July 19, 2007
Book benefits Art Department
Augusta, Ga. – A world-renown artist who has lent his expertise to Augusta State University’s Department of Art for more than a decade just keeps giving. A book featuring his life’s work will help provide for the education of ASU art students for years to come.
A group of donors gave to help the publication of Philip Morsberger: A Passion for Painting. In the process, the group also provided an endowment in the name of the Morris Eminent Scholar Emeritus that will be used to establish the Philip Morsberger Collection, of which one framed student work of art will be added each year.
“If they chose well, they could end up with some quite important work,” Mr. Morsberger says, adding that he is pleased with the ongoing nature of the book’s benefits for the art department.
Mr. Morsberger says the overage from the book’s sponsorships – a check for $10,000 – was earmarked for ASU’s art department, as were future royalties from sales of the book. Any unsold copies of the book will also become property of the university.
“ASU got what we hope is a very helpful check,” Mr. Morsberger says.
According to ASU Art Department Acting Chairperson Kristin Casaletto, the benefits of Mr. Morsberger’s book topped off a very successful year for her department in which it was also moved into its own building, Washington Hall.
“This has felt like a year of firsts for the Department of Art, a historic year, even,” she says. “We became an independent entity; we moved part of our operations into a beautiful new facility, and now we receive our first gift to the new department. We’re very grateful to each of the donors and to the Morsbergers.”
The book itself consists of 80 plates of Mr. Morsberger’s works and many biographical photographs. The author, Christopher Lloyd – a freelance art historian and curator – once served as the Surveyor of the Queen’s Pictures at the Royal Collection in London. The book also contains eight appreciations by Mr. Morsberger’s fellow contemporaries.
ASU continues to receive worldwide acclaim from the book. It is for sale in many places across the Atlantic as well in New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art. It can be found locally at the ASU Bookstore, the Mary Pauline Gallery on Broad Street, the Morris Museum of Art Museum Store, Barnes and Noble, and Borders. It can also be purchased online at www.amazon.com.
Mr. Morsberger has held numerous prestigious teaching positions, both in the United States and Britain. Among them, he was the first American to hold the distinguished Ruskin Master of Drawing chair at Oxford University in England; he served as artist in residence at both Dartmouth College and Rochester Institute of Technology, and was a fellow of the Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts at Harvard University. His work – which spans a wide range of styles – can be found in many public and private collections around the world.
January 2007 | February 2007 | March 2007 | April 2007 | May 2007 | June 2007