Without Regard to Sex, Race or Color
The City of Charleston Office of Cultural Affairs presented Without Regard to Sex, Race, or Color by Andrew Feiler, on view at City Gallery August 23 through October 6, 2019. This striking exhibition examines race, privilege, and the power of education through photography. City Gallery hosted an opening reception on Thursday, August 22 from 5:30-7:30 p.m, with an artist’s talk with Andrew Feiler will be held on Sunday, September 22 at 2 p.m.
Photographer Andrew Feiler is a fifth-generation Georgian who brings his upbringing to bear in Without Regard to Sex, Race, or Color, a photographic study of Morris Brown College in Atlanta, Georgia. In 2010, Dr. Stanley Pritchett, Sr. became the 18th president of Morris Brown College, an historically black college, at the height of one of the worst real estate depressions in 75 years. Faced with mounting debt, Dr. Pritchett laid out his plan to sell the property on the periphery of the campus, pay off the college’s debts, and reconstitute the institution in the heart of the old campus. Under Dr. Pritchett’s leadership, in 2015, the school emerged from bankruptcy. Feiler’s work documents this era and exposes the inequity that while roughly one hundred HBCUs make up just 3% of colleges in America, their enrollment represents more than 10% of African Americans who go to college and more than 25% of African Americans who earn degrees.
“These photographs put into perspective Morris Brown College’s great legacy and history; they give a glimpse of what once was and, more importantly, offer a vision of what can be,” says Dr. Pritchett. “The photographs convey a sense of rough edges, of incompleteness, reminding me of an unpolished stone. They inspire me to want to make a difference, and I hope they will motivate others to be a part of our transformation.”
Andrew Feiler was raised Jewish in Savannah, Georgia. His experience as a minority in the South influences his work, which has won numerous awards and has been featured in museums, galleries, magazines, newspapers, and is in a number of private and public collections. The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania graduate holds a Master’s in Modern History from Oxford University and a Master’s in Business Administration from Stanford University.
Recent Posts
