The Jasper Project’s most ambitious multidisciplinary arts project to date – the Supper Table –
is traveling to the Fine Arts Center of Kershaw County for the summer with an opening reception on Thursday, June 17th from 5:30-7pm inside the Bassett Gallery.
An homage to Judy Chicago’s iconic feminist art installation, The Dinner Party, and using Chicago’s project as a loose model, Jasper Project executive director Cindi Boiter conceived of the Supper Table as an innovative way of honoring 12 of SC’s largely uncelebrated, yet ground-breaking women in history who, via their work in the arts, medicine, law, business, athletics, entertainment, and more, changed the course of human history.
Using the model created by Chicago, Boiter commissioned Richland Library Makerspace Coordinator Jordan Morris to create a 12’ x 12’ x 12’ wooden table at which visual artists would create place-settings inspired by and honoring the historical women. In addition to the 12 visual artists, a dozen artists each from the literary and theatrical arts as well as film were also invited to participate. The result is a multidisciplinary arts installation and performance which includes the book Setting the Supper Table, a commemorative publication covering the creation of the installation, photos of all art, artists’ and biographical notes, and essays inspired by the honored women written by some of SC’s most accomplished women writers.
Funded in part by a Connected Communities grant from Central Carolina Community Foundation, the Supper Table installation premiered in September 2019 with a two-part opening at Trustus Theatre and Harbison Theatres in Columbia, SC, after which it remained installed at Harbison Theatre before moving to Stormwater Studios. The installation traveled to Francis Marion University and Sumter County Gallery of Art before touring was interrupted during the COVID-19 pandemic, beginning in March 2020. In December 2020, the installation, which features the work of more than 50 SC women artists, moved to the TRAX Visual Arts Center in Lake City, SC, in a dual show with artist Kirkland Smith, who created 12 portraits of the honored women as part of the installation.