An Early Evening Tribute to Samuel Fleisher and His World of Art and Yarn, with Bill Brookover, Marie Elcin and Beth Kephart

Fleisher Art Memorial is a living memorial to the work of Samuel Fleisher, who created a place for the arts to flourish in South Philadelphia. By acquiring the former St. Martin’s College for Indigent Boys in 1916, Sam moved his successful Graphic Sketch Club to Catherine Street. The Graphic Sketch Club offered free art classes to the public, adults as well as children, in what Fleisher called “a playground for the soul.” He soon acquired the former Church of the Evangelist, a protestant sanctuary whose beauty had been created to encourage a spiritual connection with its congregation. Fleisher opened the former church building as a sanctuary, filled with art, oriental carpets, and fine furnishing reminiscent of Fleisher’s own home. The Sanctuary embodied Fleisher’s ideas of the healing power of art.

Brookover will present a brief slide show presenting the chronology of the Fleisher buildings on Catherine Street, putting Sam Fleisher’s ideas into the context of the building’s history. He will be joined by Beth Kephart, author of Tomorrow Will Bring Sunday’s News: A Philadelphia Story, a critically acclaimed new novel that features our city in the year 1918 and has at its heart the magnificent artful Fleisher Yarn factory that once stood at 26th and Reed. Kephart will speak to the impact that the Fleisher family’s generosity had during a critical year in the city’s history and will read passages from the novel that tell the tale of life inside the Fleisher factory. Kephart, a National Book Award finalist and former Philadelphia Inquirer features writer, is also the author of such Philadelphia-centric books as Flow: The Life and Times of Philadelphia’s Schuylkill River, Love: A Philadelphia Affair, and My Life in Paper: Adventures in Ephemera. More about Beth can be found at bethkephartbooks.com.

Marie Elcin, a fiber artist and art educator from Philadelphia, will share her insights regarding textiles in the arts. She has a BFA in 2D Fine Art from Moore College of Art and Design and a Masters of Art Education from Tyler School of Art, Temple University. She currently teaches printmaking and fiber arts at Fleisher Art Memorial and is an art teacher at a charter middle school in South Philadelphia.  Working in fibers keeps her connected to family and cultural traditions, and teaching art in schools and communities allows her to explore art and ideas in social contexts.