Wealtha worked with oil, water, pastels, stone, and lithograph.
She graduated from the Philadelphia School of design in 1926.
She studied at Temple University, Wagner Institute of Science, and Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts and Graphic School.

Wealtha's lithographs have been accepted in national and international shows,
including the Art Institute of Chicago, Seattle Art Museum, World's fair in New York
and traveling shows taken from such exhibitions.

Wealtha supervised the National American Art Week in Oil city for 30 years.



>Her paintings and lithographs hang in a permanent collection at Philadelphia's Graphic.
Two of her lithographs are on display at the Drake Well Museum in Titusville and two at the Franklin Library.

As an art teacher she often said she wanted
to bring out what was in each of her pupils.
She usually accomodated 15-30 pupils.

Wealtha said:
"You must make youth use their imagination,
inspire them,
help them to become creative."


Students of Wealtha Barr Vann Ausdall:
• Brad Holmes
• Daniel S. Holmes
• Georgie Torrey Walker
• Jeanne Dennett
• Patricia Freeman
• Martha Small
• Ruth Ann Leitze
• Mary Lee Stoughton

I thought you might enjoy my memories. ...Georgie Walker This is an account as I remember of art lessons given by Wealtha Barr VanAusdale. My name is Georgie Torrey Walker. At the time I was 10 years old. The years 1935 -1936. Along with Jeanne Dennett, Patricia Freeman , Martha Small[], Ruth Ann Leitze , and Mary Lee Stoughton, we made our way to the two hundred block of West Third Street , where every Saturday morning from 10 AM till noon for 50 cents we would take art lessons. The first one up the steps had the fun of turning the large brass key that sounded a loud clanging door bell. Miss Wealtha would greet each of us as we passed through the door. At the time she would be 37 years old. A petite women, 5¹3" ³ or 5¹4² ,with straight black hair worn in a short bob. Her eyes were very, very dark brown. Her complexion was sallow. Very much the color of the ever present cigarette and cup of black coffee in her hand. She tended to wear dark , loose fitting clothing over which she wore a black cardigan- summer or winter. There was never a hint of make up. Her being resembled a blank slate,a study in black and brown. waiting for color to emerge. On the second floor of the house was the studio. A large room with 15 foot ceilings,bare wooden floors covered in layers of chalk dust , The south wall had three floor to ceiling windows, giving off an abundance of natural light. One corner was taken up with an enormous iron machine. There were all kinds of gears and a press. My guess is it was what she used to make lithographs. Piled one on top of the other was a number of large marble blocks she used for etchings or lithographs. Every Christmas we were each given a lithograph card done in sepia tones of a winter scene showing a horse and cutter. In the lower right hand corner would be the signature hand written in ink ³Wealtha Barr VanAusdale² We were all aware that we had received something very special, but at the time didn¹t fully appreciate the cards worth. The far end of the studio held three easels made of heavy carved mahogany or walnut. The easels were all of 6 feet tall . I don¹t remember how it was determined who would use the easels. Those not using an easel sketched with paper thumbtacked to a board set on a chair turned around backwards. Special paper is required for pastels. These sheets she sold to us for 10 cents a piece. All paper was to be revered , never wasted . ³Use both sides of your paper girls.² Charcoal paper was gray in color and had a rough finish. We mainly used charcoal for sketching. Our first lesson was that of a blue bud vase into which she had inserted a peacock feather. Right arms were extended, left eyes closed , the right thumb slid up the charcoal to what we precieved to be the height of the vase. We then marked the paper,the height three times and went on to do the same for the feather. We next sketched in the vase and feather with charcoal. An art gum eraser was used to correct mistakes. Erasing was a process we were discouraged from using often. Pastels were half the diameter of a pencil. They came from Germany. A half a dozen or so of mine have survived the years, but not any pictures. No two of us saw colors the same. Colors could be mixed , blended with our finger, new colors added as we learned about shadows and reflected light. Miss Wealtha would walk by our work and with a suggestion here and a line there would transform our weak attempts into a presentable study. As we got more proficient two more feathers were added until pretty soon there would be a silk or velvet drape added. Textures became important. One Saturday we were not concentrating like we should so she proceeded to wind up the big mahogany victrola.. We lined up facing each other and she proceeded to teach us the Virginia reel. Feet tapped the beat and we doe cee doed . This became one of our favorite breaks. We were also learning spontinuity and use of our larger muscles. On another Saturday when we came in our boards were covered in large sheets of news print Again the victrola was wound up. This time there was classical music , jigs and patriotic marches. We were encouraged to put the music on to the paper in big swoopinglines and swirls. To visualize sound. Could this be modern art ? One lesson was a still life of fruit . We were told to always use wax fruit because the starving artists would eat the real thing before we could paint it. Always paint from life. Study pictures but work from the real thing. She shared with us how as a young girl she could not go off to the big city alone , so her mother gave up her life to go to Philadelphia with her . Here her mother took care of her physical needs , Wealtha would spent twelve to eighteen hours a day learning to be an artist. During anatomy classes they couldn¹t use real cadavers so worked out a deal with a vet erinarian to get animals to disect . This gave them a chance to study the skeletal structure and more important the muscles; how they articulated.,,structure and movement. giving life to their drawings. ³Art is more then putting charcoal to paper.