Fanny Mahon King remains a quiet presence among the better twentieth-century Charleston artists, and with Emma Gilchrist, was in the group of artists who slightly preceded the Charleston Renaissance. She was educated in Washington, D.C., but received most of her instruction in art in Charleston from out-of-town artists. King studied with multiple nationally prominent artists including William Posey Silva, Frank Swift Chase, Harry Leith-Ross, Alfred Hutty, Emile Gruppe, Ivan F. Summers, and G. Howard Hilder. A body of her work dedicated to the magnolia gardens of the region was exhibited throughout the South and in New York galleries. Her works are in the permanent collections of the Nashville Museum of Art, the High Museum in Atlanta, and the Gibbes Museum of Art in Charleston.