About Dr. Gore
Dr. Samuel Marshall Gore joined the MC faculty in 1951 after completing a three-year BFA program at the Atlanta College of Art. The son of a Baptist preacher soon began his own “ministry” of teaching art classes in Ratliff’s dormitory ground floor. He taught courses in that large room that once functioned as a school cafeteria many years ago.
Completing his BA requirement at MC in 1952, he was invited to remain in the only full-time art position at that time and to nourish a quiet but significant interest in art on campus. He further qualified himself by completing both the Master’s and Doctoral degrees. Dr. Gore developed the Art Degree curriculum and recruited students with art career interests. From the beginning, his commitment was to the church-related mission of the college and art with a strong Christian emphasis.
Through his perseverance, the full-time art faculty grew in number from one to six, offering undergraduate and graduate degrees, including the Master of Fine Arts. He successfully raised art scholarship funds and established the Sam Gore Art Scholarship Endowment. Under his leadership, significant firsts were achieved. Among these are hosting the first loan exhibit in the South from the Guggenheim Museum, the first of forty Southern Baptist Colleges to offer an MFA degree program, and being the first small college to have a graduate elected to membership in the National Sculpture Society.
Today, the four-story Aven Hall remains home to part of the Department. The classrooms and computer labs house the Graphic Design Program, Photography studios, Darkroom, and the Interior Design Program.
The Art Department has continued to grow and was blessed with a new facility, moving into the new Gore Arts Complex in the Fall of 2022. Department offices and thirteen renovated classrooms house the Studio Art and Art Education programs on the East Campus in the former Clinton Junior High.
When MC first purchased the property from the Clinton Public School District, Sam Gore saw the potential for using the building for Art. He immediately started drawing up floor plans of possible ways to use the space. He prayed over the building and laid his hands on it, asking God to make it available to the Art Department. At the time, the funds were unavailable for renovation, so MC used the space as storage for the campus. When Dr. Blake Thompson first came to MC as the President of the University, Dr. Sam Gore met with him to discuss using that space for Art. Within two years, plans were underway to renovate the space. The space was named after the founder of our department and his tireless effort to improve the department and its facilities, which spanned seventy years.
