Eastern’s Art Gallery recently received a donation of about 40 paintings created by a key figure in the art program’s history. Jan Akus, son of former art Professor and Department Chair Julian Akus, recently gifted his father’s artworks to Eastern’s permanent collection.

In January, Akus decided to honor his late father, who taught at Eastern for nearly 30 years until his passing in 1981. Due to his prolific impact on the culture of Eastern and Willimantic, Eastern’s former art gallery in Shafer Hall, the Akus Gallery, was named in his honor.

The paintings will be on display this March through the end of the school year in the first-floor hallway of the Fine Arts Instructional Center (FAIC), just outside the Art Gallery.

Akus explained that his father’s art, particularly in the late 1940s through the early 1960s, leaned on abstract expressionism, an art form he called “truly American.” He said that abstract expressionism “was kind of a cultural revolution … where abstract art and nonrepresentational art were kind of an expression of freedom.”

Viewers of the paintings can expect to see experimental artifacts of the mid-20^th century that pique their creativity. “It would be inspirational for them to see how that generation expressed itself and broke the traditional mold of art,” said Akus, the son.

Akus retired last year after a five-decade career as a physician. Citing having more “energy” in his retirement, he explained that he decided to donate the paintings after venturing into his attic and looking them over.

“He went up there, and it was like, ‘we should do something with these,’” said Akus’s wife, Sandra. “I think that was essentially the impetus, that he had time to actually think about it.”

Sandra met Akus at Eastern through his father, who introduced the two when Sandra was his student. The two will soon celebrate their 53^rd wedding anniversary.

Aside from making a lifelong match between his son and his student, Julian Akus encouraged his students to improvise in their art, a practice he employed in his own studio in downtown Willimantic. The younger Akus often accompanied his father to the studio.

“He seemed to get excited about using different media, like marble dust to build up texture,” he said. “He would get excited about experimenting and trying different things in terms of the actual painting.”

Akus continued: “That instilled in me, in my artistic endeavors, to try different things … improvisation and putting your thoughts on the canvas or whatever media is expressionistic.”