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Claflin University (SC Delaware State University
From RUFFLES® to restoration
University of Delaware restores treasured Jimmie Mosely painting
A new / old painting now hangs outside the secondfloor office of the dean of the School of Education, Social Sciences and the Arts in Hazel Hall.
“New” in the sense it was placed there this summer -- for first the time -- after a three-year restoration slowed by the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Old” in that the oil-on-canvas painting is an original work by Jimmie Mosely Sr., the late faculty member after whom the campus art gallery in the Thomas & Briggs Arts and Technology Center is named.
“Korean War Scene,” painted in 1953, depicts a wounded American soldier being carried to safety by what appears to be Korean peasants. Mosely’s work was inspired by a black-and-white photo taken by the late David Douglas Duncan that is housed at the University of Texas.
Duncan’s pictures were widely published in American print media because they captured the horrors of the conflict the Korean peninsula was experiencing just a decade following World War II.
Mosely’s 41-by-59 inch piece was stored in an archive room when a torrential rainstorm rolled across the lower Eastern Shore in mid-May 2018. The storm dumped nearly three inches of rain on Princess Anne, exposing an aging roof that subsequently allowed water to leak in.
The following day, Mosely gallery Director Susan Holt discovered “extensive water damage,” and sprang into action by “calling museum contacts.”
That led to the University of Delaware, which takes on such projects to give hands-on experience to students training to be art conservators.
Restoration was overseen by Dr. Joyce Hill Stoner, director of the university’s Preservation Studies Doctoral Program. The flaked paint – Stoner described as the “potato chip” effect – was typical of water damage. The Mosely painting took a painstaking 229 hours to restore, including 28 hours in a special humidity chamber, consolidating the raised “potato chip” curls, which took 65 hours, and another 60 hours of paint retouching.
Storer said Delaware has an interest in helping preserve and restore works by Black artists and is looking to recruit students of color to help diversify the profession. In addition to a humanities background, graduate students need to have a grasp of chemistry, too.
The conservators did not charge for the work. By this past March, restoration was complete.
Holt received a 15-page report with “detailed color photos.”
“The UDel program is one of the best in the country,” Holt said. “We were so lucky.”
Marshall Stevenson, a historian and dean of the School of Education, Social Sciences and the Arts, said the Mosley painting resonated with him for several reasons; it reflects the creativity of a talented artist who captured an image from the Cold War’s early days that justified preservation.
The original black and white image that inspired this painting is in the archives of the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin.
By Jamie Handy, PGATOUR.COM
Broken home. Low income. High crime in the neighborhood.
DeAndre Diggs grew up in Baltimore and was faced with these harsh realities from an early age. Many families and kids could relate to the challenges of overcoming financial hardships and crime-ridden neighborhoods.
When things seemed as though they couldn’t get harder, Diggs’ home was broken into. His family had to rebuild all that had been taken, which was not a lot to begin with.
“My story is similar to others in Baltimore,” said Diggs, a UMES senior, “but my family made sacrifices. At the end of the day, it’s not where you were born, but how you were raised.”
Just as hope began to be restored, a fire destroyed their family home.
“We lost everything – twice,” Diggs said. “My family was poor, going further into debt and … still tried to keep me in private school. It just kept pushing us further back.”
Although he and his family felt like they were in a dark tunnel with no light, Diggs always kept pushing forward to “see something.”
While he may not have realized it then, that light he saw at the end of the tunnel was Caves Valley Golf Club.
Caves Valley is where Diggs took his first job, and the club has rallied around him and his story ever since.
Diggs had been part of the First Tee – Baltimore since age eight, his first exposure to golf, and Caves Valley helped to stir his passion for the sport.
He set his sights on higher education, driving himself to do his best in the classroom as well as learn as much as possible from leaders at Caves Valley. He started to chip away at the college application process. He worried about the cost of higher education and exploring financial aid and student loan options. To Diggs’ surprise, he learned he had been selected as the recipient of a $100,000 scholarship from the Caves Valley Golf Club Foundation. Diggs continued to work hard and enrolled at the University of Maryland Eastern Shore, the only HBCU that has a professional golf management program. “I found there to be a lot of students with similar stories to mine, but at the same time, embraced that we all are unique,” Diggs said.
UMES golf management students must complete 16 months of internships as a graduation requirement. His first internship was at Caves Valley. The second was at The Broadmoor in Colorado Springs. He then became an assistant intern at Congressional Country Club working in the pro shop, serving as a marshal and overseeing the employees in the cart barn and driving range.
Eager for more golf experience, Diggs decided to work at Arundel Golf Park in Glen Burnie, where he helped increase sales 20-30 percent, despite the pandemic.
Currently, Diggs works at Cherokee Town and Country Club in Atlanta as an intern in food and beverage, where he continues to pave his way toward a career as a general manager at a club.
Though Diggs’ story started similarly to those growing up in the tough neighborhoods of Baltimore, he’s determined to make sure it inspires others in the end.
This article is excerpted from a version published on the PGATour.com website and is reproduced here with that organization’s permission.
