Arts & Entertainment

Restoring Historic Artwork at South Pasadena Middle School, One Step at a Time

A group of preservationists works to restore a rare 1930's stone sculpture and other art pieces at South Pasadena Middle School.

Lori Rusch, a long-time resident of South Pasadena, is the project coordinator for the Art and Architectural Preservation Committee at . An art historian, she not only extensively studied the public art of the middle school for her Master's Thesis, but also spearheaded a parent-led campaign to raise funds for the restoration of historic art pieces at the school. Her work has paid off, and the school received an $8,000 grant from the National Trust for Historic Preservation to restore a 1933 stone relief by Donal Hord. 

This cast stone sculpture, "Civilian Conservation Corps Workers," was commissioned under the Works Progress Administration (WPA) Federal Arts Project, which facilitated the design and installation of public art sculptures after the Great Depression. The four-foot-long by three-foot-wide Hord sculpture features a group of male workers in a camp sponsored by the Civilian Conservation Corps, which provided jobs to young men, who performed conservation work in rural areas.

"It was like a mix between summer camp and the military," Rusch said of the Civilian Conservation Corps. "They built things like campgrounds and trails and lived in a barracks-like setting." In this sculpture, Hord shows men wrestling, building a road, clearing trails and cooking. 

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In 1933, a WPA art show at Exposition Park in downtown Los Angeles featured Hord's sculpture, Rusch said. It was at this show that someone chose this piece for the middle school. 

Over the years, the sculpture has been "painted, sandblasted, and chopped," Rusch said. The restoration work will involve removing the sculpture from the exterior wall of the middle school auditorium, completely clean the panel of paint and hang it in the lobby entrance of the auditorium, where it will be protected from the elements. 

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The committee has tapped Rosa Lowinger, a well-known conservator who recently worked to restore murals at St. Trinity Cathedral in Haiti under the Smithsonian Institution's Haiti Cultural Recovery Project, to restore the Hord piece. 

Lowinger said the sculpture is made of a concrete-like material, which was common for the 1930's. She will clean paint off the surface of the sculpture, inject a restoration grout into cracks and remove the staining. She estimated the project could take about a month to complete, and hopes to draw students attention to the artwork.

"Anytime you have important works of art in a school, it enriches the experience of the kids that go to that school," said Lowinger, who has done restoration work in schools in Hawaii as well. "I'm a huge fan of working in school districts. The curiosity of the kids is unmatched," she said.

The recently approved the restoration plan for the Hord sculpture, and work will begin as soon as the district's engineer gives the green light.

A Unique Auditorium

The only remaining structure from the original school campus constructed in 1928, the middle school's auditorium contains a wealth of notable artwork.

"The auditorium is a gem," said Glen Duncan, who serves on the South Pasadena Preservation Foundation and the city's Cultural Heritage Commission. He noted that the auditorium and tower at the middle school would be eligible national register listing, and he emphasized the significance of the Hord sculpture and the numerous other art pieces. "I think they just have to be preserved and restored," and added, "I hope that the PTA, school supporters and alums can get behind it."

Rusch said the auditorium was designed in a very European style. "They just didn't want a standard brick building," she said. "The community spent money on this back then." Her own parents graduated from the school in 1933, and her children also attended the school, making this restoration effort even more important to her. "It's up to the community to take care of its legacy," Rusch said.

Other Art at the Middle School

In addition to the Hord sculpture, a number of other pieces adorn the interior and exterior of the auditorium building. Artist Lucile Lloyd painted a large mural, "Madonna of the Covered Wagon," on the proscenium of the auditorium stage, and she also designed and painted the decorative ceiling of the auditorium. The mural shows a family with their covered wagon a day before arrival at Yosemite National Park. The first woman to work in the drafting department of renowned New York City architect Bertram Goodhue, Lloyd also created murals for the California Senate Building.

California artist Millard Sheets created a triptych of frescoes for the north-facing exterior wall of the middle school's auditorium, and these paintings are now buried under layers of paint, and hidden from view.

The wet frescoes were damaged within five years of completion, and completely covered over in the 1970's. It was also in that decade that other historical buildings, including the original middle school library, were torn down, Duncan said.

