston's Gibbes Museum! Explore rotating exhibits & a permanent collection featuring Southern artists, historical portraits, and contemporary works in a Beaux-Arts setting.

A Charleston, South Carolina native, Edwin Augustus Harleston was a graduate of the prestigious Avery Normal Institute in Charleston and Atlanta University. In Atlanta he studied sociology under renowned scholar Dr. W.E.B. Du Bois, and in 1905 Harleston was accepted to Harvard University to continue his liberal arts education. However, when he arrived in Boston he changed his mind, and instead, chose to attend art school at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. After seven years of study under the direction of artists such as Edmund C. Tarbell, Frank Benson, and Phillip Hale, Harleston returned to Charleston as one of the city