In her 80s, Mary Nagan saw creativity reach full bloom

After Mary Nagan raised her large family, she began to paint and make pots, exploring art with a passion that impressed family members and fellow artists alike.

Nagan, who earned a bachelor of fine arts degree at the University of Minnesota at the age of 82, died of cancer on Oct. 15 at her home in Minneapolis. She was 90.

She said of her art degree in the Star Tribune on May 15, 2000, "It's a kind of personal fulfillment."

After graduating from Central High School in Minneapolis, Nagan attended the university briefly in 1936, but finances prevented her from continuing.

The war came along and she married, raising a family of nine kids. Another child died in infancy.

When her children were grown, she took art classes and eventually returned to college to earn a degree.

After she and her husband had retired to Outing, Minn., she made a two-day, 300-mile round-trip journey to take classes at the university, spending the night at one of her children's houses.

"She was active, engaged and passionate to the very end," said her granddaughter. "She was always trying new things."

Her university education inspired her to try new media, such as welded metal sculpture and printmaking, while improving her ceramic skills.

Nagan's ceramic birdhouses drip with glaze and color. She dyed her own fabrics for quiltmaking. And many of her family members display her steel masks, brightly enameled interpretations of tribal masks.

Curtis Hoard of St. Paul, retired professor of art at the university, said she was particularly passionate about ceramics.

"She had a nice feel for the material and a very good eye," said Hoard. "She had a very personal touch, definitely putting her stamp on the work."

"She had an exuberance, a glow about her," he said. "She really brightened up the room when she walked into it."

For years, her pots were sold in Crosby. With a grandchild, she started an Internet business two years ago. Mary Jane's Handmade makes and sells aprons, based on vintage patterns.

Four years ago, she returned to Minneapolis. Weekly, she patrolled her northeast neighborhood with a watch group, helping keep the area safe and clean.

Her husband, William, died in 1993. An infant son, James, died in the early 1950s and another son, Thomas, died in 1995.

She is survived by five sons, Denis of Minneapolis, John of Maple Grove, Timothy of Columbia Heights, Joseph of Healdsburg, Calif., and Matthew of Petaluma, Calif.; three daughters, Margaret McInerny of Minneapolis, Rita Nagan of Golden Valley and Emily Nagan of Minneapolis; a sister, Kate Woods of Minneapolis; a brother, William Farley of Minnetonka, 28 grandchildren and 10 great-grandchildren.