Anita Freund Morganstern
The Jewish Encyclopedia
of Western Pennsylvania
A project of the Rauh Jewish Archives at the Heinz History Center
Anita Freund (1906–2003) was born in Beaver, Pa., and grew up in Squirrel Hill. After graduating from Schenley High School, she spent eight years at the Carnegie Mellon University studying music, painting, sculpture, and architectural design. She was a contemporary of the painter Samuel Rosenberg and the designer and sculptor Irene Pasinski.
Soon after graduating in 1932, Freund opened a community art school in the basement of her family home at 1088 Shady Ave. in Squirrel Hill. It was called the Creative Art Classes. Her students were primarily children, although some adults are participated.
In early 1935, Freund spent several months at the Art Student League in New York, studying under the German expressionist painter Hans Hoffman and an American sculptor named John Papazien. At the next Associated Artists annual exhibit, in early 1936, she submitted an abstract sculpture made from mahogany called “Reeling Bison.” It was among the earliest examples of abstract sculpture exhibited by a local artist.
Throughout her career, Anita Freund Morganstern worked to increase accessibility to art. She was the Art Gallery Chair of the new Arts & Crafts Center of Pittsburgh from 1948-1950. She was public relations director of the Associated Artists of Pittsburgh from 1951 to 1954. In that role, she helped organize the “Everyman’s Art Show for Amateurs.” She brought a similar spirit to the early days of WQED-TV, producing the local show “You The Artist” from April through September 1954. She became the founding director of the Pittsburgh Plan for Art in 1955. The business made contemporary art more accessible and affordable locally by hosting exhibits and developing an innovative leasing program.
In 1988, Morganstern proposed Homage to the Teachers, an exhibit planned for the Jewish Community Center focusing on Samuel Rosenberg and Armando del Cimmuto, and their former students at the Irene Kaufmann Settlement Art School. The program never came to fruition during her lifetime, but in 2011, the American Jewish Museum at the Jewish Community Center hosted A Painter’s Legacy: The Students of Samuel Rosenberg, an exhibit with a similar theme.
Anita Freund married Richard R. Morganstern. They had a son, James Morganstern.