² One memorable Saturday morning we made our way down the stairs to the kitchen. Her tiny white haired mother stood stirring something on the stove. Her father was seated at a very large roll top desk doing paper work. He was an important third ward alderman. Miss Wealtha introduced us one by one as we stood there self consciously giggling . Her father stood up, all 6 foot 5 inches of him and said ³Hello girls². I thought him the tallest man in the world. Our surprise came in a box next to the stove. Inside was a mother tabby cat and five kittens. Their eyes not yet open. They had scarcely any hair and resembled little mice. I remember how we all talked in whispered tones, ³ oohing and awhing.² When they were a little older she brought them up to the studio for us to hold and to sketch. By now they were very active. She demonstrated how to quickly capture the movement . forget about detail. This was best left to the experts. Wealtha had written a story about a cat and her kittens. Not a Disney type story , but an adventure based on reality. When two publishing companies expressed interest in publishing the story but didn¹t want the illustrations she was crushed. Her pride would not allow her to sell it no matter how much they needed the money. As we advanced we brought in one of our dolls to paint. I brought in my Shirley Temple doll, complete with dimples and corkscrew curls. A lesson in patience was to be learned as we worked on the face, hands , the eyes. This took many weeks to complete. When all done Miss Wealtha praised our work, took out a brass bottle wit h a brass straw insert it into the bottle of fixative, blew into the straw coating the picture with a varnish that made the picture permanent. Lessons ended at a quarter to twelve. Our work would be critiqued , smocks hung on a peg at the back of the door, supplies put away ready for the next week. The next half hour was spent in the ³parlor¹². , We would all race to be one of three to sit on a horse-hair sautee. Whoever sat there would wriggle fingers to loosen a horse hair that had protruded and pass it around when Miss Wealtha wasn¹t looking. Her mother would bring in a tray on which was a china tea pot , real porcelain tea cups. and small white linen napkins. The tea was mixed much like a Japanese tea ceremony. The tea was always jasmine with a dried jasmine flower floating in the cup. As time went on and we learned the protocol we took turns ³pouring².There was a ginger jar with crystallized ginger to sweeten the tea. She told us how ginger had been found in tombs of the pharaohs and was still good. None of us ever sweetened our tea for fear it had come from a pyramid. During these secessions we learned about Leonardo Da Vinci. A really true genius who happened to be left handed. He kept his notes secret by writing backward in a code that scholars today are trying to decipher. He was a great mathematician who designed flying machines , weapons of war, machines way beyond the times. When he created a painting he would be bored with the mundane and would turn over the background to students to finish. There were stories of Mary Cassett born in Pittsburgh who became a well known women artist in France.; daring to succeed in a man¹s world. VanGogh was a favorite. A little mad, who cut off the tip of his ear and sent it in a box to a lady friend. His mastery of sunlight even impressed us as illustrations were passed around. There were antidotes about Michelangelo Buonarrote becoming so engrossed in his painting of the Sistine Chapel that he would spend days on his back on the scaffolding. His socks grew into the skin of his feet . Meals and supplies were sent up by pulley and waste was sent down. We saw illustrations of the dome , how it is laid out in the shape of the human brain with God in the middle breathing life into man. On and on she went; Monet, Edger Degas, Toulouse-Latrec who in spite of physical deformities became one of the great painters. Wealtha was a master story teller. We grew older and moved on to other interests. In 1950 Miss Wealtha was very ill.Her next door neighbor , Dr, George Magee diagnosed her with a ruptured appendix. He drove her to the Oil City Hospital where Dr. Summerville performed emergency surgery. With the help of penicillin grown in the hospital lab she made a full recovery. Jeanne Dennett was the one with the talent in our group and managed to keep in touch with Wealtha. I left Oil City returning in 1947 to get married. A young boy delivered a package wrapped in tan tissue paper. In it was a pressed glass candy dish with painted strawberries , a gold leaf wash around the rim. Inside was a small card on which was written ³Good Luck² Wealtha Barr VanAusdale. I never knew where she lived nor heard from her again. We never saw her working on any art projects of her own. She was a very good teacher with with a passion for art who was secure enough in her abilities to give the rudiments of art to six young girls that would last a life time and enrich their lives for ever.. Thank you Wealtha Barr VanAusdale.--GMW