The Arts Commission Celebrates Edith Franklin Youth Arts Fund Event

Eye On Art  |  06/14/2016

In celebration of The Arts Commission’s dedication to arts access for area youth and of one of Toledo’s strongest advocates for youth arts programming, it is with great pride that The Arts Commission presents the Edith Franklin Youth Arts Fund Event.

The evening event will take place at the University of Toledo Center for Visual Arts, 620 Art Museum Drive (adjacent to Toledo Museum of Art), on Thursday, July 7, 2016. The
event features an Open House Reception & Auction/Sale from 5:30-8:30pm, with an Exhibition Opening June 30, 2016.

Selected archival works by Edith will be sold, along with other local artists’ works donated in her honor. Event proceeds benefit the Edith Franklin Youth Arts Fund at the
Toledo Community Foundation.

Donations to the Edith Franklin Youth Arts Fund may be made at the event or mailed to The Arts Commission.

The Arts Commission expresses its appreciation to the following for their exceptional commitment to Edith's legacy and the Young Artists at Work program: The Family of Edith Franklin, Carlos, Brian Carpenter, the University of Toledo Center for Visual Arts, and Jane Randall.

About Edith Franklin:
Edith Franklin was is often cited locally as “Le Grande Dame of the Arts,” and “The Godmother of Ceramics.” Edith was instrumental in the establishment of the Toledo Potters’ Guild, first housed near the Toledo Museum of Art and later re-established at the Toledo Botanical Gardens where it remains today.

Edith took up the study of clay in the early-1940s, during World War II, while away at college at the Boston Museum of Fine Art. Back in Toledo in the early ‘50s, she worked with studio glass art movement innovator, Harvey Littleton and acclaimed local sculptor Jo Anne Cousino to found the Potter’s Guild, and later the Toledo Glass Guild and the now-defunct Toledo Paper Makers Guild.

In the early 1960s, Franklin was a member of the very first Studio Glass Workshop at the Toledo Museum of Art, along with Littleton, Tom McGlauchlin, and Dominic Labino. This class would go on to launch a world-wide arts movement in studio glass arts. She furthered her education throughout the 1970s at Bowling Green State University and the University of Toledo, later becoming a workshop instructor at both institutions.

In the late 1980s, Franklin was hired by Virginia Secor Stranahan to teach at her estate, which later became the 577 Foundation, where she continued to teach adult pottery classes for the next ten years. Her career is marked by numerous exhibitions and awards, including the first solo female exhibition at the Toledo Museum of Art in 1958, and a 1999 Lifetime Achievement Award from the Toledo Federation of Art Societies.

Ms. Franklin is an Honorary Trustee of the Arts Commission, and participated in the organization as a Board Member for a number of decades until her passing in 2012 at the age of 89.

In the final years of her life, Edith established the Youth Arts Fund at the Toledo Community Foundation, as she wishes her legacy be carried on to inspire, ensure, and make possible a bright future for young artists.