Art show to support church meal programs
Organizers hope the upcoming Community Dinner Art Show & Sale Gala will become an annual event.
The two-day show and sale, running from 7 to 10 p.m. Feb. 26 and from 12:30 to 4 p.m. Feb. 27 at Trinity Lutheran Church, 120 Sunset Drive, is a fundraiser for the five community meals put out by five Butler churches during the week.
Justine Brown, the manager of Katie’s Kitchen at St. Mark’s Evangelical Lutheran Church, 201 W. Jefferson St., said Feb. 26 is a ticketed event featuring music, light refreshments and wine from Anna Marie's Winery & Cafe in East Butler.
The theme for the event will be Mardi Gras.
The event will also feature a basket raffle as well as the sale of the works of local artist Jon Pugliese.
Brown said, “Jon will be there with all his art. He will be working on a painting at the event. ”
Pugliese in addition to being an artist is a volunteer for Katie’s Kitchen’s Thursday night dinners and a colleague of Brown when she was a family and consumer science teacher and he an art teacher at Butler High School.
“He has been volunteering at Katie’s Kitchen for several years and mentioned early into the COVID pandemic that he wanted to sell his art to benefit the community dinners,” said Brown.
Pugliese said he will have 35 pieces of his art for sale.
“It’s primarily acrylic on board,” said Pugliese. “They range from realism to expressionism to impressionistic landscape style.”
“It’s kind of my ‘pandemic show.’ When the pandemic hit, I could do a lot of painting without any problems,” he said.
“I’ve always been a painter, and Justine asked me if I’d like to share it,” he said. He said 30% of the proceeds from his art sales would go to the churches’ community meals.
Tickets are available from each church that serves a community meal. In addition to St. Mark’s, they are: First English Lutheran Church, 241 N. Main St.; All Saints Parish at St. Paul Roman Catholic Church, 128 N. McKean St.; Saint Andrews United Presbyterian Church, 201 E. Jefferson St.; and First Methodist Church, 200. E. North St.
On Feb. 27, said Brown, the event is free to the public from 12:30 to 4 p.m.
Brown said, “Part of the proceeds from the sale of the art will benefit the community dinners and all of the basket raffle sales.”
Mary Ann Swanson, one of the coordinators for the Monday community meals at First English Lutheran, said, “ This is the first time we’ve gotten together for a fundraiser. The five churches do meet occasionally to get ideas and see how things are going.”
Swanson said since the COVID-19 pandemic all of the meals are takeout only. She added First English had 95 people turn out for its last Monday meal.
Brown said, “All of the community dinners are takeout, and we serve about 100 meals a day times five churches. That’s 500 meals a week approximately depending on the weather and the week of the month.
“There is no sign-up, no registration, They just come to our doors and we hand them a hot meal,” said Brown.
“This is the first year we are doing this. I’m hoping we can make this a yearly event, adding more artists,” said Brown. "Each of these churches fund the community dinner on their own, the congregation really supported the community.“
She added, “There is a lot of food insecurity in Butler. This goes a long way to paying for the food that people need so desperately.”
Brown took over as manager of Katie’s Kitchen at St. Mark’s in November 2019. She said she was new to the community dinner, but the church had been doing serving the meal for close to 30 years.
Swanson said her church’s meal includes meat or a casserole, a vegetable, salad and fruit as well as bread and butter and milk or an orange drink.
“We try to use fresh things in what we serve,” said Swanson. “We make everything fresh.”
