Rick Peterson

Author: Rick Peterson

Young alumni-driven crowdfunding initiative looks to enhance Lawrence Diversity Center

A $10,000 crowdfunding effort to support Lawrence University’s Diversity Center and enhance campus life for students is in the home stretch.

Organized by the Viking Gift Committee and led by Lawrence alumni Erin Campbell Watson ’09 and Gayatri Malhotra ’14, the effort is targeting young alumni in an effort to help current and future Lawrentians. The campaign, which runs through Monday, April 18, has generated nearly $2,600 to date.

“We thought it would be meaningful to explore fundraising opportunities related to campus inclusivity and the student organizations involved,” said Watson. “This is a powerful way for young alumni to show current students that we support them while making an impact on the campus climate that really demonstrates the meaning of our donations, no matter how small.”

Gail Watson '09 — Erin Campbell Watson ’09

The Diversity Center, which will be relocating this summer from the lower level of Memorial Hall to the main floor, provides a safe, welcoming place for students to be aware, educated, and engaged with cultural competency and building a more inclusive community. It provides resources that are often taken for granted, such as cultural support, campus wide programming, connections to student organizations, community collaborations, as well as a comfortable space that is “home” for many students.

The Diversity Center currently has one full-time staff member, a part-time program coordinator and 18 student workers. An additional full-time staff person is expected to be added this spring.

Funds raised through the crowdfunding effort will be earmarked to support professional development opportunities for student workers, provide additional educational programming to campus and establish a monetary reserve to assist students in times of emergency need. In addition, they will enhance the environment of the new location with artwork and visuals to represent a transparent diverse community.

“As our Lawrence community continues to grow and become more diverse, we also need to enhance the necessary resources and services that foster student success,” said Pa Lee Moua, associate dean of students for multicultural affairs. “The Diversity Center is much more than a department or location. For many, it’s home. It’s a supportive community. It’s personal growth. It’s leadership development. It’s education, awareness and knowledge, which are all essential components in retention and overall academic success.”

All donations go directly to the Diversity Center’s annual budget. They will not count as a gift to the Lawrence Fund. For more information, contact Kari Swason, assistant director of annual giving, 920-842-7307 or kari.e.swanson@lawrence.edu.

About Lawrence University
Founded in 1847, Lawrence University uniquely integrates a college of liberal arts and sciences with a nationally recognized conservatory of music, both devoted exclusively to undergraduate education. It was selected for inclusion in the book “Colleges That Change Lives: 40 Schools That Will Change the Way You Think About College” and Fiske’s Guide to Colleges 2016. Engaged learning, the development of multiple interests and community outreach are central to the Lawrence experience. Lawrence draws its 1,500 students from nearly every state and more than 50 countries.

Lawrence grad Bill Baer named associate attorney general at U.S. Justice Department’s

A Lawrence University alumnus has been named acting U.S. associate attorney general in the Justice Department by Attorney General Loretta Lynch.

Bill Baer, a 1972 Lawrence graduate, will leave his current position as head of the department’s Antitrust Division to assume the department’s no. 3 post. He will replace Stuart Delery, the acting associate attorney general.

“From his work at the Federal Trade Commission to his leadership of the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division, he has demonstrated keen intelligence, strong judgment and consummate skill,” Lynch said in a statement announcing Baer’s appointment.

Baer has served as Assistant Attorney General for the Antitrust Division since December 2012. Within a month of his appointment, Baer moved to block Anheuser-Busch InBev’s takeover of Grupo Modelo. In April 2013, he ramped up litigation previously filed against Apple over the pricing of e-books. Also in 2013, his office challenged the merger between American and US Airways, which led the airlines to agree to significant divestitures to address competition concerns.

His antitrust work has been recognized with numerous awards. In 2010, the National Law Journal named him one of “the decade’s most influential lawyers.” The International Who’s Who of Business Lawyers named Baer the “leading competition lawyer in the world” in 2006 and 2007.

After earning a bachelor’s degree in government from Lawrence and a law degree from Stanford University, Baer began his career with the Federal Trade Commission in 1975, serving first as an attorney advisor and then as assistant general counsel and director of congressional relations. In 1980, he joined the law firm of Arnold & Porter, where he led the firm’s antitrust practice.

Baer served on the Lawrence University Board of Trustees from 2000 until 2012, including the last two years as vice chair, before joining the Justice Department.

