If you walk around the side entrance of the museum, there’s a small work of art outside that you could easily miss, nestled as it is in a bed of wildflowers. Horace Farlowe’s “Tennessee Cut” is an abstract pink marble sculpture that measures about two feet in each dimension.
Previously tucked into a hidden garden at the University of Georgia Center for Continuing Education and Hotel, where Scott Simpson of the Office of University Architects noticed it, the sculpture has found new life at the museum. The Georgia Center transferred ownership to the museum in 2013. Museum staff consulted with Robert Jarrell, an artist and former student of Farlowe’s to restore and display the sculpture in a way that captured the artist’s intention for the piece and celebrated his legacy at the university. Farlowe studied architecture at North Carolina State University after serving in Korea with the Marines, and it heavily influenced his sculpture.
“Tennessee Cut” is part of Farlowe’s window series, so it was important that the piece be placed at a height to allow both adult and young visitors to look through to the other side, as well as that it frame a good view from either side. Farlowe worked mostly in stone, and his sculptures, towering up to 17 feet tall, can be seen in Spain, Germany, Italy, Scotland and all over the United States. According to Jack Kehoe, one of his colleagues in the art department, the prominence of the marble-carving program at the university can be attributed to Farlowe’s skill and passion as an artist and teacher.
