A leader in the arts

Virginia Murdock was a local artist and an active member of the Logansport Art Association. After her death a memorial award was to be presented annually by the local Tri Kappa chapter. Marilou Chrisman was the first winner of the Virginia Murdock Memorial Award with her painting “Warf Scene No. 2.” Marilou and Virginia were painting partners and good friends.

Virginia Murdock was born in North Judson July 23, 1914, to George and Harriet Isabel Planck Mitchell. She had one sister, Georgia Jean.

All during her early life, Virginia was always interested in artistic pursuits. As a young woman, she focused her creative energies on writing poetry and sketching fashion designs. With all of her beautiful paintings and artwork, she had very few art lessons.

The first formal lessons that Virginia took were in a drafting class at Purdue University during World War II. Several years later Virginia worked with two Purdue art professors. These were not actually lessons, but painting with them as co-artists. The drafting class was the only actual formal training that she ever took. In reality, Virginia was a self-made creator of art from her own mind and ability.

Virginia married Sewell Murdock, April 4, 1942. They had one daughter, Harriet Rincon, who provided much of the information for this article.

Harriet wrote, “Virginia devoted a large part of her life to her painting during the 1950s and the first half of the 1960s. Her specialty seemed to be pastel portraits, particularly of children. If the children were quite young, she worked from photographs.” Harriet remembers being paid 25 cents an hour to pose for a full-length portrait. That painting was titled simply, “Harriet” and won a first premium ribbon in the fine arts professional division at the Indiana State Fair and later was exhibited at the Hoosier Salon show. The Cass County Historical Society has a portrait of Will Ball that Virginia painted.

Memorial Hospital was presented with a portrait titled, “Mother and Child.” This painting had won first prize in pastels at the Hoosier Salon Show of 1964. Virginia Hilderbrandt was the model for the mother in the picture. That painting cannot be located at the hospital at the present time. Between the years 1952 and 1965, she had 15 paintings accepted by and exhibited at the Hoosier Salon.

Shortly after Virginia Murdock’s death in 1966, the Logansport Art Association featured a Virginia Murdock Memorial Exhibit.

Mrs. Murdock was also interested in sketching and painting the stone quarry east of Logansport. She sat on her canvas stool with her easel for hours on end painting her landscapes.

Virginia was an active member of the Cass County Mental Health Association and Trinity Episcopal Church.

Virginia Mitchell Murdock died March 23, 1966.

• Richard B. Copeland is a Cass County historian and may be reached at ptnews@pharostribune.com. The material for this article came from Harriet Rincon, the Pharos-Tribune and the Cass County Art Association archives.

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