106

Bernice Johnson Sims

(1926-2014)

Hog Killing Time.

Oil on cotton canvas, circa 2000s.
Signed in oil, lower right
15 3/4 x 20 in. (40 x 50.8 cm.), Frame: 17 x 21 in. (43.2 x 53.3 cm.)

  • Provenance:
    The collection of Ambassador Shirley E. Barnes, Washington, DC.
  • Notes:
    Bernice Johnson Sims was born in Hickory Hill, Alabama as the first child of Robert and Essie Bell Presley Johnson, soon to be followed by seven younger siblings. As she grew up, she went to reside with her grandparents in a community that was less racially segregated, which provided Sims with an expansive network of friends and peers. Sims observed her next-door neighbor, Hattie, using a brush and paint to construct pictures on canvas. She inquired about learning and soon began taking lessons. Over the next few months, newly equipped with an understanding of canvas, paint, and brush, Sims would utilize found and gifted materials to produce her own artworks.

    Active in the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s, Sims worked to coordinate the activities of the NAACP in secret because the organization was outlawed by the state of Alabama at that time. She participated in voting rights marches and recalled being turned away from the polls herself. She was one of the first to enroll her children in the formerly all-white public schools in her community. She participated in the Selma-Montgomery March and witnessed the events of "Bloody Sunday" first hand – an event she would later depict in many of her paintings.

    At age 52, Sims took an art history class at Jefferson Davis Community College that renewed her interest in art. The instructor, Larry Manning, led her to find interest in Mose Tolliver, who lived and worked nearby. After visiting Tolliver in Montgomery, she decided to pursue her postponed dream. Bernice specialized in memory painting, recreating colorful scenes of farm life, church activities, daily family life, and civil rights struggles.

    In 1993, Sims's work was included in a nationally traveled exhibition of Self-Taught Artists at the New Orleans Museum of Art. Her work has been included in the Brooks Museum of Art, the National Center for the Study of Civil Rights and African American Culture at Alabama State University, the Alabama State Capitol, and in Washington D.C. In 2005, the United States Postal Service honored Bernice Sims by issuing a postage stamp featuring her painting of the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama. The stamp is one of ten in the series entitled To Form A More Perfect Union chosen to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the Voting Rights Act. In 2014 Sims released a book about her life called The Struggle: My Life & Legacy and attended a book signing for it.
  • Condition:
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April 2, 2026 12:00 PM EDT
New York, NY, US

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