Out & About: Westmoreland Society chooses new work for museum collection

The permanent collection of The Westmoreland Museum of American Art is richer, following the 35th Annual Westmoreland Society Dinner on Dec. 2 in the Greensburg institution.

As is their custom, members were presented with a choice of artworks to acquire. This year’s choice was between two pieces by Pakistani-American artist Anila Quayyum Agha.

Agha’s work employs textiles, embroidery, wax, dyes and silk-screen printing. She creates patterns based on ancient Islamic geometric and interlace patterns through hand-cutting, laser-cutting and sewing on paper.

Society members had the opportunity to assess the works during the cocktail hour. Their ultimate choice was “Flowers (Blue and Red Circle),” encaustic and beads on paper.

Additionally, Society members made donations totaling more than $35,000 to the museum’s Art Acquisition Fund.

The evening included a video presentation by Chief Curator Jeremiah William McCarthy about another recent acquisition, “Naima,” a 1999 bronze sculpture by African American artist Elizabeth Catlett, 1915-2012.

McCarthy noted that Catlett won a scholarship to Carnegie Institute of Technology (now Carnegie Mellon University), which then refused to admit a Black woman. Later studying at the University of Iowa, she found a mentor in “American Gothic” painter Grant Wood.

Catlett’s work focused on the Black American experience and often included “ennobling and edifying abstracted and idealized images of women and community.”

For many guests, the evening also was the first opportunity to view Thomas Hovenden’s 1882 oil painting, “Death of Elaine,” since it was reinstalled in October with a new frame.

Dinner remarks came from museum board President Helene Conway-Long and Interim Director/CEO Suzanne Wright, along with Westmoreland Society President Karen Douglas and Secretary/Treasurer Sande Hendricks.

Seen: Tom Long, Rhonda Madden, Doug Evans, Richard Hendricks, Kevin and Judy O’Toole, Linda McKenna Boxx, Paul and Diane Nickoloff, Bill and Elizabeth Kofmehl, Rod Booker, Linda Assard, Eric and Michele Bononi, Chuck and Nancy Anderson, Barry and Jo Ellen Numerick, Joseph Jamison and Susan Ciarimboli, Jim and Kathy Longacre, Chuck and Sally Loughran and Kitty Hricenak.