“World of Warcraft,” “South Park” soundtrack contributors visit campus for special events

Accomplished multimedia composer Jeff Kurtenacker makes a return visit to his alma mater and he’s bringing Grammy Award-nominated trumpet player Wayne Bergeron along. The two Los Angeles-based musicians will lend their respective talents to the Lawrence University community for a series of special events April 12-13, culminating with a big band concert.

A 1999 Lawrence graduate and Green Bay native, Kurtenacker has made his mark in the video game industry. After graduating from Lawrence with a self-designed major in composition, Kurtenacker landed a job with Hans Zimmer at his company, Media Ventures/Remote Control, where he honed his craft of composing for media.

After serving as choral arranger on “Warcraft 3” for Blizzard Entertainment, Kurtenacker worked on numerous other video game titles, among them “World of Warcraft,” “Pirates of the Burning Sea,” Dreamworks’ “Igor,” and “American Idol.”

Kurtenacker joined Carbine Studios in 2008 as a sound designer and three years later moved into the role of lead composer. In addition to that role, he also serves as Carbine’s audio department manager. He composed, orchestrated and conducted a 75-piece orchestra in recording more than nine hours of music for Carbine’s “Wild Star.”

Bergeron has established himself as one of the most sought-after musicians in the world for studio sessions, film soundtracks, international touring, jazz concerts and clinics. He is especially in demand for film and television scores, having contributed to more than 350 TV and motion picture soundtracks. His many credits include “Frozen,” “Bridge of Spies,” “Monsters University,” “Despicable Me” “Marley & Me,” “The Simpson’s Movie,” “Dreamgirls,” “Mission Impossible 3” and “South Park.”

After working behind the scenes for many years, Bergeron released his first solo effort, “You Call This a Living?,” which earned rave reviews as well as a Grammy Award nomination in 2004. His second disc, “Plays Well With Others” released in 2007, drew similar praise. His latest project is scheduled to be released later this year.

During their residency at Lawrence, Kurtenacker and Bergeron will participate in the following events, all of which are free and open to the public.

• Tuesday, April 12, 11:10 a.m. Bergeron and Kurtenacker will lead masterclasses in trumpet and composing, respectively, in Shattuck Hall 163 and Shattuck Hall 4.

• Tuesday, April 12, 7 p.m., Shattuck Hall 163. The pair will conduct a live recording session with the Lawrence Symphony Orchestra sight reading one of Kurtenacker’s orchestral soundtracks. The session will be recorded just as his music is at Warner Bros. in Los Angeles. Bergeron will play with the LSO for the recording.

• Tuesday, April 12, 8 p.m., Shattuck Hall 163. Bergeron and Kurenacker lead a discussion on “the business of music,” providing an insider’s look at the world of composing and performing for film, television and multimedia.

• Wednesday, April 13, 8 p.m., Lawrence Memorial Chapel. Bergeron headlines a concert with the Lawrence University Jazz Ensemble and the new 19-member Lawrence Jazz Faculty Big Band. The program will feature jazz standards such as Billy Strayhorn’s “Take the A Train” as well as several selections Bergeron has personally selected from his library.

“We are so fortunate to get this opportunity to perform with Wayne Bergeron, who is really one of the world’s most in-demand musicians,” said Patricia Darling, lecturer in music and director of the Lawrence University Jazz Ensemble. “We’ll be playing some great big band charts. This is going to be a very exciting and rewarding concert for everyone.”

Lawrence Artist Series welcomes opera star Lawrence Brownlee

If you enjoy opera, you’ll love Lawrence Brownlee. If you don’t, he may turn you into a convert.

With effortless sound and sparkling diction, Brownlee brings his powerful and agile tenor voice to the Lawrence Memorial Chapel stage Saturday, April 16 at 8 p.m. in the latest Lawrence University’s Artist Series concert.

Lawrence-Brownlee_newsblog_2 — Tenor Lawrence Brownlee

Tickets, at $25/$30 for adults, $20/$25 for seniors and $18/$20 for students are available through the Lawrence Box Office, 920-832-6749.

While performing opposite the leading ladies of contemporary opera, Brownlee has established himself as a star on the international scene. He has dazzled audiences in nearly every major theater in the world and enjoys a relationship with many prominent conductors and symphony orchestras.

Since being named Grand Prize winner of the 2001 Metropolitan Opera National Council auditions, the Associated Press has named him one of “the world’s leading bel canto tenors.” National Public Radio hailed his voice as “an instrument of great beauty and expression.” In 2006, Brownlee was named the winner of the prestigious Marian Anderson Vocal Award.

