Alice Huger Ravenel Smith painted a number of watercolor scenes of the rice cultivation process in the Lowcountry at the turn of the 20th century. The process had not changed substantially since it was first imported into the Carolina coastal region in the late 17th century, and an extensive system of canals and trunks was developed in the 18th century. This is a plant of "Carolina Gold Rice," the most widely planted strain of rice, so named because of its distinctive gold color.
Courtesy of the Gibbes Museum of Art/Carolina Art Association.
