House Concurrent Resolution 81

A CONCURRENT RESOLUTION ACKNOWLEDGING SEPTEMBER 28, 2015, AS "MARIE ATKINSON HULL DAY" AND ENCOURAGING THE CITIZENS OF MISSISSIPPI TO COMMEMORATE ITS OBSERVANCE ON SEPTEMBER 28, 2015, AND EACH YEAR THEREAFTER.

WHEREAS, on September 28, 1890, in Summit, Mississippi, Ernest and Mary Katherine Atkinson welcomed one of Mississippi's most significantly prolific and influential artists and teachers, beloved by generations of collectors, students and fanciers of art into the world, a baby girl they named Emily Marie Atkinson; and

WHEREAS, from an early age, Marie Atkinson displayed an unparalleled fondness for the arts, as her very cultured parents instilled a love of music in their daughter from the very beginning, as early as the age of four years, when they took her to a piano concert in New Orleans, Louisiana, which definitely chartered the course for her evolvement into one of Mississippi's most treasured citizens and one of the world's most proficient artists; and

WHEREAS, in 1909, after she graduated with a degree in music from Belhaven College in Jackson, Mississippi, Marie Atkinson began offering private piano lessons and playing pipe organ for local Jackson area churches, which allowed her friends and neighbors to experience firsthand her learned appreciation of music as her skillful fingers created melodious rhythms on the piano; and

WHEREAS, unfulfilled by the musical arts, Marie Atkinson furthered her creativity by enrolling in art lessons with the only trained art teacher in Jackson, Mississippi, Aileen Phillips, who had studied at the first and finest art school in the country, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia; and

WHEREAS, the undiscovered passion engrained in Marie Atkinson's very being emerged immediately upon completing her first art lesson, and she promptly traded pedaling and fingering the piano for a paint brush and blank canvas, focusing all of her energy into igniting her new and burning zeal for painting; and

WHEREAS, in 1912, clothed in the guidance and encouragement of Aileen Phillips, Marie Atkinson enrolled at Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia to immerse herself in the study of art, and upon her return to Jackson after only one year, she began teaching art at Hillman College, the predecessor institution to present-day Mississippi College in Clinton; and

WHEREAS, consumed with an unquenchable thirst for knowledge of the arts, Marie Atkinson studied at the Art Students' League in New York, and upon returning to Jackson, before partaking in the holy vows of matrimony, she illustrated books and magazines as a commercial artist and broadened the pool of young artists in Mississippi by offering private art lessons to children; and

WHEREAS, in 1917, Marie Atkinson married Jackson architect Emmett Johnston Hull, who became a pillar of support to her artistic career throughout his lifetime, a union of perfection that allowed them to support one another and expand their knowledge base that would benefit each of them as an artist and an architect; and

WHEREAS, Marie Atkinson Hull honed her skills as a landscape painter so much so that she was awarded her first gold medal from the Mississippi Art Association in 1920, and in 1926, she received first prize at the Southern States Art League; and

WHEREAS, in 1929, channeling the lessons from her teacher John Carlson, who cautioned her to paint strong pictures, not pretty ones, Marie Atkinson Hull put brush to canvas and created a magnificent still life portrait of Yucca blossoms, and entered the rendering into the Texas Wild Flower Painting Competition, which yielded her the second purchase award, complete with a $2,500.00 cash prize; and

WHEREAS, using her Texas prize money, Marie Atkinson Hull traveled to Europe, where her creative instinct blossomed under the exposure to the halls of prestigious galleries and museums as she absorbed the knowledge embedded in each stroke of the ingenious artists who came before her, which inspired over six hundred oils and watercolors, renderings that reflected the picturesque environments of her travels, such as St. Cere and Hillside in Cuenca, Spain; and

WHEREAS, when Marie Atkinson Hull transitioned from landscape extraordinaire to perfecting portraits, the masterful figures she emblazoned onto canvases included several prominent Mississippians, including then Governor Thomas L. Bailey and historian Dunbar Rowland as well as powerful African-American Mississippians such as John Wesley Washington and local farmers such as Louis Henry Gragert; and

WHEREAS, while museum curators around the world began prominently displaying Marie Atkinson Hull's picturesque work in their galleries, her masterful painting, Church at Penne, France, was chosen for the Spring Salon in Paris, the only international juried exhibition open at that time, and two of her sharecropper paintings were selected for major exhibits in 1939, one in the Golden Gate Exposition in San Francisco, California, and one at the New York World's Fair; and

WHEREAS, Marie Atkinson Hull was presented with the Katherine Bellaman Prize at the Governor's Mansion in 1965, and won the Grand Prize at the Mississippi Arts Festival in 1973, culminating an impressive career; and

WHEREAS, once stating that her ideas rose from "a street pavement's cracks, the rhythms and patterns formed by rocks in a gravel walk, the beauty of red Mississippi clay," Marie Atkinson Hull's imagination was often sparked by her very beautiful surroundings in the Magnolia State and the breathtaking locations provided by Lady Liberty; and

WHEREAS, while Marie Atkinson Hull enjoyed transposing landscapes, still lifes and portraiture as her subjects, above all, she valued quality and creativity in art, as art never ceased to amaze her and she never stopped creating new and wonderful jewels of art despite her ailing health, even as she crossed the chilling rivers of Jordan with her paintbrush in hand on November 21, 1980; and

WHEREAS, any reference to art in Mississippi and the South since the early part of the 20th century would not be complete without breathing the name, Marie Atkinson Hull, as her art and life as a painter and teacher inspired hundreds of young artists to pursue their creative dreams; and

WHEREAS, the people of present-day Mississippi, who have received abundant insight and pleasure from viewing and studying the articulate strokes that emanated from the gifted hand of Marie Atkinson Hull, firmly believe that it is fitting and proper to commemorate and observe September 28, 2015, the 125th anniversary of her birth, as "Marie Atkinson Hull Day":

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED BY THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE STATE OF MISSISSIPPI, THE SENATE CONCURRING THEREIN, That we do hereby acknowledge and observe September 28, 2015, as "Marie Atkinson Hull Day" and encourage the State of Mississippi and its citizens to commemorate and observe its significance by celebrating the life and legacy of the legendary artist and great Mississippian on September 28, 2015, and each year thereafter on that specified date.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, That copies of this resolution be furnished to Bruce Levingston, the Governor of Mississippi, the Lieutenant Governor of Mississippi, the Speaker of the House of Representatives of Mississippi, the Secretary of State of Mississippi and to the members of the Capitol Press Corps.