Sheets, a pre-eminent Southern California regionalist, attended the prestigious Chouinard Art Institute in Los Angeles, and later taught there. Sheets, who chose artists for the Public Works of Art Project during the Great Depression, is also famous for designing the mosaics for Home Savings of America banks.

Rusch said the middle school principal invited Sheets to speak to the students. "He was so impressed that he volunteered to give these kids these works of art as a reward," she said. The triptych consisted of three pieces, "The Farm," "The Harbor," and "The City," and were all scenes from Los Angeles. 

Since the restoration of the Sheets frescoes could be a difficult, and expensive endeavor, Rusch initially hopes to re-create them in banner form for the building. "It's an extensive chemical and physical process" to recover these paintings, she said.

In addition, paintings by Norman Chamberlain entitled "Indian Cermonial" hang in the auditorium foyer. 

Rusch has several other projects in mind after the Hord sculpture restoration is complete. "We need to open up these doorways [around the auditorium] and restore the interior," she said, pointing out the historic light installations, plaques, and paintings inside the building. 

Art in Education

In the late 1920's and 1930's, art became an integral part of American public school buildings. "Art stimulated creative thinking," Duncan said. "It was seen as a more critical part of education. Inspiring creativity was important."

Rusch said, "the student body was living and learning in a beautiful environment." Students, too, took part in designing public art, including a fountain, she added. The school opened in 1928 as South Pasadena Junior High School, which educated 7th, 8th and 9th graders, and emphasized arts and vocational training in addition to academics. 

In an article for Progressive Education magazine in October 1935, South Pasadena Junior High School Principal G. Derwood Baker wrote, "art is not only a tool of the core unit; it is a way of life." He went on to write, "Making one's surroundings more beautiful is unquestionably a legitimate social and educational objective." 

When the idea of a fountain was suggested for one of the interior patios, the ninth grade art class at the junior high school took it upon itself to design the fountain, Baker wrote. The class "launched into research on Spanish and Moorish fountains. Each pupil in the class designed a fountain and the tile to be used in it," he wrote. 

An artist-architect evaluated the individual designs and created an collaborative design. During the design process, students from several classes came together, including the mechanical drawing class and the wood shop class. Afterwards, students worked on the excavation of the ground and actually poured the concrete for the fountain.

"At the dedication exercises, when the president of the student body and representatives of the art class made the presentation to the Board of Education, everyone was fully aware that the pupils had, through this project, acquired a new, vested interest in the school. It was their school...," Baker wrote.

In fact, at that time, graduating high school classes often commissioned major artists to create a piece of art for the school for their annual class gift, Duncan said. 

The middle school, along with the South Pasadena Library and El Centro School (now the administrative building for the South Pasadena Unified School District), were designed and constructed by architect Norman Foote Marsh, who Duncan referred to as the "architect-laureate of South Pasadena."

"[Marsh] liked to hire well-known artists to decorate the buildings," Duncan said. "He considered himself a scholastic architect."

Marsh and his good friend George C. Bush, the Superintendent of South Pasadena's school district at the time, "were of one mind in the importance of art and architecture in creating an environment for learning," Duncan said.

The committee would love to have copies of family photos that include the Junior High/Middle School auditorium (interior or exterior). E-mail Lori Rusch at ruschville55@yahoo.com if you have any photos to share.

Additional Links

To learn more about artist Donal Hord, who lived most of his life in San Diego: 
http://www.sandiegohistory.org/hord/hord.htm

The estimated restoration cost for the Donal Hord sculpture is between $18,000 and $20,000. With about $7,000 in funds raised by the PTA and $8,000 from the National Trust, Rusch's committee is still fundraising to fill the gap. To make a donation for  preservation of the South Pasadena Middle School artwork, visit this link (scroll down to PTA Donation - Historic Art Restoration): 
http://www.spmspta.com/supportus.html

To read about the grant from the National Trust for Historic Preservation: 
http://www.preservationnation.org/about-us/regional-offices/western/los-angeles-preservation-fund/fourteen-projects-receive.html

Los Angeles Times article by about the Millard Sheets frescoes:
http://articles.latimes.com/2010/jun/05/local/la-me-then-20100605


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