“Lawrence Brownlee is, without exaggeration, a phenomenon in today’s operatic world,” said Joanne Bozeman, a voice instructor in Lawrence’s conservatory of music. “With all due respect to other fine tenors, I don’t believe anyone currently matches him in the high-flying bel canto repertoire. NPR Music’s Tiny Desk Concert of Mr. Brownlee singing spirituals is a great way to sample what he will bring to the chapel stage as an equally phenomenal recitalist.”

Brownlee’s operatic highlights include: “La Cenerentola” in Milan, Houston, Philadelphia and the Metropolitan Opera; “L’italiana in Algeri” in Milan, Dresden, Boston and Seattle; and the title role in the 2015 world premiere of Daniel Schnyder’s “Charlie Parker’s Yardbird,” a work written specifically for him, at the Opera Philadelphia.

Brownlee’s discography boasts the Grammy Award-nominated “Virtuoso Rossini Arias,” a testament to his broad impact in the classical music genre. He also has contributed several opera and concert recordings, among them “Armida” at the Metropolitan Opera and “Carmina Burana” with the Berlin Philharmonic.

In 2013, Brownlee released a collection of African-American spirituals entitled “Spiritual Sketches” with pianist Damien Sneed, which the pair performed at Lincoln Center’s American Songbook series. In a review of the album, NPR it as “soulful singing” that “sounds like it’s coming straight from his heart to yours.”

An avid salsa dancer and photographer, often taking portraits of his on-stage colleagues, Brownlee is a die-hard football fan and has treated many NFL audiences to his rendition of the national anthem.

A native of Youngstown, Ohio, Brownlee earned a bachelor’s degree from Indiana’s Anderson University and a graduate degree from Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music.

Moral psychology focus of final Lawrence brain series presentation

Duke University philosophy scholar Walter Sinnott-Armstrong explores moral psychology in the final installment of Lawrence University’s five-part Liberal Arts in the Century of the Brain series.

Sinnott-Armstrong, Chauncey Stillman Professor of Practical Ethics in the department of philosophy and the Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke, presents “Are Psychopaths Responsible” Tuesday, April 12 at 11 a.m. in Stansbury Theatre of the Music-Drama Center. A question-and-answer session follows the presentation.

In conjunction with his talk, on Monday, April 11 at 7 p.m. in the Warch Campus Center cinema, Sinnott-Armstrong will show a filmed interview with an imprisoned psychopath and discuss the nature of psychopathy and its moral implications. Both events are free and open to the public.

Psychopaths make up less than one percent of the population, but they commit more than 40 percent of violent crimes. Some research suggests they do not understand the immorality of their acts. In his presentation, Sinnott-Armstrong will discuss whether such individuals should be held legally or morally responsible if they don’t comprehend their acts, and if not, how should society dealt with them.

Sinnott-Armstrong, whose scholarship interests include neuroethics, is the author of several books, including 2009’s “Morality Without God?” and “Moral Skepticisms.” His current research focuses on moral psychology and brain science, as well as uses of neuroscience in the legal system.

Launched last fall, the Liberal Arts in the Century of the Brain series incorporated the interdisciplinary areas of neuroscience and cognitive science to create connections with other disciplines at Lawrence.

Lawrence conservatory faculty featured in Riverview Gardens concert celebrating Latin American music

Lawrence University Conservatory of Music faculty members take their talents into the community Monday, April 11 to highlight several genres of Latin American music.

Riverview Gardens Community Center will host “A Celebration of Hispanic and Latino-American Music” at 7 p.m. The concert, at 1101 S. Oneida St., Appleton, is free and open to the public.

The concert, organized by pianist Anthony Padilla, associate professor of music, and saxophonist José Encarnación, assistant professor of music and director of jazz studies, is one of a series of ongoing community programs highlighting 500 years of diversity and achievement by Latino Americans.

Padilla will lead the concert’s first half, which will feature classical pieces by Roberto Sierra, Astor Piazzolla, and Juan Orrego-Salas. He will be joined by Janet Anthony, cello, Wen-Lei Gu, violin and Matthew Michelic, viola.

The second half of the concert program highlights musical several styles, including Brazilian bossa nova, bolero from Mexico, rumba-son from Cuba and Argentine tango. All of the pieces were arranged by Encarnación, who will be joined by percussionist Dane Richeson and bassist Mark Urness.

