The Arts at Black Mountain College

Although it lasted only 24 years (1933-1957), was beset by financial woes, and enrolled fewer than 1,200 students, Black Mountain College provided an extraordinary legacy an abundance of creative talent that shaped a whole movement of modern art in America. Those who taught included Willem de Kooning, Robert Motherwell, Agnes de Mille, Paul Goodman, and Walter Gropius. Among the students were Robert Rauschenberg, Arthur Penn, Joel Oppenheimer, and Francine du Plessix Gray. Mary Emma Harris has written the definitive account of this tiny outpost of experimentalism, uncovering many little known facts and correcting distortions about the school.