Since its founding 60 years ago, the Pittsburgh Center for the Arts has been a work in progress, changing gradually from a mix of merry volunteers to an arts organization with a paid professional staff.

But since its abrupt closing last summer and reopening six weeks later, the center has been led by an acting executive director who volunteers his services and seven paid staff members. The organization's future may lie in a proposed merger next year with Pittsburgh Filmmakers.

Artists have donated time and money to what Kathleen Zimbicki, a retired gallery owner who lives in Oakdale, calls "the mother house" of Pittsburgh's art community.

	"If it's going to go this way, the artists will have to man and help and work. And I know they're willing as long as they can have shows." -- Kathleen Zimbicki, a retired gallery owner and teacher at Pittsburgh Center for the Arts

The center's board members reached into their pockets to pay two final payrolls that totaled $64,000 before laying off 13 employees and turning off the lights last August because of $1.1 million in debt.

"I had $6 in the bank when we closed the doors," said Mike Joyce, treasurer of the center and a financial manager at Citizens' Bank.

To survive and prosper, the center must deal with financial as well as artistic issues. Today, its debt stands at $780,000. Of that total, $350,000 is tied up in a 12-year loan from Enterprise Bank. The loan is partly collateralized by center supporters. The remaining money is owed to art suppliers, utilities, equipment leases and obligations to local foundations for restricted grants.

"What's crushing them now is short-term debt with vendors and contractors," Joyce said.

Chris Casavale, a center board member and chief financial officer of Red Square Systems on the South Side, said the center is awaiting payment of a total of $263,000 in three separate grants from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts. Of that total, $123,000 will go for a partnership grant that provides art education in local schools; $85,000 will support artist residencies in local schools; and $55,000 will go for operating expenses.

The organization's leaders also must decide if the center can continue to afford to fulfill multiple missions, including teaching classes for dabblers young and old, presenting edgy, artistic work and offering exhibit space to regional artists.

Last October, Charlie Humphrey, executive director of Pittsburgh Filmmakers, volunteered to serve as the center's acting director with an eye toward merging the two arts organizations, both of which earn most of their income from course fees.

Humphrey has made some progress. All of the artists who taught classes last year or consigned work for sale in the gift shop were paid last month after an anonymous donor released $100,000 from the endowment. About $400,000 remains in the endowment.

A solicitation letter sent out last fall generated more than $70,000 in donations. Staff members are logging long hours to keep the center open five days a week for courses and on the weekends so visitors can see exhibits.

On April 1, the center opens a biennial featuring the work of young, contemporary artists and an exhibit of acknowledged local masters, including Diane Samuels, whose work has been shown internationally. Both shows will run through Aug. 22.

This month, about 190 people will participate in 55 classes that start March 18. A summer schedule is available, and 150 youngsters ages 4 to 14 have registered for weeklong art camps. If its luck holds, the center will celebrate the 60th anniversary of its founding with a two-day fund-raising festival on Sept. 17 and 18.

By next January, Humphrey and center directors plan to merge the center with Pittsburgh Filmmakers. Each organization is supposed to retain its identity.

At a meeting at the center last month, Humphrey told an audience made up of 80 artists and staff members that the contemplated merger will build on each organization's strengths.

The center could help Pittsburgh Filmmakers improve its children's offerings. This summer, a digital photography class for youngsters will alternate between the center's facilities and the Pittsburgh Filmmakers classrooms in Oakland.

Filmmakers, which offers college-level courses to students from seven local universities, could help the center establish a curriculum for students who want to earn college art credits.

Humphrey told his audience that the center still needs to raise a lot of money, according to a summary of the meeting by Loretta Stanish. Stanish has volunteered to run the artists' gift shop at the center, and her business acumen has been invaluable, Humphrey said.

By the end of this month, the center hopes to hear back from local foundations on its request for $350,000 in operating support.

On a daily basis, Laura Domencic, the assistant director, coordinates exhibitions with artists and works with staff members. She also deals with problems such as a furnace on the fritz, lapses in Internet service and coordinating volunteers to distribute course catalogs. With Humphrey's help, she is writing grant proposals.

Typically, Domencic said, the artists guilds exhibit four times a year at the center. The guilds include painters, jewelers, sculptors, illustrators, water colorists and fiber artists. But this year, guild members have had only one chance to exhibit their work in a show that opened in January and closed Sunday.

The tug between what Zimbicki calls "high art from out of town or local people" is nothing new.

"Jerry Caplan used to say artists will hang in meat markets," Zimbicki said, recalling the late ceramist whose work is included in the Carnegie Museum of Art collection.

Zimbicki said local artists will support the merger if they can exhibit their work.

"If it's going to go this way, the artists will have to man and help and work. And I know they're willing as long as they can have shows," she said.

Bob Cook is president of the Pittsburgh Watercolor Society, which hosted the recent exhibit of guild artists' work. He noted that visitors could see the exhibit only on weekends. He also said that exhibiting work by out-of-town artists creates fewer opportunities for regional artists.

"PCA was founded by the guilds for the guilds," Cook said. "There should be some work done in the area of showcasing the guilds and going back to the original purpose of the PCA."

Humphrey believes there's room for regional and national shows.

"If we only show our own work to each other, the opportunities for growth are greatly diminished."

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Correction/Clarification: (Published Mar. 9, 2005) A Mar. 8, 2005 story in yesterday's editions on the Pittsburgh Center for the Arts gave an incorrect date for the start of classes at the center. Classes for adults and children begin on March 29.