The community program “Latino Americans: 500 Years of History” was organized through a partnership between Lawrence, the Appleton Public Library, Casa Hispana and the History Museum at the Castle. It is supported by a pair of grants Lawrence received from the American Library Association and the Wisconsin Humanities Council with funds from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Appleton native, Iowa Writers’ Workshop Director named Lawrence’s 2016 commencement speaker, honorary degree recipient

It will be a homecoming of sorts for award-winning writer and Appleton native Lan Samantha Chang when she returns to the Lawrence University campus to receive an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree Sunday, June 12 at the college’s 167th commencement ceremony.

Chang, the director of the prestigious Iowa Writers’ Workshop at the University of Iowa, also will serve as the principal commencement speaker. This will be Chang’s first honorary degree.

“An understanding of the creative process is core to the education Lawrence offers,” said President Mark Burstein. “We are very pleased that Lan Samantha Chang will join us for commencement this spring so we can honor an Appleton native who has perfected her craft and now teaches it to others as director of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. From her first book, which the New York Times described as ‘a taut, incisive study of Chinese immigrants in America and their almost wordless struggle to adapt to a new life,’ to more recent work, Samantha has provided us a window into the human experience.”

Lan Samantha Chang will receive an honorary degree from Lawrence and serve as the principal speaker at the college's 167th commencement June 12. Photo by Tom Jorgensen. — Lan Samantha Chang will receive an honorary degree from Lawrence and serve as the principal speaker at the college’s 167th commencement June 12. Photo by Tom Jorgensen.

Chang, whose parents emigrated to the United States from China, graduated from Appleton West High School in 1983. Her honorary degree will further connect her to Lawrence. Her mother earned a bachelor of music degree in piano pedagogy from Lawrence, while her father was an associate professor of engineering at the former Institute of Paper Chemistry, which had a long affiliation with Lawrence.

“Receiving an honorary degree from Lawrence means a great deal to me,” said Chang, “in part because when I was growing up, Lawrence was the center of intellectual life in Appleton. It is a greatly respected university. I have vivid memories of being at the conservatory during my mother’s recitals and meeting her professors.”

Her path to award-winning writer followed a circuitous route. Chang attended Yale University intending to satisfy her parent’s wishes of pursuing a medical degree, but she soon decided becoming a doctor was not in her future. After earning a degree in East Asian Studies, she told her parents she would become a lawyer, another career option more designed to please her parents than her own interests. She eventually earned a master’s of public administration degree from Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government.

“I realized that I didn’t want to pursue that direction either,” Chang explained of her second change of heart. “It was really just a question of coming to face the fact that I had never wanted to do anything else except write fiction and that it would be pointless to try to keep trying to do other things.”

Chang eventually enrolled at the University of Iowa and earned a master of fine arts in creative writing.

While she says her life has been much easier since then, “I don’t think I’ve ever circled as much as I did after college when I understood that I would have to disappoint my parents and pursue an uncertain life,” said Chang.

Before returning to the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, Chang taught creative writing at Stanford University as Jones Lecturer in Fiction, in Warren Wilson College’s MFA program for writers and at Harvard University as Briggs-Copland Lecturer in Creative Writing.

Since 2006, she has served as the program director of the Writers’ Workshop at the University of Iowa, where she also teaches English as the May Brodbeck Professor of Liberal Arts and Sciences.

Chang’s experiences as an Asian American inspired her to write two novels and a collection of short stories about the merging of Chinese and American culture and the dynamics of family and wealth in times of hardship or after war. Her works include 1998’s “Hunger: A Novella and Stories,” 2004’s “Inheritance: A Novel” and “All is Forgotten, Nothing is Lost: A Novel” in 2010.

Chang’s work has been recognized with the 2005 PEN Open Book Award for “Inheritance,” while “Hunger” was the winner of the Southern Review Fiction Prize and named a finalist for a Los Angeles Times Book Award. Chang’s writing has been selected twice (1994, 1996) for inclusion in the yearly anthology “The Best American Short Stories.”

Our Pale Blue Dot: Lawrence International Cabaret celebrates the planet’s human beauty, diversity

More than 100 students representing more than 30 countries celebrate the 40th anniversary of Lawrence University’s annual International Cabaret in a pair of performances showcasing their native cultures through music and dance.

Under the theme “Our Pale Blue Dot,” students will highlight the world’s beauty and diversity in performances Saturday, April 9 at 6:30 p.m. and Sunday, April 10 at 3 p.m. in Stansbury Theatre of the Music-Drama Center. A free reception follows Sunday’s performance at 5 p.m. in the Warch Campus Center.

