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Governor Ted Kulongoski will recognize the extraordinary contributions made to the arts by Oregon artists and citizen leaders when he presents the 2003 Governor’s Arts Awards in Salem on December 8, 2003. The 2003 awards will be bestowed on Pamela Hulse Andrews of Bend, publisher of Cascade Business News and Cascade Arts + Entertainment; Allen Nause, artistic director of Artists Repertory Theatre in Portland; Sondra Pearlman, founder and former executive producer of Oregon Children’s Theatre; Salem’s Pentacle Theatre, now celebrating its 50th season; Carla Perry, founder of Writers on the Edge in Newport; and Portland philanthropist Jordan Schnitzer whose passionate support of the arts in Oregon has been an inspiration to others. Rep. Betsy Johnson of Scappoose, will receive the Ron Schmidt Award, presented to an elected official who has been an exemplary supporter of culture and the arts. The Governor’s Arts Awards, presented since 1977 in partnership with the Oregon Arts Commission, give official recognition to those whose work on behalf of the arts has significantly contributed to the growth and development of Oregon’s cultural life. "The Governor's Arts Awards honor Oregonians whose contributions to the arts have been exemplary," said Steve Forrester, Chairman of the Arts Commission. "This year we honor artists and visionaries who’ve brought recognition to Oregon through their work. We honor citizen leaders like Pamela Hulse Andrews and Jordan Schnitzer whose generosity has moved others to invest in the arts. We salute theatres and theatre directors in Salem and Portland. And we acknowledge that one person’s artistic vision can make a difference. It is fitting that we gather each year as a cultural community to salute their commitments." Selected for 2003 Governor's Arts Awards are: Pamela Hulse Andrews Pamela Hulse Andrews publishes Cascade Business News, Central Oregon's bi-weekly business newspaper, which received the Governor’s Small Business of the Year Award in 1994; Cascade Arts & Entertainment, Central Oregon's monthly arts and culture magazine, and Cascade Discovery, a quarterly publication for active and retired adults in Central Oregon. Until Pamela founded Cascade Arts & Entertainment, area arts and culture organizations were working in relative isolation, with no sense of being a cultural community. Cascade A & E received the Central Oregon Arts Association's Business of the Year Award in 1998, in recognition of its contributions to building cultural community. In collaboration with Arts Central, the regional arts council for Deschutes, Jefferson and Crook counties, she published the area's first comprehensive Arts Resource Directory, illustrating the vitality of Central Oregon’s cultural community. Pamela Hulse Andrews and Cascade A & E have been generous to arts organizations, contributing pro bono display advertising to needy arts organizations over the years. Her free promotion has both encouraged and enabled the survival of both emerging and established arts groups. Her diverse business background gives her a broad perspective on the business community as well as the economy of Central Oregon. Working for years in Portland and in California, she returned to her home state of Oregon in 1991 where she and husband Andy Andrews own a working ranch in Alfalfa, east of Bend. Pamela Hulse Andrews, recently appointed to the Oregon Economic and Community Development Commission, serves on board of directors of the Deschutes United Way. She also Co-chairs the general campaign for the Tower Theatre Foundation and is one of the founding board members of the City of Bend's Arts, Beautification and Cultural Commission. Rep. Betsy Johnson Betsy Johnson (D-Scappoose) continues her family’s long legacy of public service. She is serving her 2nd term in the Oregon House of Representatives where her father, the late Sam Johnson, was a House member from Redmond. Her mother, Becky Johnson, has a distinguished history of public service and personal philanthropy. Continuing that tradition, Betsy Johnson is now Vice-President of the Samuel S. Johnson Foundation. Her regional leadership has supported the restoration of the Liberty Theater in Astoria, which will be used extensively during the Bicentennial's National Signature Event in November, 2005. Johnson also spearheaded the LCBO strategic plan which supports a wide variety of cultural programming, including the Portland Art Museum's "People of the River" exhibit of over 130 artifacts crafted from Columbia River tribes. Most critically, Rep. Betsy Johnson and a key group of legislators were instrumental in working with Governor Kulongoski, the Oregon Arts Commission and Oregon Cultural Trust to develop strategies to preserve the important infrastructure of public funding for culture in Oregon during the 2003 legislative session. Her efforts led to the passage of legislation merging the operations of Trust and Arts Commission, ensuring ongoing public benefit from culture for Oregonians. For these achievements, she will be honored with the 2003 Ron Schmidt Award, presented to a public official who has made significant contributions to advance the arts in Oregon. Allen Nause Allen Nause, Artists Repertory Theatre's artistic director, is an