The Niagara Pumphouse Arts Centre has secured a $125,000 five-year commitment from Rainer Hummel and his family, money board chair Natalie Early says will expand the art centre’s programs, support artists and improve the spaces the centre shares with the public.
Early announced the gift Aug. 9 at a donor and volunteer appreciation reception at the Ricardo Street arts centre, where she also recognized a renewed $25,000 gift from lifetime members Geoffrey and Lorraine Joyner. That gift will fund monthly exhibitions in the centre’s main Joyner Gallery.
Early told the room the Pumphouse depends on that kind of support for everything it does, from exhibitions and classes to children’s camps and seniors’ programs.
“Quite simply, we couldn’t operate without you,” said Early.
The Hummel commitment has been recognized with a bronze plaque on the centre’s legacy wall. Hummel could not attend the reception, so the centre framed a rubbing of the plaque as a keepsake for the family.
Early also thanked Paul Bosc, whose gift paid for Vinifera, a public artwork by James Cameron Smith installed on the Pumphouse grounds.
The centre’s dependence extends past money, Early said, and she turned much of the afternoon toward the volunteers who keep its events going.
“Generosity isn’t measured only in dollars. Some of our most valuable gifts we receive are measured in hours,” she said.
She honoured Sandra Stokes, a former board chair who has co-ordinated Art at the Pumphouse for 12 years and helped build it into a juried show.
She also recognized Sandra Nass Misiak, who recently stepped down as exhibit chair for the Joyner Gallery, and Joanne Morandin, a past events chair and former board member.
Early thanked her predecessor as chair as well, a volunteer who led the board through 10 years of growth.
The reception took place inside FACE IT! Portraits of the Harvest, artist Nancy Wardle’s new exhibition of the people behind Niagara agriculture. The show remains in the Joyner Gallery until Aug. 29.
