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Artist Leo Twiggs: Requiem for Mother Emanuel

Requiem for Mother Emanuel: No. 9
Courtesy of the artist
Requiem for Mother Emanuel: No. 9
Leo Twiggs
Credit Courtesy of the Artist
Leo Twiggs

Renowned South Carolina artist, Leo Twiggs, now 82, has long been fascinated by the contradictions of the South, and he has defined a unique iconography in his work by seizing on certain symbols, especially the Confederate battle flag, its stars and bars, the shape of an “X” and the image of a target, with its sequential rings and bull’s-eye.

For a new series — nine paintings of Emanuel AME Church, “a testimony to the lives that were lost” — the “X” figure is repeatedly used. But this time it is transformed from a symbol of hate into a symbol of love and redemption. Twiggs joins Dr. Edgar to talk about the series, “Requiem for Mother Emanuel.” 

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Dr. Walter Edgar has two programs on South Carolina Public Radio: Walter Edgar's Journal, and South Carolina from A to Z. Dr. Edgar received his B.A. degree from Davidson College in 1965 and his Ph.D. from the University of South Carolina in 1969. After two years in the army (including a tour of duty in Vietnam), he returned to USC as a post-doctoral fellow of the National Archives, assigned to the Papers of Henry Laurens.