actor, teacher and theatre ambassador. He came to Oregon in 1975 to act with the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, then joined A.R.T. as the company's first artistic director. Since 1989, Nause has directed many of its most popular productions, ranging from Appalachian Ebeneezer, Touch, Killer Joe, The Crucible, and The Beauty Queen of Leenane, to A Raisin in the Sun, Fortinbras, A Perfect Ganesh, A Taste of Honey, The Diary of Anne Frank, We Won't Pay! We Won't Pay! and A Long Day's Journey Into Night. His work with other theatre companies includes directing Our Town with Mahesh Dattani in Bangalore, India; The Foreigner for Portland Repertory Theater; Tons of Money and Absent Friends for Portland Civic Theatre; Noises Off for the Oregon Shakespeare Festival and Beirut for triangle! Productions. He has been a teacher of theater arts at Lewis & Clark College, PSU and the University of Portland. As an actor, Allen has performed at many Northwest theaters in Portland, Seattle and Tacoma. He appeared in the feature films Frances, The Runner Stumbles and Gathering Evidence and directed the film Zig Zag, starring Dan Reed. He has directed and acted for the Oregon Symphony's "Nerve Endings" series. Nause’s international theatre work includes some of his most interesting experiences. In 1994, he directed A Journey Through American Comedy, which toured Asia, Africa and the Middle East. In 2000, Allen traveled to Vietnam and co-directed a bilingual, bicultural production of A Midsummer Night's Dream and a Vietnamese language production of The Glass Menagerie as part of the Vietnam America Theatre Exchange. Under his artistic leadership, A.R.T. has been selected this year by the National Endowment for the Arts as one of only six theater companies nationally to participate in the "Shakespeare in American Communities" program, the largest-ever tour of Shakespeare in the U.S. Sondra Pearlman With an undergraduate degree in education, a graduate degree in public administration, and several years of running summer theatres, Sondra Pearlman was well prepared to start a children’s theatre company under the auspices of Portland Civic Theatre in 1988. When that institution closed two years later, Ms. Pearlman’s program was so successful that she formed the non-profit, Oregon Children’s Theatre, and continued to delight young audiences with high quality professional children’s theatre productions. As the children’s theatre in residence at the Portland Center for the Performing Arts, Oregon Children’s Theatre has introduced over 1.3 million children to the wonders of the performing arts. School groups coming from a wide geographic area on field trips fill 30,000 seats for each of OCT’s annual productions. Sondra and OCT have maintained a rigorous commitment to keep ticket prices for school shows affordable, with an average ticket price of just $6. With a mission to enrich the growth, development and creativity of young people through quality theatre experiences, Oregon Children’s Theatre’s programming includes a variety of theatre services for teachers and schools, a year-round acting academy and a training program for committed young professionals. Under Sondra’s keen management, Oregon Children’s Theatre has operated with a positive fund balance since its inception, a rarity for a non-profit arts organization. Sondra Pearlman retired this year as the founder and executive producer of Oregon Children’s Theatre. Her colleagues in the theatre community pay tribute to her heart, her humility, her professionalism, and her commitment to arts education as a bright light in Oregon since 1989. Her legacy is the achievement of children’s theatre excellence, innovative theatre offerings, and tens of thousands of children, their teachers and their parents each year introduced to professional theatre. Pentacle Theatre, Salem Pentacle Theatre, celebrating its 50th season this year, began in 1954 in a barn on Highway 22 west of Salem. Fifteen people were the nucleus of that effort, and, with a contribution of $2 from each of them, the interior of the barn was whitewashed, a load of sawdust spread on the floor, and a large tarpaulin spread in the center acted as a stage. A local mortuary loaned folding chairs, dressing rooms were set up in a chicken coop outside – and what is now a longstanding local theatre tradition began. Soon after, planning began to build the present theatre where Pentacle now produces an eight-play season each year. Pentacle hired the best architect it could find (his design won a national award) but the theatre was built, in the main, by amateurs, in the best sense of the word, by people who did what they did for love, not money. In 1963, the first production in the present theatre took place. A nine-member working board of directors governs the theatre, interacting with hundreds of people from the community who do everything: directing, performing, building sets, costuming, ushering and selling refreshments. Artistic direction is set by a volunteer Play Reading Committee, which, over a year’s time, reads 80-100 scripts to formulate a season. Recognized by the Salem Art Association in 1979 with its Excellence in the Arts Award and by the Salem Convention and Visitors Association in 1998 as its Non-Profit of the Year, Pentacle is