BETHLEHEM, Pa. — The founder of ArtsQuest will be awarded the Linny Awards' Lifetime Achievement Award at a ceremony in November, it has been announced.
Also honored at the 2024 Linny Awards ceremony will be an Air Products executive who dedicates her time to helping nonprofit organizations in the Lehigh Valley, and a cable TV company that supports Lehigh Valley activities.
Former ArtsQuest President Jeffrey A. Parks will be honored for his pioneering work using arts strategies for community and economic development in founding Musikfest and ArtsQuest.
Also honored will be Air Products Corporate and Community Relations Director Laurie Hackett with the Philanthropy in the Arts Award, and Service Electric Cable TV with the Business Supporter of the Arts Award.
The Linny Awards, presented to individuals from the region for longtime commitment and dedication to the arts, will be at 6 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 7, in Musikfest Cafe at ArtsQuest Center at SteelStacks.
“The Linny Awards is an opportunity to pause and celebrate those who make a difference in our community through the arts and education."ArtsQuest Foundation Executive Director Selena Lavonier
It will be preceded by a cocktail hour featuring live music at 5 p.m.
Tickets, which include dinner, cocktails, hors d’oeuvres, and live music, are $250 and available at www.SteelStacks.org. Proceeds benefit the nonprofit ArtsQuest Foundation, which supports Musikfest and other ArtsQuest programs.
The Linny Awards are named after the late Marlene "Linny" Fowler, a stained-glass artist and community leader who supported artists and arts organizations throughout the Lehigh Valley for more than a quarter century and founded the ArtsQuest Foundation in 2003.
The awards are designed to recognize and celebrate the region’s arts community.
“The Linny Awards is an opportunity to pause and celebrate those who make a difference in our community through the arts and education,” ArtsQuest Foundation Executive Director Selena Lavonier said.
“The gala is an evening filled with artwork, performances, inspirational stories, food, drink and more."
Pioneer of arts as development
Parks, of Bethlehem, was an attorney when, to help his community deal with the ravages of deindustrialization, he conceived of a free music festival, Musikfest, as a vehicle to sustain Bethlehem’s downtown.
Under Parks' leadership, the festival grew into the nonprofit agency ArtsQuest, and Musikfest became the largest non-gated music festival in the country.
Under Parks, ArtsQuest also established the Banana Factory Arts Center in 1998 and in 2011 opened the 10-acre SteelStacks Arts and Culture Campus, a $90 million project at the base of the former Bethlehem Steel blast furnaces.
Parks retired from ArtsQuest in 2015 but remains an advocate for arts in community development. He was chairman of the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts from 2016-24.
Hackett, of Bethlehem, is a volunteer and board member with many Lehigh Valley-based nonprofit organizations. In her role at Air Products and with the Air Products Foundation, she champions the communities they serve.
She hosts an NPR radio podcast on radio station WDIY-FM focused on the work of Lehigh Valley nonprofit leaders.
She's also vice chairwoman of the boards of Miller-Keystone Blood Center, Century Promise, and the Greater Lehigh Valley Chamber of Commerce.
She's an active board member of the Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival, Valley Youth House, Greater Easton Development Partnership, United Way, and other nonprofit organizations.
As the first solo chair of the 2022 United Way campaign, she raised a then-record $19.7 million for the Lehigh Valley community.
She has also received the United Way Betsy Torrence Philanthropist of the Year Award, Chamber Athena Award and Girl Scouts Take the Lead Honor.
Service Electric Cable TV & Communications, based in Bethlehem, is a third-generation family-owned communications company founded in 1948.
SECTV crews work on location for high school football, Musikfest concerts, college basketball, Halloween parades, charity golf tournaments and professional hockey and Trible-A baseball.
Other recipients
Other Linny Award recipients are:
Visual Artist of the Year — Anthony Smith Jr. of Allentown
Performing Artist of the Year — Dina Hall of Bethlehem
Emerging Artist of the Year — Lilly Moss of Bethlehem
Arts Educator of the Year — Daniel Zettlemoyer of Bethlehem
Student Artist Scholarship — Sammy Wendland of Easton
Volunteer of the Year — Roger and Dawn Cressman of Bethlehem
Winners for this year’s award ceremony were selected by the ArtsQuest Foundation Board of Trustees, the ArtsQuest Board of Trustees, the ArtsQuest Performing Arts Board and Visual Arts Board.
The Linny’s are open to people living or working in Lehigh, Northampton, Upper Bucks and Upper Montgomery counties in Pennsylvania, and Warren County in New Jersey.
