Ruthellen Pollan Scholarship Endowment

Coloring Outside the Lines:
A Brief Overview of the Ruthellen Pollan Scholarship Fund

Ruthellen Pollan was a prolific teacher, artist, gardener and program organizer in her adopted home of Blanding Utah where she served as both resident artist, art professor at the College of Eastern Utah and champion of her students’ works in clay, paper, canvass, straw, stone, metal and the creative spirit that she inspired in them.

Ms. Pollan was born in New York City in 1941. She attended the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn and earned her bachelor’s degree from Stony Brook University in New York. She earned her master’s degree from C. W. Post College and her MFA from Maryland Institute, College of Art, in Baltimore. Her creative expression found root first in her drawings and paintings, then through her teaching of multiple mediums across every age and geography she encountered in her breathless 63 years.

Ms. Pollan often remarked that for her, relocating to Bluff and then Blanding in 1990 was a “homecoming” and that she considered Southeastern Utah to be her adopted homeland. She celebrated her exuberance for nature through Monet's gardens in Giverny, France, the harbors of her native Long Island, and finally, the sweeping vistas of Bear's Ears, Moab, and Canyonlands.

She built a welcoming, one-of-a-kind home and surrounding gardens atop of the bluffs of North Blanding. Her backyard views were expansive on the scale she required to contain the grandeur of her landscapes, her bold vision of the art program she created on the San Juan campus, and the many students that she mentored.

Ruthellen's journey had no dead-ends or straight lines. Her friends, family, and fellow artists remember her as coloring outside the lines. The lines weren't rules or directions -- just someone else's version of a contour or a boundary. In that pioneering spirit, Ruthellen's family, friends and benefactors are joining with USU to support and celebrate her enduring connection to a rich regional heritage. Each year, one or two aspiring artists and visual communicators attending Blanding’s USU campus will receive her scholarship to continue their education along the lines of their choosing.