Augusta Christine Fells Research Paper

Augusta Christine Fells was born on February 29, 1892 in Green Cove Springs, Florida. Augusta was born to Edward Fells, Cornelia Murphy Fells. Augusta was part of a large family and started making art at a very young age, using naturally found clay. Because Augusta was so into art she sometimes skipped school to make more of her sculptures. Her father, a Methodist minister did not approve of her of this doing and did whatever he could to stop her. Even though her father disapproved this doing, she continued to make sculptures. At the age of 15 August married John T. Moore in 1907 and had her only child, Irene, in 1908. After Moore died a few years later her and her family moved to West Palm Beach, Florida, in 1915. Around that same time she married James Savage, but she divorced him in the early 1920s and kept his name. When moving to this new spot in Florida Augusta encountered a challenge, the lack of clay. Savage eventually found some materials from a local potter. With those materials she created a group of figures that she entered in a local county fair. All of her work paid off and she won the contest. Along with winning the prize, the superintendent of the fair, George Graham Currie offered her to study art despite the racism of that time. After winning that contest and getting to study more about art Savage thought her career was going to
Inspired by the words of the poem "Lift Every Voice and Sing," by James Weldon Johnson, she created The Harp. This wonderful piece of work stands 16 feet tall and it reinterpreted the musical instrument to feature 12 singing African-American youth. With a series of heights as its strings, the harp’s sounding board transformed into an arm and a hand, and in the front is a kneeling young man offered music in his hands. This piece of work was considered one of her major works, but unfortunately The Harp was destroyed at the end of the