Oct 1st – Oct 31st, 2026
Opening Reception: Friday, October 2nd, 6-8pm

Drawing has been Will South’s language since childhood — a way of making sense of the world before he had words for much else. That instinct has never left him. Across a body of work spanning paintings, drawings, linocuts, and even wry cartoon sketches, Will South approaches image-making as an ongoing act of attention: to the human figure, to the small observed moment, to the discipline of a single line. Will South’s portraits and figurative drawings reveal a hand trained by decades of looking closely at other artists’ work, filtered through a sensibility that is unmistakably his own — direct, unsentimental, and quietly humane.

Will South is also widely known as an art historian and curator, with a doctorate from the CUNY Graduate Center and more than fifty scholarly publications to his name, including definitive studies of American Impressionism and Stanton Macdonald-Wright’s Synchromist movement. That scholarship has shaped how he sees — and how he makes. Years spent studying the choices of painters like Guy Rose and William Wendt inform South’s own decisions at the easel, giving his work a rare fluency in art history’s vocabulary without ever feeling academic on the page.

Painting for Sanity: Looking for Continuity in the 21st Century
An evening with Will South, benefiting Ukrainians in the Carolinas

Join us for a special presentation by artist Will South, whose talk, “Painting for Sanity: Looking for Continuity in the 21st Century,” explores how art can offer steadiness and meaning in uncertain times. This event is a benefit for Ukrainians in the Carolinas, a fitting cause, as several of the paintings in Will’s show take the war between Ukraine and Russia as their subject.

Following the presentation, stay for a festive reception featuring live Ukrainian musicians and authentic Ukrainian cuisine.

Date: Thursday, October 29 at 5:30 p.m.
Cost: $45 per person, 100% goes to Ukraine Relief efforts
Reservations are required, and seating is limited. To reserve your seat, please call the Gallery at 919-828-3165 or email us art@nullgalleryc.net.