[Congressional Record Volume 154, Number 5 (Tuesday, January 15, 2008)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E10]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        HONORING JOE ANN COUSINO

                                 ______
                                 

                           HON. MARCY KAPTUR

                                of ohio

                    in the house of representatives

                       Tuesday, January 15, 2008

  Ms. KAPTUR. Madam Speaker, I rise today to recognize Joe Ann Cousino 
of Toledo, Ohio.
  A newspaper once headlined, ``Name any art media, and chances are 
good that Mrs. Cousino has had experience in it.'' Joe Ann Cousino 
blessed Toledo with her artistic talents, beautifying the world she 
touched. Mrs. Cousino passed from this life Wednesday, December 19, 
2007 due to ailing health. She was one of the most eminent artists in 
the Toledo area for more than 50 years and a renowned sculptor. Mrs. 
Cousino's sculptures can be seen in public spaces, buildings, and 
private collections throughout northwest Ohio, in surrounding states, 
and as far away as Cairo and San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. Her 
figurative bronze pieces have won national acclaim and her work has 
appeared in more than 100 shows nationwide.
  Born Joe Ann Bux, she was the only child of Mr. and Mrs. George Carl 
Bux. She graduated from Scott High School in Toledo, Ohio and later the 
University of Toledo, where she majored in art and minored in English 
literature. To finance her education, she taught classes in mural 
painting and glass etching at Toledo's YMCA and YWCA. She was accepted 
to study at the prestigious Pratt Institute in New York, but chose to 
stay in Toledo with her fiance, Wayne Kenneth Cousino.
  Among her most visible sculpture projects are the 6-foot-tall ``Woman 
with the Birds'' at Toledo Botanical Garden, the 7-foot bronze Outreach 
of a ``Woman and a Dove'' at the University of Toledo Medical Center, 
the former Medical College of Ohio, and the 6-foot, 3-inch ``St. 
Clare'' at the Franciscan convent's gardens in Tiffin. ``She has been 
such a prominent figure in the Toledo art world, and a lot of that has 
to do with so many of her pieces being public art,'' said Greg Jones, 
former director of the School of Art and Design at the Toledo Museum of 
Art.
  Mrs. Cousino was a founding member and later a president of the 
Toledo Potters' Guild. She focused on sculpture but her work included 
interior decoration, fashion design, jewelry, ceramics, painting, and 
architecture. In the early 1950s she designed her family's Ottawa Hills 
home. Mrs. Cousino traveled the world to research art and cultures, 
going as far as a village in Egypt in search of tapestries made by 
Bedouin children.
  In March 2007 Mrs. Cousino presented her last major sculptural work 
in Bowling Green, Ohio: a stoneware bust of local silent film star 
Lillian Gish. It was a capstone achievement to a distinguished 
professional career that began to take shape in the late 1940s. Through 
the years she became known for her industrious work ethic, indomitable 
spirit, and outspoken nature--traits which availed her rise to 
prominence during the 1950s in what was then a largely male-dominated 
sculpture field. ``She was like a dynamo,'' said Tracey Ladd, one of 
Mrs. Cousino's art instructor colleagues. ``There just weren't a lot of 
female sculptors [in the 1950s], and she had to struggle a bit to make 
her artwork.''

  The Toledo Blade interviewed Mrs. Cousino in 2000, providing a 
glimpse of her persona in which she explained her approach to 
instructing students. ``I'm fussy. I'm a taskmaster, and for myself 
too,'' she said. ``People run all over artists. You learn. I learned 
the hard way. I sometimes get on the case of these young artists 
because they just get abused.''
  She taught sculpture for most of her life, and until a few months ago 
gave private lessons from home while teaching adult continuing 
education classes at the Toledo Museum of Art. ``She had the ability to 
teach them exactly what they need to sculpt a human figure, and to do 
that out of a lump of clay is very, very difficult,'' Mr. Jones said.
  The Toledo community deeply will miss the loss of this artistic 
treasure. Her talent and the generous nature of her public work remain 
irreplaceable. The Toledo community will remember her courage, skill, 
and spirit every time they pass by and view her momentous and beautiful 
creations.

                          ____________________