23 June 2009 - About the Gallery

Charleston is the embodiment of all that is Southern—an amalgam of Southern tradition, culture, and art. In the heart of the city’s historic district, the Charleston Renaissance Gallery serves as home to each of these by offering Southern masterworks of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries to discerning collectors.
For over thirty-five years, the Charleston Renaissance Gallery has been hailed as the nation’s foremost dealer in fine art of the American South. Our art tells the story—the story of Southern, in pictures.


From the Charleston Renaissance Gallery website:

Established in 1972 by Robert M. Hicklin, Jr., the Charleston Renaissance Gallery is the nation’s premier dealer in fine art of the American South. Our holdings range from rare eighteenth century portraiture and engravings to acclaimed selections by lauded contemporary artists, including oils, works on paper, and sculpture. Other areas of specialization include the art of the Charleston Renaissance and selections from the estate of Elizabeth O’Neill Verner. Our art has found its way into the homes of connoisseurs around the world and into the halls of this nation’s most revered cultural institutions. A comprehensive index of artists whose works are represented in the gallery's holdings is available under the Art tab, as is a select list of institutional clients.
In addition to our complement of widely regarded exhibitions, the Charleston Renaissance Gallery has a longstanding commitment to the advancement of Southern art through scholarship. The gallery has published four major volumes on Southern art and regularly releases literary catalogues; our library and archives are unrivaled in the region.
The Charleston Renaissance Gallery is a member of the prestigious Fine Art Dealers Association (FADA), a national coalition of the most distinguished art dealers in America. As the founding member of the Charleston Fine Art Dealers Association (CFADA), the gallery participates each autumn in the Charleston Fine Art Annual, a weekend replete with exhibitions by important American artists, studio tours, and lectures.
The gallery is housed in a gracious nineteenth century building in the heart of Charleston’s historic district and features two spacious galleries along with intimate viewing rooms. Painstakingly restored to period perfection, 103 Church Street was recognized with the prestigious Carolopolis Award by the Preservation Society of Charleston in 1999.

Robert M. Hicklin, Jr. is the leading dealer in art that relates to the American South. He is the owner of Hicklin Galleries, LLC; the Charleston Renaissance Gallery; Saraland Press; and principal of Harlean Limited Partnership. Since 1972, Hicklin has handled preeminent paintings of Southern interest, including The Last Meeting of Lee and Jackson by E.B.D. Julio and important works by artists such as William Aiken Walker, Gilbert Gaul, Thomas Satterwhite Noble, Martin Johnson Heade, and Elliott Daingerfield. His clients include more than eighty museums as well as hundreds of corporate and private collectors across the South, the United States, England, Canada, and Mexico.
In 1998, Hicklin opened the Charleston Renaissance Gallery, offering discerning connoisseurs the very finest historic cultural material, including nineteenth and twentieth century oils; works on paper and sculpture; and the art of the Charleston Renaissance.
Saraland Press, the publishing arm of Hicklin Galleries, LLC has issued a series of large-format, scholarly art books. The Charleston Renaissance, a lavishly illustrated, 232-page volume, details the artistic legacy of the painters, printmakers, and photographers who spearheaded a twentieth century cultural renewal in the South's most "ancient, beautiful city." Other Saraland Press publications include: The Sunny South: The Life and Art of William Aiken Walker; Look Away: Reality and Sentiment in Southern Art; The Last Meeting’s Lost Cause; and The South on Paper: Line, Color and Light. Exhibitions related to each of these volumes have been mounted in major museums across the South. In 1992, Robert M. Hicklin Jr., Inc. celebrated its twentieth year in business with the publication of Antiquarian Pursuits, a catalogue featuring thirty-two masterworks of Southern art from the gallery's collection. Calm in the Shadow of the Palmetto and Magnolia: Southern Art from the Charleston Renaissance Gallery was released in celebration of the gallery's thirtieth anniversary in 2003.
A native of Columbus, Georgia, Mr. Hicklin attended public schools there and in Bessemer City, North Carolina before moving to Spartanburg, South Carolina in the late 1950s. Mr. Hicklin graduated from Presbyterian College in Clinton, South Carolina in 1971 and began his career in the art business in 1972 following a tour of duty in the United States Army.