Longtime Irwin art teacher enjoys camaraderie with students

Patricia Vaughn loves teaching others to paint.

“I really enjoy the people. It’s the camaraderie. It’s fun watching them grow, year after year” said Vaughn of North Huntingdon, who has been a teacher at the Norwin Art League since 1977.

Vaughn teaches classes three days a week in the cozy confines of the art league’s narrow storefront on Main Street in Irwin. The space is filled with paintings and trays of paint. Lots of paint.

Vaughn, who likes to work in oils, is an artist who found day jobs as a florist and as a courtroom sketch artist.

The good thing about taking art classes with Vaughn is the students don’t have to feel intimidated that they are not good enough to put brush to canvas.

“You don’t have to have any talent to take classes. So much of this is desire,” Vaughn said as she walked among her student painters, offering doses of advice and encouragement.

One of her new students is Janet Sullo, who has been making the drive from her home in Delmont to Irwin for a year.

“She’s really very good with her instruction. It’s really worth it,” to take her class, said Sullo, who did not paint much prior to taking the classes.

Other members of her advanced class have been taking instruction for 30 and 45 years.

Audrey Daniels of Irwin said Vaughn has an interesting approach to teaching painting.

“She helps with improving our strengths and what we need to work on,” Daniels said, adding that Vaughn teaches students how to handle their weaknesses.

“She really cares about everyone here,” Daniels said. “I was extremely happy to have found this. It’s offering more to the art students and the community. There’s nothing like this for miles around,” Daniels said.

One of her earliest pupils, Linda Rusnock, now president of the Norwin Art League, remembered being a student in Vaughn’s art classes in 1977 at age 16. She has continued taking her classes over the years.

“Now I help as her assistant. She is like a second mother to me,” Rusnock said.

For Vaughn, her teacher was Charles Pitcher, who taught art in Pittsburgh Public Schools and owned a gallery in Shadyside in the early 1970s.

Not only is the artist creating something when they paint but, Vaughn said, it can be therapeutic.

“It’s the cheapest therapy around. When you paint, it takes you somewhere else,” Vaughn said.

An octogenarian, Vaughn has slowed down her teaching but has no plans to put the paint brushes down just yet.

“I used to teach six classes over four days. Now I am down to three classes,” Vaughn said.

Art show

Students are creating artwork for the Norwin Art League’s 48th annual art exhibit on Oct. 3-5, which will be held in the new social hall at First Presbyterian Church, 617 Main St., Irwin. The exhibit will be open to the public from noon to 8 p.m. Oct. 3 and 4 and from noon to 5 p.m. Oct. 5. There is no entrance fee for those viewing the art show.

Moving the art show from its usual location at Redstone Highlands in North Huntingdon to the church in downtown Irwin will give them more space to exhibit artwork, Rusnock said.

Lynn Armbrust, longtime owner of the Greensburg Art Supply, will judge the exhibits.

“We are hoping to increase the artwork in the show as well as our foot traffic, with the location in downtown Irwin,” Rusnock said.