Tickets, at $10 for adults, $5 for students/children (age four and under are free), are available through the Lawrence Box Office, 920-832-6749. The box office will be open one hour prior to Sunday’s performance.

Bimal Rajbhandari, a junior from Nepal and current president of Lawrence International, said this year’s Pale Blue Dot theme reflects our small, but unique, place in the cosmos.

“When we look at Earth from the Voyager 1 spacecraft from billions of miles away, it looks smaller than a single pixel,” said Rajbhandari, “and as far as we know, we are the only life that exists in the vast universe. Since we only have each other, we should be kind to each other and respect one another.

“Even though we are this tiny speck in the universe, there is so much beauty and diversity in our pale blue dot. We want to showcase a small part of that beauty through the cabaret,” Rajbhandari added.

The talent portion of this year’s cabaret includes:

• The song of herdsmen, a famous Chinese flute song that represents the great spirit of herdsmen on China’s fnorth prairie.

• Three different elements of Japanese dance.

• A fusion performance that blends rhythm and dance influences from Ghana, Guinea and Nigeria along with the sorsonet, a drum rhythm originating from Guinea in West Africa.

• Raga Yaman, a partial rendition of a piece from Indian classical music performed on the bansuri, an Indian flute.

• Ukali Orali Haruma, a Nepali song sung by the hugely influential classical artist Tara Devi.

• A traditional Tatar dance, representing one of the more than 180 ethnic minorities within Russia.

• Jordanian Dabkeh, one of seven distinct traditional dances popular in Arab countries. First performed in Palestine in 1962, it has 19 main moves.

• A lyrically abstract Indian song that incorporates elements of jazz, performed on an iktara, an ancient Indian single-stringed instrument.

• A musical recitation of two corresponding poems — Shikwa and Iqbal — by revered philosopher-poet Muhammad Iqbal, “the spiritual father of Pakistan.”

• A performance of Qing Hua Ci, a unique synthesis of Eastern and Western music popularized by Jay Chou, a major Asian artist who helped create the genre Zhong Guo Feng by fusing traditional Chinese musical styles with R&B and rock influences.

• A Korean dance team highlighting the three major types of modern Kpop culture: hip-hop, girl group and funky dance.

• A Vietnamese bamboo hat dance, inspired by the Northern Vietnamese agrarian traditions, accompanied by traditional Vietnamese musical instruments.

In addition to the musical and dance performances, the cabaret again will feature its popular fashion show, highlighting native clothing from around the world.

Lawrence International is one of the largest student organizations at the college, connecting the international community with American students on campus. Nearly 200 of Lawrence’s 1,500 students identify themselves with the international community, either through citizenship or personal background.

Lawrence Artist Series welcomes pianist Jeremy Denk

With a thought-provoking repertoire and an enthusiastic interest in all things music, pianist Jeremy Denk brings his gifts for enlivening the musical experience for diverse audiences to Lawrence University’s Artist Series.

Denk performs Friday, April 8 at 8 p.m. in the Lawrence Memorial Chapel. Tickets, at $25/$30 for adults, $20/$25 for seniors and $18/$20 for students are available through the Lawrence Box Office, 920-832-6749.

Through performances with many of the country’s leading orchestras, among them the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Philadelphia Orchestra as well as the symphony orchestras of Boston, Chicago and San Francisco, Denk has built a reputation as one of America’s most compelling artists. The New York Times praised Denk as someone “you want to hear no matter what he performs.”

He has toured extensively with violinist Joshua Bell and collaborates regularly with cellist Steven Isserlis. His 2012 album with Bell, “French Impressions,” won the 2012 Echo Klassik Award.

“Jeremy Denk is one of the most fascinating young pianists out there,” said Catherine Kautsky, professor of music and chair of the keyboard department at Lawrence. “He not only plays a massive range of repertoire with total command— going from Bach’s ‘Goldberg Variations’ to Ligeti’s immensely difficult and recent ‘Etudes’— but he also speaks and writes about music with a rare eloquence.”

Named a recipient of the MacArthur Foundation’s coveted $625,000 “Genius” Fellowship in 2013, he was honored the following year with Musical America’s 2014 “Instrumentalist of the Year” award. That same year, he was named winner of the Avery Fisher Prize, which is awarded by New York City’s Lincoln Center and recognizes solo instrumentalists who have demonstrated outstanding achievement and excellence in music. It includes a $75,000 monetary prize.

