Help Pegasus Art Gallery Survive & Thrive!

My name is Paige Shumway and I am the owner of Pegasus Frame Studio & Gallery in Corvallis, Oregon. Many of you know Pegasus as a nearly 40 year old family owned small business in the heartbeat of Downtown Corvallis, Oregon. Our business has been closed since statewide social distancing orders in March, and although we will begin a slow reopening in the weeks to come COVID-19 has put Pegasus Art Gallery’s future in profound jeopardy. Our lease runs out this summer, and we are seriously behind in rent. We cannot ask Ted and Veronica Cox (the owners of the iconic downtown business The Old World Deli, where Pegasus has always rented its space) to risk their own business while we struggle to save ours. It is incredibly awkward to ask for your help, especially when things are so difficult for so many. We must turn to you now though, despite our wish to continue to try to resolve the problems ourselves. We have not yet qualified for any Coronavirus Small Business Support or funds, and the outlook on that front is not looking hopeful. Thursday’s appointment with the bankers was another bust. We will continue to try all routes, apply for all support processes, and work, work no matter what. Our business rents are past due. We are negotiating with our venders, insurances, and utilities. We intend to resolve everything with everyone somehow. We are an honorable tribe. Pegasus Gallery is an elastic business concept with Art, Hope and Transformation at its core, so we will move forward with that! This business belongs to this community as much as it belongs to us. We would hate to lose it and have said nothing. It is with that in mind, we turn to all of you for your help.

Pegasus was founded in 1981 by community patriarch Jim Howland. Along with co-founding CH2MHill and blazing a humble trail of supports for the community he believed in through the Arts and the Arts Center, The Howland Open and the Riverfront Project to name an obvious few. Jim started Pegasus Frame Studio & Gallery in the Old World Center Building as a business endeavor to be of service, support and connection to the people, the experiences, the traditions and the history of this creative community and their for-profit, non-profit and not-always-profitable but worthwhile adventures. This business was Jim Howland’s personal gift-in-practice to this place he lived and believed in.
I stand humbly in the footprints of Jim and his troop of brave apprentices – the dynamic Dorothy Matthews, my amazing father Bill Shumway, the talented and steadfast Shelly Willis, and their teams of co-workers, family, artists and friends of which many of you know I mean You!
When Jim Howland joined Ted Cox and opened Pegasus Art Gallery, they shared similar moral, adventurous business ideas and entrepreneurial spirits about the importance of history and community. The people and their businesses that have shared their journeys with us here is amazing – Kent Buys with Troubadour Music and the Old World Center building’s original “OG”, Dave Wills with Oregon Trail Brewery, Jim, Sue and Errol Noel with The Toy Factory, Tom Alexander with Growing Edge Magazine, Don Ferguson with Shadowsmith Photographic, Laurie Zink with Kaleidoscope Beads & Treasures, Susan Stogsdill with Cyrano’s Bookbinding, Deb Perry-Guetti with Azure Gallery and now JP Valot and his family with Valcan Cellars Wine Tasting Room. Soon too, the new neighbor, the Benton County Historical Society's Corvallis Museum. Pegasus has spent almost 40 years taking care of the art, memories, and precious things for people in the valley and around the world, and holding space with the artists and the amazing efforts to create and record they have made, exhibiting, learning and teaching with them and holding them up and celebrating them. Celebrating, collaborating, inventing, and grieving together with grandparents, parents, kids and you. This business has found a way to be of service and use wherever it was needed over the decades.
Jim believed in Ted Cox. Years later, when our family was met with repeated medical hardships, Ted Cox, in turn, believed in me. As a landlord, he was pushed to the edge working with me over the past four years. Our family would never have made it through the health challenges and the ongoing fears to this point if it had not been for the unbelievable support of the loving people in this valley (you Know who You are …and our perseverance is dedicated to You!) and to Ted’s unending patience.
We want to keep Pegasus Frame Studio & Gallery available to continue to be in service, support and connection to the people and artists in this beautiful place like Jim Howland and his merry gang of creative and business collaborators hoped. Our indebtedness to Ted and Veronica and our desire to keep The Old World Center safe and a vibrant place for a long time to come has moved us past our pride and turned us to all of you for your support. We will proceed to transform in the process. We will post our progress in pics and videos online, and we will do what people do. We will transform and move forward and keep making Art, Hope and Transformation with you somehow in this beautiful community.

All of us involved at Pegasus Frame Studio & Gallery are deeply, deeply grateful for your support. Thank you for all you do and your sense of community!
Paige Shumway and the entire Pegasus Gang of artists, friends and family