Oelschig studied with Emma Wilkins, Lamar Dodd, Henry Lee MacFee, Alexander Brook, Justino Fernandez, the Mexican muralists Diego Rivera and José Clemente Orozco in Mexico City, and Dr. Horace Kallen and William Scharf of New York City.

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She is known for creating social commentary by exploring aspects of African-American life in the low country. Oelschig painted a variety of strong themes, and much of her art concerns the serious social injustice of Southern race relations. Many of her paintings concern
African-American subjects, some in horrific, violent lynching scenes. Others essay the African-American presence in the same genre terms one finds in the works of Charles Shannon.

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In 1972, Oelschig received a commission for a mural depicting the history of Savannah for the Home Federal Savings & Loan on Telfair Square in Savannah. The mural, composed of 45 individual paintings worked into an overall design, took three years to complete. In 1999, the mural was purchased—and reinstalled in 2000—at the Savannah Area Chamber of Commerce office on the Southeast corner of Bay and Drayton Streets. Due to health issues, she retired from painting in 1976. Oelschig died on July 24, 2000.

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Augusta Oelschig created emotionally intense images and works that express social concern. In the 1930’s, she studied with Lamar Dodd at the University of Georgia in Athens and Henry Lee McFee, who had a studio in Savannah, GA.

Her work became more impassioned and expressionistic following a 1947 stay in Mexico and contact with famous Mexican muralists, particularly José Clemente Orozco.

Death of a Carousel (1951). She recalled that while riding the bus one evening in 1950, she noticed a vagrant cooking in an area near the park’s carousel. She called to warn the police, but nothing was done and a fire broke out that night and the carousel burned. The painting depicts the ride’s interior with burned horses appearing to rear in agony.

In Memoriam (1952). After the carousel incident, Oelschig received word that her brother, a pilot, had been shot down in the Korean conflict and was presumed dead. Shortly thereafter, she returned to the carousel to find that further deterioration had created an opening for a shaft of light to enter. She painted this scene and gave it the title In Memoriam in honor of her brother. According to Oelschig, the first of these carousel paintings may be interpreted as death and the second as life after death.

Oelschig exhibited sporadically in New York and returned to Savannah in 1962.

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Augusta Oelschig gained recognition with her first solo exhibition at the Telfair Museum of Art in 1941. She married James Petressen in 1947 and began using her married name professionally (A. O. Petressen). The newlyweds spent and extended period in Mexico during their first year of marriage. There, she continued her studies and came under the spell of the famed mural painters, David Siqueiros, Diego Rivera, and, most importantly, José Clemente Orozco, whom she was able to observe at work.

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The Mexican muralists inspired Oelschig to initiate an ambitious mural project upon her return to Savannah in 1948.In seeking to depict the recent history of Georgia for a new Savannah high school, the artist proposed imagery that highlighted the civil rights struggle in the segregated South (including depictions of the Ku Klux Klan) and implied criticism of recent government stewardship. Her proposal was predictably rejected for its controversial interpretation.

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However, this event galvanized her personal ideology and inspired her to produce a number of related works. Do Unto Others reflects both Oelschig’s expressive style and social consciousness. Grim in its confrontation with a dark reality, the scene suggests hooded Klansmen as apparitions surrounding a tangled mass of lynched bodies. Like many of her works onpaper, the work is characterized by a strong sense of narrative and draws attention to the plight of African Americans.

Though abstract expressionism was the prevailing trend (1940s-50s), Oelschig continued to pursue subjects oriented toward social realism.

 

The major triumph of Oelschig’s later years was the completion of a major mural project to honor the nation’s bicentennial for the Home Federal Savings and Loan Bank in Savannah. Executed over the course of three years, from 1973-5, the mural cycle, featured 44 scenes of historic Savannah (44 individual paintings). In 1999, the mural was purchased—and reinstalled in 2000—at the Savannah Area Chamber of Commerce office on Bay Street, not far from her studios.

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“I sat for numerous mornings at [Diego Rivera’s] feet while he explained his thoughts and the fresco technique in which he worked.”

 

“She met and worked with Mexican muralist Jose Clemente Orozco, who advised her on her own mural plans. ‘I liked Orozco’s work,’ said Oelschig. ‘He impressed me tremendously. He encouraged me to try the medium of fresco.’”

 

“[Lamar] Dodd once referred to her as a ‘talented and imaginative young artist with the tools to produce very personal and regional scenes of social consequence,’ according to a catalog entry in ‘A Southern Collection’ from the Morris Museum of Art.”