respected for its commitment to community service. A free dress rehearsal is provided for residents of area hospitals and institutions. Each production includes a student night, the final dress rehearsal, where area drama students see the play and discuss it afterwards with the director and actors. Three performances of each production are reserved and sold as fundraisers for local non-profit organizations. With over 500 members and a volunteer workforce of over 1000, Pentacle Theatre is now in the midst of its first capital campaign: a $1 million project to upgrade the theatre. With the distinction of producing quality productions involving emerging and experienced local actors of all ages, Pentacle is the product of hard work and dedication of many - and the steadfast patronage of Salem area residents. Carla Perry From humble beginnings, and through hard work and determination, Carla Perry has created a literary tradition on the Oregon Coast. In 1997, she developed a monthly writers’ series in Yachats under the sponsorship of the Friends of Yachats Commons. In 1999, the series to Newport’s Performing Arts Center where it became the Nye Beach Writers Series, presenting, to date, 165 poets, playwrights, memoirists, historians, novelists and songwriters at 66 events. Her extensive contacts have attracted Oregon writers such as Ken Kesey, Molly Gloss, Tom Spanbauer, former Governor Barbara Roberts and Chuck Palahniuk. Reaching beyond the Pacific Northwest, Carla Perry has brought to Newport nationally known writers who have accepted minimal honoraria and made it possible for the rural, isolated area to experience literary arts that would never be available otherwise. The series collaborates with Mountain Writers Series, the University of Oregon, KBOO radio, and the Oregon Council for the Humanities to “piggyback” with other readings and performances. Such success comes at the price of incredible dedication and hard work - and Carla receives no salary for any of it. In 2002, she formally organized Writers On The Edge, Inc. a non-profit corporation, and began applying for grants to fund writing programs for Lincoln County school students. The first grants helped bring writing workshops to Waldport High School. The second collaborated with Portland-based Community of Writers to train Lincoln County’s third- and fifth-grade teachers to teach creative writing. All of this is consistent with Carla Perry’s lifelong commitment to the arts. She received a BA in Poetry from the Iowa Writers Workshop. Her poetry, short stories, interviews and photos of writers have been published widely, and she was the 2002 recipient of the Oregon Book Award’s Stewart Holbrook Award for outstanding contributions to Oregon’s literary life. Carla Perry’s outstanding and selfless efforts to bring live culture in the form of the word – written, spoken and performed – have indeed brought new energy to the central Oregon coast. Jordan Schnitzer, philanthropist, Portland Jordan Schnitzer is a true philanthropist with a deeply developed love for and commitment to the arts, particularly arts education in Oregon. He has dedicated his personal passion and resources and the resources of his foundation and companies to provide significant continued support for many institutions including the Oregon College of Art & Craft, Hallie Ford Museum of Art, The Art Gym at Marylhurst, Pacific Northwest College of Art, the Sitka Center for Art and Ecology, Crow’s Shadow, and the Pendleton Round Up, among many others. His investments in arts organizations are developed with his own considerable research and input from his foundation staff. Many of his concerns about program direction stem from his deeply held belief that art plays a large role in developing creative vision and self esteem in early childhood. Over the years, Schnitzer has amassed an enormous collection of contemporary American and European works on paper that he freely lends to institutions throughout the region. Unlike many art collectors and patrons who keep their collections hidden away or behind closed doors, he firmly believes he has a responsibility and obligation to share his collection – and his passion for the visual arts – with others. Buoyed by the success of the recent Pressure Points exhibition, a selection of contemporary Americans prints curated by Terri Hopkins and John Olbrantz, which toured throughout the region, he is partnering on two new exhibitions of prints, one focused on humor and satire in contemporary printmaking works, another examining the work of printmakers of color. Jordan Schnitzer embraces new ideas and innovation with excitement, verve and enthusiasm – all of which have benefited the arts and arts groups across Oregon. The Oregon Arts Commission provides leadership, funding and arts programs through its grants, special initiatives and services. Nine Commissioners, appointed by the Governor, determine arts needs and establish policies for public support of the arts. The Arts Commission became part of the Oregon Economic and Community Development Department in 1993, in recognition of the expanding role the arts play in the broader social, economic and educational arenas of Oregon communities. Dated for freshness! Page last updated May 02, 2008 |
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