Beyond his captivating performances, Denk contributes eloquent insights about music on his blog, “Think Denk,” which recently was selected for inclusion in the Library of Congress’ web archives. An article he wrote for The New Yorker in 2013 entitled “Every Good Boy Does Fine” forms the basis for a memoir about his experiences as a music student.

In an interview he conducted with the UK’s Daily Mail, Denk said he likes to “tear the music apart and see how it works.”

“My way of communicating is to hopefully help people see the elements that I see, and [explore] why this music is so strange and beautiful.”

Currently living in New York City, Denk holds degrees from Oberlin College, Indiana University and the Julliard School.

Three Wisconsin photographers featured in latest Wriston Art Center exhibition

University of Wisconsin Professor of Visual Studies Jill Casid delivers the opening lecture for the latest exhibition at Lawrence University’s Wriston Art Center Galleries Thursday, March 31 at 6 p.m. with a reception to follow. Both events are free and open to the public.

Kissing-on-Mainstreet_newsblog — Jill H. Casid, “Sylvia Beach Way, Princeton, NJ 08542,” from “Kissing on Main Street,” 2015, original SX-70 Polaroid.

The exhibition, which runs through May 8, features the work of three Wisconsin photographers, including Casid. All three exhibitions highlight photography that engages with different conceptions of intimacy, interrogates the archive as a site of emotional resonance and reveals drastic changes in photographic technologies.

“Although they are three distinct exhibitions, they complement each other wonderfully,” said Beth Zinsli, director and curator of the Wriston Art Center galleries.

Casid’s “Kissing on Main Street” will be shown in the Kohler Gallery. Using a Polaroid camera, Casid captures acts of public intimacy and points her camera at the theoretical intersection of sex, imaging technology, vulnerable exposure and policing. She explores the vulnerability and temporality of public displays of affection through a medium that is itself instantaneous and easily shareable yet susceptible to damage and overexposure. An artist, theorist and historian, Casid founded and served as the first director of the Center for Visual Cultures at UW.

The Hoffmaster Gallery hosts “The Archive as a River: Paul Vanderbilt and Photography,” a celebration of the work of Vanderbilt (1905-1992), who sought new ways to understand the world through visual images as a visionary, archivist and photographer.

From 1942-1945, Vanderbilt worked with Roy Stryker at the Library of Congress, classifying more than 200,000 photographs of tenant farmers and farm workers for the Farm Security Administration. In 1954 he was hired by the Wisconsin Historical Society to curate and organize a treasure trove of images that became known as the Iconographic Collections. Inspired by Stryker’s approach of organizing materials around themed collections, Vanderbilt created a unique visual archive that is renowned for its depth, subtlety and flexibility.

Paul-Vanderbilt_newsblog — Paul Vanderbilt and his camera (detail), ca. 1963. Photographer unknown. Wisconsin Historical Society (WHI 87567).

Vanderbilt spent 18 years as the field photographer for the WHS, focusing his lens on rural Wisconsin landscapes, architecture and small-town life. His fine sense of composition created photography with narrative and meaning that went beyond mere documentation.

He pioneered new formats for presenting images from the Iconographic Collections and his idiosyncratic thematic panels and pairings combine thoughtfully selected historic images with his own photographs and poetic texts. “The Archive as a River” includes large-scale reproductions of his thematic panels and pairings, a selection of Vanderbilt’s own photographs of Wisconsin and an array of artifacts and papers that reveal his innovative approach to organizing images.

The Vanderbilt exhibition is organized by the James Watrous Gallery, Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts and Letters and the Wisconsin Historical Society, Division of Library-Archives and is sponsored in part by the Wisconsin Arts Board with funds from the State of Wisconsin and the National Endowment for the Arts.

Lavitia_newsblog — Livija Patikne, “Untitled (flowers),” no date

The Leech Gallery presents “Certificates of Presence: The Photography of Livija Patikne.” A U.S. immigrant, the Latvian-born Patikne (1911-2001) took photos of herself throughout the 1950’s and 1960’s in different guises with intricate flower arrangements. Living in Milwaukee when she died, she left behind without explanation or instruction hundreds of these photographs that portray a quiet, private life of profound stillness, often tinged with loss. Struck by the powerful yet silent composition in these photographs, photographer James Brozek and Debra Brehmer assembled an exhibition of her work, which was first shown at Milwaukee’s Portrait Society Gallery.

Wriston Art Center hours are Tuesday-Friday 10 a.m. – 4 p.m., Saturday-Sunday noon – 4 p.m., closed Mondays. For more information, call 920-832-6621.

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