South Pacific (musical) of her portrayal of Nellie Forbush ... who is so shocked to find her early racial prejudices cropping up. Hers is a completely irresistible performance." When "South Pacific" opened in London in November 1951, the reviews were mixed. London's "Daily Express" praised the music but disliked other elements of that show, writing, "We got a 42nd Street "Madame Butterfly", the weakest of all the Hammerstein-Rodgers musicals. The "Daily Mail" suggested, "The play moved so slowly between its songs that it seemed more like "South Soporific"." "The Times" applauded the songs but indicated that "before the end the singing and the
Nellie Mae Rowe the Guerilla Girls, an anonymous group of feminist, female artists, recognized Nellie Mae Rowe along the ranks of the Frida Kahlo, Edmonia Lewis, and Georgia O'Keeffe. And finally, in 1999, the American Folk Art Museum mounted "The Art of Nellie Mae Rowe: Ninety-Nine and Half Won't Do." In 2014, The High Museum of Art in Atlanta, showed “Nellie Mae Rowe: At Night Things Come to Me.” ""I don't know what he put me here for, but he got me here for something 'cause I don't draw like nobody. You speak one way, but I come on and say it different.