Ann Allen Morgan

Ann Allen Morgan, 90, daughter of the late Lewis Houston Allen and Catherine Jones Allen, died peacefully on July 4, 2024, surrounded by loved ones. Ann grew up in Memphis, Tennessee. A 1952 graduate of Messick High School, she attended Memphis State University (now the University of Memphis), and after completing her Master of Fine Arts degree in painting at the University of Georgia in Athens, she taught in the Art Department at LaGrange College for three years. She then returned to Athens to pursue a second Master’s degree in education and counseling and subsequently served as a counselor and teacher to students at various schools in the Athens area for several years until she retired to pursue her art practice. 

Annie, as she was known by her friends, was a talented and accomplished visual artist, and she continued to draw right up until the very end of her life. Besides drawing, in pencil or with pastels, she worked in printmaking and painting as well as jewelry casting. Along with her artist husband, Charley Morgan, she helped to inspire many students during Charley’s 38 years as an art professor at the University of Georgia. Together, he and Annie shared their sense of appreciation and wonder at what art and its practices, as well as travel abroad, could mean and do with hundreds of students participating in UGA’s Art Program in Cortona, Italy, in which the couple participated almost annually until Charley’s death in 2014.

Like her gentle husband, Annie Morgan lived with a deep awareness and appreciation for the simple and most meaningful elements of our daily lives. By their living example they inspired numerous colleagues, students, and friends to view the world with open and alert eyes. Each had their own distinct vision and voice, but together they shared an affinity for the intimate—for the people, animals, places, and things that are right before us, and whose rhythms sustain us on a daily basis. Their artworks renew us with quiet strength, but their lives also were full of humor and laughter. Annie had strong opinions about many things—especially the Atlanta Braves—and was a generous and kind friend to all who knew her. Just a few days before her death, a friend gave her a pink rhinestone-encrusted crown and glittery sash that said, in big letters, “90 & Fabulous!” As she told her friend, with a glint in her eye, “Well. I’ll wear the sash, but not the crown. I’ll wear the crown next year.” 

Annie is survived by her sisters, Dorothy “Dot” Williams (Grady) of Nashville, Tennessee, and Carolyn Seaver of Wilmington, Delaware, as well as many nieces and nephews; she also treasured her relationship with beloved long-time friends Scott and Suzy of Athens. Ann’s other sister, Jane Sharpe Carl, of Memphis, Tennessee, died only hours before Annie did, also on July 4th. A celebration of Annie’s life will be held at her home in the Spring of 2025 for her family and close friends. In lieu of flowers, the family suggests donating in Annie’s name to the UGA Foundation for the “Charles and Ann Morgan Cortona Scholarship Fund”(75080003) . Online donations can be made directly at:https://gail.uga.edu.commit? Search75080003.

Lord & Stephens Funeral Home, EAST, Athens is entrusted with arrangements. www.lordandstephens.com.