 

“While in Mexico, Oelschig made plans to return to Savannah and paint a mural dealing with racial violence. Preparatory sketches depicted angular elongated figures—after the style of Orozco—of a Ku Klux Klan member using red suspenders as whips. The suspenders were a symbol for former Georgia Governor Eugene Talmadge.”

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“In 1953 . . . Howard DeVree, the New York Times art critic, chose Sparrows (1953) as one of the top ten paintings in the show. The painting . . . came about by accident, said Oelschig. The artist was painting a house on Green Square when she ran into the group of children depicted in the work. ‘A whole raft of kids were playing around there, trying to distract my attention,’ she said. They wanted to be painted. Oelschig told them to sit on a fence and she made several sketches . . . ‘I painted just whatever hit me at the time,’ said Oelschig . . .”

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“Panel and frame exhibit and extreme diagonal torque that may cause problems for the pain layers and the adhesion between the pain and the panel.”

 

“Yellowish uneven tones on the sky are the result of ages
linseed oil and/or varnish combinations, meant at the time of
application, to add a desired color tone to the sky. These
substances have aged and become extremely contracted as a
result of no paint medium to help stabilize the mixture. This
substance has not only darkened, but has developed
contraction cracquelar. The substances have slid across the
lower (blue) paint as it dried causing the “alligator” skin
appearance. In some areas, this alligator crackle is so small,
and close together that its condition obscures some of the
composition, the street lamp at the far left for example.”

 

“There is no treatment which will safely remove the
contracted yellow material from the sky. To clean the surface
grime is also not recommended because the overall paint is
soluble in all safe solvents as well as in water—and not all
areas are soluble in the same solvents.”

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Initially a painter of the American scene, Oelschig was often tough-minded, passionate and unafraid to delve into dark subject
matter and meaning. Sensitivity to social issues and contact with prominent American artists of the early 20th century helped shape her
experience. She eventually explored both socially explosive and highly personal ideas in a style that is often visceral and expressionistic.
A study in contrasts, her art also include whimsical images as well as works that capture the natural beauty and people of the coastal
region.

 

Oelschig befriended prominent artist Alexander Brook, who became nationally known for his painting Georgia Jungle, a first place winner at the 1939 Carnegie International exhibition, depicting a destitute African American family living in Savannah. This work and others by Brook fueled Oelschig’s already strong interest in African American subject matter.

1947, Mexico. She took courses including “The Three Great Muralists of Mexico” under critic Justino Fernando at Mexico CityCollege.

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Painted in 1948, a work by Oelschig depicts a horrific landscape in which a lynched figure is shown surrounded by Klansmen, flying red suspenders, banner-like, from long pikes. A third piece, entitled Pieta, portrays the aftermath of a lynching in which a black male’s body becomes a surrogate Christ figure. In contrast, Civil War—Culmination of the Old South literally shows the old South going
up in smoke, while black figures emerge from the foundations of antebellum mansions. The fact that Oelschig painted these works in the year of the continuation of the Talmadge governorship, and intended them for a white segregated school truly seems a revolutionizing gesture for a woman of her time in Savannah.

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Following the breakup of her marriage in 1962, Oelschig returned to Savannah, where her work branched in two directions. She painted the local scene, while simultaneously experimenting with abstraction and non-traditional materials.

Despite the turbulence of the 1960’s, Oelschig rarely produced socially critical works. Exceptions include Fall Out #2 (1968) which shows the aftermath of a violent explosion. A work from the early 70’s explored darkness of a more personal nature. And Deliver Us From Evil (1971) depicts a distorted version of the artist’s face surrounded by a host of nightmarish creatures, perhaps an exorcism of the difficult years following the breakup of her marriage. She painted this work in incompatible media, ink and oil-based paint, which
produced random effects that she later developed into images.

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Bibliography:

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“Oelschig, Augusta: 1918-2000.” The Johnson Collection. 2016. Accessed May 7, 2016. http://thejohnsoncollection.org/augusta-oelschig/

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Harry DeLorme Jr., Augusta Oelschig (American, 1918-2000). Edited by Hollins Koons McCullough. From Collection Highlights: Telfair Museum of Art. Savannah, GA: Telfair Museum of Art. 2005, 232-233.

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Lynne Blackman, ed. Spot: Southern Works on Paper. Charleston Renaissance Gallery: Charleston, SC. 2008, 99.

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Mary Shuter. “Savannah native’s long life devoted to art.” Savannah News/Press. May 11, 1995.

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Letter from G. Theodore Nightwine (Nightwine and Associates: Fine Arts Conservators) to Ms. Chris Neal (Curator of Fine Arts and Exhibitions, Telfair

Museum of Art) regarding the condition of Old City Market (1999) by Oelschig, signed A. Oelschig. June 29, 2000.

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