Restrictions to Access

This collection is not available for immediate or same day access. Please contact Research and Instructional Service staff at wilsonlibrary@unc.edu to discuss options for consulting this collection.

Restrictions to Use

This collection contains born-digital materials that are accessible only on the campus of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The digital publication Voices, the magazine of the North Carolina Folk Art Society, is restricted to use in research room only.

Copyright Notice

Copyright is retained by the authors of items in these papers, or their descendants, as stipulated by United States copyright law.

Preferred Citation

[Identification of item], in the Margaret Day Allen and Robert John Allen Collection #20576, Southern Folklife Collection, The Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Acquisitions Information

Gift of Margaret Day Allen and Robert John Allen, November 2019 (Acc. 20210604.4).

Sensitive Materials Statement

Manuscript collections and archival records may contain materials with sensitive or confidential information that is protected under federal or state right to privacy laws and regulations, the North Carolina Public Records Act (N.C.G.S. § 132 1 et seq.), and Article 7 of the North Carolina State Personnel Act (Privacy of State Employee Personnel Records, N.C.G.S. § 126-22 et seq.). Researchers are advised that the disclosure of certain information pertaining to identifiable living individuals represented in this collection without the consent of those individuals may have legal ramifications (e.g., a cause of action under common law for invasion of privacy may arise if facts concerning an individual's private life are published that would be deemed highly offensive to a reasonable person) for which the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill assumes no responsibility.

The following terms from Library of Congress Subject Headings suggest topics, persons, geography, etc. interspersed through the entire collection; the terms do not usually represent discrete and easily identifiable portions of the collection--such as folders or items.

Clicking on a subject heading below will take you into the University Library's online catalog.

• Allen, Margaret Day, 1951-
• Allen, Robert J. (Robert John), 1948-2020.
• Folk artists--Southern States--Biography.
• North Carolina Folk Art Society.
• Outsider art--Southern States.

Margaret Day Allen and Robert John Allen (1948-2020) are former members of the Folk Art Society of America's National Advisory Board and past presidents of the North Carolina Folk Art Society. Margaret Day Allen authored When the Spirit Speaks: Self-Taught Art of the South.

Video interviews, photographs, articles, and book chapters about self-taught/folk artists created by Margaret Day Allen and Robert John Allen. Videos were recorded digitally by the Allens over a 10- to 15-year period. Materials document African American and white artists from Kentucky, Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, Virginia, Louisiana, South Carolina, Mississippi, and Arkansas. Artists featured in the collection include: Ab the Flagman (Roger Lee Ivens), Minnie Adkins, John "Cornbread" Anderson, Michael Brien, Tammy Leigh Brooks, Benny Carter, Neolia "Nell" Cole, J. J. Cromer, John "Johnnie" Culver, Eric Cunningham, Bruce Davenport, Brian Dowdall, Winton and Rosa Eugene, Sam Ezell, Patti Fenick, Theresa Gloster, Edna Hackett, Eddie Hamrick, Eddie Hayes, Chris Hubbard, Clyde Jones, Stacy Lambert, Paul Lancaster, Arbon Lane, Jr., Eric Legge, Juanita Leonard, Tim Lewis, Peter Loose, Denny Maloney, Sam "The Dot Man" McMillan, Kessiah Freeman Meroney, Roy Minshew, Bruce New, Ashley Pierce, Sarah Rakes, Joe Reinhardt, Kathy Richards, Harold Rittenberry, Robert Roberg, O. L. Samuels, Cher Shaffer, Gabriel Shaffer, Rev. Johnnie Simmons, Vollis Simpson, William Thomas Thompson, Della Wells, and LaVon Williams.