Milly working in her Saucon Valley studio while her parrot, Lola, looks on. Photo by Milly’s son, George Holton
The Museum will host a Dynamic Conversation titled “’Fearless Enthusiasms’: The Life and Art of the Remarkable Milly Johnstone” on Saturday, March 22, 2025, starting at 1 p.m. The program will begin with a presentation about Mildred “Milly” Johnstone (1900-1988), a pioneering fiber artist and wife of Bethlehem Steel director William H. Johnstone. Milly was a member of international artistic and intellectual circles and a decades-long spiritual seeker who practiced Zen Buddhism and the Japanese Tea Ceremony. Her needlepoints of the 1950s and 1960s are imaginative pieces based on her visits to Bethlehem Steel and her meticulous research into steelmaking, even as she challenged the corporate culture into which she married.
Carol Shiner Wilson, Ph.D., will give a slideshow and talk and then welcome Milly’s goddaughter Mira Nakashima, who will share memories of her close relationships with Johnstone.
Admission to the Museum and to the Dynamic Conversation is free, but seats are limited, so please rsvp now if you wish to attend.
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Mildred T. Johnstone (American, 1900-1988), Mrs. Ingot (Self Portrait), 1950s, wool and lurex thread, linen backing, plain weave, needlepoint. Allentown Art Museum: Gift of Margaret Balzer Cantieni, 2002 (2002.016.003)
The Dynamic Conversation will be preceded by a brief gallery talk beginning at 12:15 p.m. with the Museum’s associate curator Claire McRee focusing on Johnstone’s 1955 self-portrait Mrs. Ingot and a cape made for her by fiber artist Alice Kagawa Parrot. No rsvp necessary for this free gallery talk.
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Carol Shiner Wilson, Ph.D., is a recognized authority on the life and art of the remarkable Milly Johnstone. She has taught English, French, and Women’s Studies and served 16 years as Dean of the College for Academic Life, Muhlenberg College. Her academic honors include Phi Beta Kappa and awards from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the American Philosophical Society. She has published with Oxford University Press and the University of Pennsylvania Press. Many of her articles and presentations are close examinations of women’s needlework in literature within historical and cultural contexts, 1650 through the twentieth century. An avid reader, Carol serves as an evaluator of fiction and narrative nonfiction for the national Chautauqua Book Prize.
Mira Nakashima was born in Seattle, Washington, in 1942, but grew up in New Hope, Pennsylvania, where her father, George Nakashima, built his home and studio. She earned her Bachelor of Arts in Architectural Sciences and General Studies at Harvard University in 1963, and a Master of Architecture at Waseda University in Tokyo, Japan, in 1966. After raising a family in Pittsburgh, she returned to the Nakashima Studio in 1970 and apprenticed to her father until his passing in 1990, when she became creative director. Mira’s designs, named “Keisho” (“continuation” in Japanese), preserve the methods and techniques embraced by her father. She received a Gold Medal for Excellence in the Decorative Arts from the National Arts Club in New York in 2008, the Hazlett Lifetime Achievement in the Arts Award from the Governor of Pennsylvania in 2108, and the Eric M Wunsch Award for Excellence in the American Arts in 2020.