Voice of America
24 May 2023, 16:05 GMT+10
New York - An art auction and New York gala have raised nearly $6 million to preserve and restore the childhood home of soul music legend and civil rights activist Nina Simone, organizers said Tuesday.
The twin events brought in some $5.88 million - far more than the original $2 million organizers hoped to raise to restore the rural North Carolina abode.
'The new funding will meaningfully advance our project goals to complete the full restoration of the house and landscape,' said Brent Leggs, executive director of the African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund. 'With this investment, we are well on our way to opening the doors to visitors in 2024.'
Brent Leggs looks at Anicka Yi's 'The Mother Tongue' (L) and Adam Pendleton's 'Untitled (Days for Nina)' (R) displayed as part of the Nina Simone Childhood Home Auction Exhibition at the Pace Gallery in New York on May 19, 2023.
Four US artists - Julie Mehretu, Ellen Gallagher, Rashid Johnson and Adam Pendleton - bought the dilapidated rural home in 2017 for $95,000. They've since worked with Leggs' organization, as well as tennis star Venus Williams, to raise money to turn the house into a cultural and historical site.
Ellen Gallagher's 'Abu Simbel, 2005' is displayed as part of the Nina Simone Childhood Home Auction Exhibition at the Pace Gallery in New York on May 17, 2023.
The online auction, with works donated by British painter Cecily Brown and American artist Sarah Sze, was organized by Pace and Sotheby's.
Among the 11 works for sale, Mehretu's ink-and-acrylic 'New Dawn, Sing (for Nina)' fetched $1.6 million.
People look at Julie Mehretu's 'New Dawn, Sing (for Nina)' displayed as part of the Nina Simone Childhood Home Auction Exhibition, at the Pace Gallery in New York on May 19, 2023.
Simone, whose songs found renewed resonance during the Black Lives Matter protests of recent years, had a complex, often difficult relationship with the United States, where she was born in 1933, during the era of racial segregation.
Born Eunice Waymon, she spent the first years of her life in the three-room house in Tryon, in the rural southeastern state of North Carolina, with her parents and siblings, and began playing the piano at age 3.
But her dream of becoming a classical concert performer was shattered when she was rejected by Philadelphia's prestigious Curtis Institute of Music, an ordeal she attributed to racism.
In the 1960s, Simone was active in the civil rights movement, including through rousing speeches and song.
Her 'Mississippi Goddam,' was a response to a 1963 fire in an Alabama church started by members of the Ku Klux Klan. Three days after the assassination of Martin Luther King in 1968, she performed 'Why? (The king of love is dead).'
Simone eventually left the United States and lived her last years in the south of France, where she died in 2003.
Get a daily dose of North Carolina Daily news through our daily email, its complimentary and keeps you fully up to date with world and business news as well.
Publish news of your business, community or sports group, personnel appointments, major event and more by submitting a news release to North Carolina Daily.
More InformationCHICAGO, Illinois: Driven by an ongoing shortage of properties available on the market, in March US single-family home prices rose ...
NEW YORK, New York - U.S. stocks surged on Friday on the debt ceiling resolution and a strong jobs report.Nonfarm ...
SANTA CLARA, California: As investors piled more capital into Nvidia, the chipmaker that has become one of the biggest winners ...
NEW YORK, New York - U.S. stocks rallied sharply on Thursday after the House of Representatives passed the controversial bill ...
BURBANK, California: Over the US Memorial Day weekend, Disney's live-action remake of its 1989 animated classic, "The Little Mermaid," brought ...
NEW YORK, New York - U.S. and global stocks tumbled Wednesday as lawmakers continued to navigate their way through Congress ...
WASHINGTON D.C.: Reuters has reported that on 7th June, former Vice President Mike Pence will enter the race for the ...
MENLO PARK, California: Facebook parent company Meta Platforms has said it would remove news content in California if the state ...
DHAKA, Bangladesh - Sheikh Hasina has vowed to build a self-sufficient Bangladesh and has urged citizens not to be concerned ...
BEIJING, China: Amid its rivalry with the US for reaching new milestones in space, reflecting their competition for global influence, ...
WASHINGTON D.C.: The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has said that more than 8.3 million US homes and businesses do not ...
WASHINGTON D.C.: A Transportation Security Administration (TSA) report released this week revealed that over the Memorial Day weekend, the start ...