Anita Freund Morganstern
The Jewish Encyclopedia
of Western Pennsylvania
A project of the Rauh Jewish Archives at the Heinz History Center
Anita Freund (1906–2003) was born in Beaver, Pa., and grew up in Squirrel Hill. After graduating from Schenley High School, she spent eight years at Carnegie Mellon University studying music, painting, sculpture and architectural design. She was a contemporary of the painter Samuel Rosenberg and the designer and sculptor Irene Pasinski.
Anita Freund married Richard R. Morganstern. They had a son, James Morganstern.
Throughout her career, Anite Freund Morganstern worked to increase accessibility to art. In 1955, she helped found the Pittsburgh Plan for Art, which displayed and circulated works of regional artists. Over the years, she also held positions with the Associated Artists of Pittsburgh, the Three Rivers Arts Festival, the Pittsburgh Center for the Arts, the Pittsburgh Society of Sculptors and the Pittsburgh Playhouse, and worked in public relations for WQED-TV.
In 1988, Morganstern proposed Homage to the Teachers, an exhibit focusing on Samuel Rosenberg and Armando del Cimmuto, and their former students at the Irene Kaufmann Settlement Art School. The program never came to fruition during her lifetime, but in 2011, the American Jewish Museum at the Jewish Community Center hosted A Painter’s Legacy: The Students of Samuel Rosenberg, an exhibit with a similar theme.
