A Cel­e­bra­tion of the Arts in Sup­port of Stu­dent Scholarships

BY CATHY ANDERSON

Wes­ley Dess­esow (far left) sings to the guests gath­ered at “Arts in the Parlor.”

The Wes­ley Col­lege Board of Trustees with Wes­ley Pres­i­dent Bill John­ston and his wife Susan hosted an ele­gant evening affair on Sat­ur­day, April 10 to raise funds for Wes­ley Col­lege schol­ar­ships and pay trib­ute to departed friend and long-time trustee Dr. Joseph S. Bellmeyer. Over 80 guests, includ­ing com­mu­nity lead­ers, alumni and friends of the Col­lege, enjoyed the first ever “Arts in the Par­lor” at the president’s beau­ti­ful his­toric home, the Annie Jump Can­non House.

Mike Sandy and David Laganella

Atten­dees enjoyed a unique event high­lighted by per­for­mances and dis­plays from tal­ented musi­cians and visual artists from the Col­lege and the sur­round­ing com­mu­nity. Harpist and fac­ulty mem­ber Mike Nielsen played beau­ti­ful music as guests first arrived, and a cap­ti­vat­ing mono­logue was deliv­ered by Jeff Mask, pro­fes­sor of reli­gion, phi­los­o­phy and Amer­i­can stud­ies. Dur­ing the course of the evening, musi­cians per­formed in dif­fer­ent rooms through­out the house. Pieces included piano selec­tions by Jonathan Emmons, instruc­tor of music and direc­tor of choirs and Col­lege organ­ist, and sev­eral stir­ring gui­tar duets by Asso­ciate Pro­fes­sor of Music David Laganella and tal­ented Wes­ley stu­dents Nick Han­cock and Mike Sandy. Two soloists, staff mem­ber Amy Kellen ’08 and fresh­man Wes­ley Dess­esow, and a quar­tet of Emmons, Kellen, Dess­esow and Advance­ment staff mem­ber Jen­nifer Telles ’09 enter­tained guests with enchant­ing vocal performances.

Jeff Mask, Ivey Mask, Mike Nielsen and Joseph Mullan

Through­out the Can­non House, visual art was exhib­ited by Debra Stelling, a noted Delaware Val­ley artist. Pho­tog­ra­pher and Wes­ley instruc­tor Joseph Mul­lan shared his tal­ents through the dis­play of three black and white pho­tographs, and Con­nie Imbo­den exhib­ited her unique pho­tog­ra­phy. And to the delight of every­one, Susan John­ston pre­sented sev­eral of her orig­i­nal water­col­ors through­out her home.

“Arts in the Par­lor” also pro­vided a cre­ative din­ing expe­ri­ence. The menu fea­tured deli­cious tapas, com­mon to Span­ish cui­sine, which Chef Pete Buon­cris­tiano was on hand to describe. The serv­ing of tapas allowed every­one to eat, min­gle and enjoy the artists through­out the house at the same time. Ann Horsey served as the “wine artist,” inform­ing guests about the var­i­ous wines offered with din­ner. The food was gen­er­ously donated by Ara­mark Cor­po­ra­tion, who pro­vides food ser­vices for Wes­ley College.

Wes­ley Soci­ety Pres­i­dent Bill Strick­land addresses the crowd.

Dur­ing the evening’s pro­gram, Pres­i­dent and Mrs. John­ston and Board of Trustee Chair Charles “Chip” Dashiell, Jr. each thanked atten­dees for their friend­ship and col­lab­o­ra­tions with the Col­lege. They shared that “Arts in the Par­lor” was designed as a spe­cial occa­sion to bring indi­vid­u­als closer to Wes­ley and embrace com­mu­nity involve­ment, while also cel­e­brat­ing the arts. Bill Strick­land, trustee and pres­i­dent of the Wes­ley Soci­ety, elo­quently expressed why Wes­ley, with its promi­nent social and eco­nomic pres­ence in the area and mis­sion in edu­cat­ing tomorrow’s lead­ers, is so deserv­ing of sup­port. He asked guests to con­sider join­ing the newly formed Wes­ley Soci­ety, which rec­og­nizes indi­vid­u­als and orga­ni­za­tions com­mit­ted as part­ners with Wes­ley through finan­cial gifts of $1,000 or more annu­ally. There are cur­rently 119 char­ter mem­bers of the Wes­ley Society.

Due to the com­bined gen­eros­ity of Ara­mark and sev­eral other busi­nesses and indi­vid­u­als, 100 per­cent of the pro­ceeds pro­vided needed schol­ar­ship funds, and each guest’s ticket price was fully tax-deductible. Given the suc­cess of this year’s “Arts in the Par­lor,” there are plans to con­tinue this as an annual fundrais­ing func­tion to increase sup­port for stu­dents attend­ing Wes­ley Col­lege and show­case the artis­tic tal­ent within the Col­lege com­mu­nity and beyond.