13 Facts About Leona Wood

Leona Wood was a 20th-century American painter, dancer, writer and co-founder of the Aman International Folk Ensemble.

Leona Wood was born on May 21,1921, in Seattle, Washington.

Leona Wood began drawing and painting at an early age, and at sixteen, entered the Annual Exhibition of Northwest Artists show at the Seattle Art Museum.

Leona Wood received a fellowship to study design in San Francisco at the school of Bauhaus artist Rudolph Schaeffer.

In 1947, Leona Wood moved to California as Art Director of the Pettingell and Fenton Los Angeles office.

Leona Wood received a substantial commission for an ongoing series of paintings for these ads, which appeared in publications around the world.

When Harland began playing at Middle Eastern venues, Leona Wood learned Middle Eastern dance in order to accompany him.

Leona Wood found her to be a "mesmerizing, spectacular performer" and urged her to join forces.

In 1980, Leona Wood received a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts to stage a Kwakiutl winter ceremonial for Aman.

Leona Wood commissioned three ceremonial masks from artist Duane Pasco, and designed the mise en scene, including a dance screen hung upstage, and a fire that lighted the stage from the center rather than the wings.

Leona Wood taught courses on Middle Eastern dance in a cultural context at UCLA extension, and continued to participate in UCLA's Department of Ethnomusicology for many years.

Leona Wood wrote numerous articles on Middle Eastern and other forms of dance.

Leona Wood's paintings were exhibited in the Lane Galleries in Westwood, California for over a quarter of a century.