As a child, Bernie Schilling visited museums and art galleries with his family. He began perusing auction catalogs when he realized he could own art. He was just 17 in 1978 when he made his first purchase, paying $150 for a limited-edition lithograph by famed British sculptor Henry Moore.
That was a "grand sum for a teenager,” he writes in a small catalog that accompanies the exhibition “Selections from the Schilling-Knapton Collection of Art” at the Southern Alleghenies Museum of Art at Loretto. “With that purchase the steamroller had started.”
Almost 200 artworks owned by Mr. Schilling and his partner, Drew Knapton, are exhibited at the museum, representing about 10 percent of their continually expanding collection. They plan to donate 24 of the exhibited works to the museum.
SAMA executive director G. Gary Moyer describes the collection as “diverse and eclectic” in the catalog. It includes 16th-century etchings, neo-impressionist landscapes and decorative objects along with the abstracts, op art and pop art that are the focus of the exhibition..
“I look for quality and a masterfulness in the work ... and a work that offers a good representation of the artist’s style and main body of work,” Mr. Schilling said in a museum interview.
While hesitating to favor any artwork over another, he cited Jene Highstein’s drawing “Study for Large Sculpture (Square),” David Prentice’s painting “Untitled (White Square),” and Elizabeth Voelker’s painting “Forest Floor” as among exhibited works that he is particularly attached to.
Other artists among the more than 150 represented include local and national figures such as Charles Biddle, Alexander Calder, Christo, Howard Finster, Dan Flavin, Aaronel deRoy Gruber, Damien Hirst, David Lewis, Roy Lichtenstein, Robert Morris, Yoko Ono, Louise Pershing, Robert Rauschenberg and Andy Warhol,
SAMA Curator Scott Dimond will speak about the collection at a Lunch a l’Art beginning at noon Dec. 7. Reservations are requested by Friday at 1-814-472-3920. The cost, including lunch, is $15; members $14.
The exhibition continues through Jan. 20. The museum is on the campus of Saint Francis University. Hours are 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesday through Friday and 1-5 p.m. Saturday. Admission is free. Information: www.sama-art.org or 1-814-472-3920.
Labor, creativity, equity
Labor, creativity and equity in and beyond the arts is the subject of a panel discussion with LaToya Ruby Frazier, Lynn Nottage and Sandra Gould Ford to be held Dec. 4 at the August Wilson Center for African American Culture, 980 Liberty Ave., Downtown.
The panel will follow the presentation of the 2017 Carol R. Brown Creative Achievement Awards to costume designer Susan Tsu and visual artist Sarika Goulatia.
Doors open at 5:30 p.m.; the awards presentation will begin at 6 p.m. followed by the panel. A reception will be held from 7:15-9 p.m.
The discussion is held in conjunction with “On the Making of Steel Genesis,” a collaborative exhibition between Ms. Frazier and Ms. Ford, organized by Silver Eye Center for Photography and presented at the August Wilson Center. Silver Eye executive director David Oresick will moderate. The exhibition will be open during the reception as well as a second exhibition, “Went Looking for Beauty: Refashioning Self: Photographs by Deborah Willis.”
Ms. Frazier and Ms. Ford will discuss connections between themes in their exhibition with those in Ms. Nottage’s Pulitzer Prize-winning play, “Sweat.”
Admission to the event is free, but registration is required at pittsburghfoundation.org.
M. Thomas: mthomas@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1925.
First Published: November 28, 2017, 7:19 p.m.
