Morgan honored by governor for efforts in arts advocacy

By LAUREN L. DILLARD

Of The News-Register

Sharon Morgan, a 1962 Linfield grad who moved back to McMinnville in retirement, has been honored by Gov. Ted Kulongoski for career achievement in art education and advocacy.

She was one of seven Oregonians singled out this year for Governor's Arts Awards, based on recommendations from the Oregon Arts Commission. In recognition, she was presented with an original piece by Lake Oswego artist Dianne Kornberg - a drawing from a series featuring patterns in seaweed.

Morgan didn't set her course in art until she left Linfield.

"When I was a junior, they said, 'Well, Sharon, you are going to have to declare a major,'" she recalled. So she picked comparative languages and literature.

But she went on to become executive director of Newport's Oregon Coast Council for the Arts. In that capacity, she created the Family Arts Agenda, recognized nationally as a model program.

"We wanted to do something that would really serve the community," Morgan said. And that eventually took the form of a pair of local centers for the arts.

She developed programs at those centers that were designed to involve children and parents of all backgrounds and income levels.

Believing art is for everyone, she put special emphasis on those from foster families.

Artists were trained to work with children effectively and to model appropriate behavior for parents," she said. As a result, "The artists of Newport were as much a part of the infrastructure as the fishermen."

During her career, Morgan also served as executive director for the Oregon Alliance for Arts Education in Salem, where she worked in tandem with the Oregon Arts Commission.

Its director, Christine D'Arcy, said, "I think Sharon Morgan is a powerful advocate for the power of the arts to change a child's life." She credited Morgan with viewing the arts in a very holistic and inclusive way.

That grows out of her most fundamental beliefs about art. "All of the arts help the brain understand patterns," she said, still advocating for the arts even though she officially entered retirement nearly eight months ago.

Morgan moved back to her college home of McMinnville to be closer to daughter Erin Bowman, the former owner of Mes Amies and Hopscotch Toys downtown, and her grandchildren. She said she had always wanted to make her home in a small college town.

In retirement, she figures, she also will have more time to pursue her own artistic outlets.

"I've mostly been a fabric collector," she said. "Part of my retirement plan is to deal with that stash of fabric."

No doubt it will also give her an opportunity to instill some of her long-held beliefs about art in her grandchildren.

"Arts education isn't about making people artists," Morgan said. She said it's about developing critical thinking skills and pattern-recognition in children, "working from a point of knowledge."

D'Arcy said it's that kind of thinking that led the commission and governor to honor Morgan in the first place.

"We need more people with Sharon Morgan's passion for arts education, to make sure that every Oregon child has quality arts in their school," she said.