Evelyn E. Schultz, Prolific Artist, 73
DGH
Evelyn Schultz, of Elmhurst, Illinois, died Thursday, April 21, 2005,
in Alexian Brothers Medical Center, Elk Grove Village, Illinois, after
a brief illness, at the age of 73.
Evelyn Ecale Schultz, a prominent local artist who started her painting
career after raising seven children, was a passionate mentor and leader
in the west suburban art community.
Mrs. Schultz was an all-media artist in realistic and abstract genres
who specialized in watercolors and had permanent collections at the
Neville Public Museum in Green Bay, Wisconsin, the Elmhurst Art Museum,
the Beverly Arts Center in Chicago, Illinois, and the Drury Lane
Theatre in Oakbrook Terrace, Illinois. She also presented one-person
exhibitions at more than a dozen places, including Navy Pier, Loyola
University Medical Center and Hinsdale [Illinois] Public Library and
participated in 11 outdoor art fairs.
Mrs. Schultz was a longtime advocate for the arts in the western
suburbs. She was president of the Elmhurst Artist Guild for six years
and a driving force behind construction of the Elmhurst Art Museum, for
which she was secretary of the board. In addition, she was vice
president of the Senior Art Network in Chicago.
Her family and friends remembered that, apart from being a talented and
prolific artist, Mrs. Schultz took great joy in helping other artists,
particularly those who, like herself, had placed their art on hold
while tending to other responsibilities.
"She just had a giving nature, and that's probably why she loved the
arts," said her daughter Karen Rantis. "She loved that personal
connection. She loved meeting other artists."
Bruce Peterson, a friend and artist from Elmhurst, said, "She
encouraged a lot of people and she helped a lot of people. She taught
them to see things in a different way."
Born on the North Side of Chicago, Mrs. Schultz graduated from Lake
View High School and studied art education and advertising at the
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Illinois, where she met her
future husband, Robert Schultz, an aspiring architect.
They married in 1955 and moved to Elmhurst shortly afterward.
Mrs. Schultz and her family remained on the same block in Elmhurst for
the rest of her life, moving into her parents' home across the street
in the early 1970s after they died. She started painting in 1992, at
age 60. Once she returned to painting, she pursued it vigorously,
friends and relatives said.
"She really kind of painted anything she could get her hands on,"
Rantis said, chuckling. That included mailboxes and windows. She even
decorated the envelopes of holiday cards she sent to friends and
family.
Mrs. Schultz's work was recognized locally and nationally. She
routinely won Best of Show awards at local competitions and had
achieved signature status membership in 12 national art societies.
In her artist's statement, Mrs. Schultz wrote that her art "is more
about what I feel than what I see. I usually create paintings that are
more abstract and non-objective than realistic, although I work in a
variety of genre."
She noted that "past experiences, historic events and people and places
that have influenced my life work their way into my art in the
imagery."
"Evelyn had the heart of an artist," said Elmhurst artist Karen Exiner,
a friend and muralist who shared a studio with Mrs. Schultz for six
years. "She was a true artist. She was always willing to try a new
medium. She was always experimenting."
In addition to her husband and daughter, Mrs. Schultz is survived by
two other daughters, Robin Brower and Jennifer Kaiser; four sons,
Kenneth, Erik, Steven and Jason; a brother, Henry Ecale; a sister,
Margaret Campbell; and eight grandchildren.
Chicago Tribune