THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, May 19, 1996 TAG: 9605170242
SECTION: PORTSMOUTH CURRENTS PAGE: 10 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Cover Story
SOURCE: BY IDA KAY JORDAN, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 71 lines
Art is as natural to Jean McKenzie Oast as living and breathing.
``It's such a part of life,'' she says. ``It's nourishing to me. It's given me more than I could ever give back.''
Oast will receive the fourth annual Gladstone M. Hill Friend of the Arts Award this coming Saturday night, during the Seawall Art Show. She was nominated for it by Gladstone M. ``Stonie'' Hill and his wife, Dot.
``Jean is a continuous and dedicated student of the arts,'' the Hills wrote in their nomination. ``She faithfully supports the arts events, lectures, etc., of cultural groups by her presence as well as her purse.''
``I really was touched that they should nominate me,'' Oast says. ``To be in the company of people already selected is a real honor.''
Oast was part of the group that established the award in honor of Hill, a retired dentist who was the first recipient. It subsequently has gone to John Paul Hanbury, an architect who was instrumental in organizing the Portsmouth Museums and Fine Arts Commission, and to Alf and Ramona Mapp, who have been involved in many activities. Alf Mapp Jr. also has served as chairman of the Museums and Fine Arts Commission.
``For me it is not a question of should I be involved,'' Oast says. ``I should get no credit. I am doing exactly what I want to do.''
Her husband, she says, claims she goes to lectures like other people go to work.
``My mother and father loved pretty things, but they were not art collectors,'' she says. ``I first became really interested in art at Randolph-Macon Woman's College. The school has a wonderful art collection hanging on the walls, and seeing art every day sparked my interest.''
The experience also convinced her of the importance of having art available for young people.
Over the past 20 years, Oast has served several terms on the Museums and Fine Arts Commission, including the first commission appointed by City Council in 1972. She was chairman in 1990.
She is a board member of the Portsmouth Museums Foundation, the organization she helped start with William F. Spong, the chairman. She also worked with Spong to help raise $1.5 million for the Children's Museum and was a member of the committee appointed by the city to select an architect to build it.
``I am prouder of my contribution to the Children's Museum than of anything I've done.''
In fact, Oast was a member of the Junior Service League, which started the Children's Museum.
Her participation in the arts is not limited to Portsmouth.
She was a member of the first docent class at the Chrysler Museum in Norfolk, and for 18 years she took art objects into Portsmouth Public Schools classrooms to prepare students for field trips to the museum. She was the first person to chair the Chrysler Museum Advisory Commission, now the Chrysler Council.
She is a board member of the Norfolk Society of the Arts and of the Hermitage Foundation Aux-il-iary.
She was once quoted as saying, ``After my family and my church, I am most interested in the arts.''
An active member of Churchland Baptist Church, she has managed to combine church and art as researcher and author of a book on the famous Willet stained-glass windows in the church sanctuary.
Oast will receive the award Saturday night at An Affair for the Arts. The 7:30 p.m. party at the 1846 Courthouse galleries traditionally honors the award recipient and the artists who are showing in the outdoor art show.
KEYWORDS: PROFILE by CNB