TPI - 2002

WELCOME

Janet Wolff -- Associate Dean for Academic Affairs; School of Fine Arts at Columbia University

Dean Bruce Jorgenson -- Dean of School of Fine Arts at Columbia University

Wolff: First of all I am really sorry that I wasn’t here, not just for the beginning of it, but for most of it, and I gather that it’s all been going really well with maybe one or two little hitches. So you’ve all been happy then, that’s the main thing. I’m here this week and I’m glad to welcome you, even if late. There are several reasons that I’m really pleased that this worked out, the association with Cheryl and the Institute and the seminar, one of them is that I had a mini-history with Cheryl before this. As you may know, before I came here which was just under a year ago, I was the director of the Ph.D. program in Visual and Cultural Studies at the University of Rochester. It was in that capacity that Cheryl and I were first dealing with one another. Over a number of years I think we sent one student per year, maybe 3-4 years, and I think they were mainly photo critics and photo historians, not photographers, but one of the real strengths of this seminar is that it mixes you guys together in that way. So I knew something about the seminar, and I got fantastic feedback from our own Ph.D. students at Rochester about their participation in it, and I had seen the journals that were produced as a result. So when it turned out that I could continue this association, I was really particularly delighted. Another reason is that one of the things that’s always struck me as a great strength, and something quite unique about this program, is this intersection of theory and practice. I haven’t looked over your records and backgrounds, but I take it that, as usual, there’s a mixture here of photographers and photography critics and photography historians, although it’s interesting that it’s not just the visual media. Looking at the program, it’s absolutely clear that it’s not just photography but video, television, film, and so on. The other intersection is between the practice of the various visual media and critical theory and various historical critical approaches too, which was what our program in Rochester was about, well, is still about actually. That was particularly appealing to me, and it fits in with what Bruce and I are doing here at the school now, and maybe I’ll leave it to Bruce to say a little bit more, he’s been here a little bit longer than me, about the school and how it works. But just in short, to tell you that we have 4 divisions. A school where we have MFA students across 4 different visions; theater, visual arts, creative writing and film. The divisions have something to do with one another, the students take some courses in other divisions, but one of our projects has been to push that forward in many ways, to get the students who come in, the opportunity to work film makers with writers and so on, and across the divisions in a number of ways, and we’re beginning a process of facilitating that more. What we’re also doing is developing interdisciplinary projects in terms of introducing new classes and interdisciplinary approaches to the arts, not just the visual media, but the arts in general. We’re really at the beginning of that, we just heard recently that we got a pretty good grant from the university to develop that, to hire people to do the teaching, the develop the program over the next two years. From our point of view, what you’re doing here fits in exceptionally well. I think it’s going to inspire us to have had the seminar here, and to continue this association with Cheryl and the Institute over the coming years, and you’re at the beginning of that. So for us, too, it’s terrific both because it sets us up in doing what we really do very much want to do here in this school, and because we look forward to seeing what comes out of it, hearing about your post-seminar projects, to seeing the journal that’s produced as a result of that, and maybe keeping in touch with some of you individually. It would be very nice if we have the opportunity to do that. So we are really happy that it’s happening and that you’re here, and pleased to see how well it’s going. I want to thank Cheryl for organizing it, for working with us, for doing it so well and so efficiently, and for choosing us to be the group and the university to be associated with. So I’m going to ask Bruce if he wants to say a couple of things to follow up. And I hope to see you over the next few days. Enjoy the rest of your time here.

Jorgenson: I actually don’t have much to add to what Janet said. She said it all very well, as usual, but I would like to, although it might be redundant, to say thank you to Cheryl for bringing the program and you to us. I think over the years as we move forward that we can only anticipate that it will become more integrated into what are plans are. I think one of the traditions, actually for almost a hundred of years, but certainly in the last couple of decades, of academic study in particular in the Ivys, but not exclusively in the Ivys, is this tension between practice and historical or theoretical knowledge. And we’ve, like most schools and departments who deal with artists, try to think through this quite vexed relationship, as it were. I’ve just come from a conference of conservatory leaders, and most conservatories are in the same position of wondering just how much information students should have with regard to history and theory and methodologies they’re in, at the same time that they’re practicing artists. That mix has both social and pedagogical impulses and possibilities, and I think in certain ways you in this more informal summer, at least spring session, actually are an ideal model for how that might work, so we’re really looking to the results of this as the results of the last years that Cheryl has been doing this program, prove to see what kind of a model this might provide for us.

I think the only other thing I might say is that we have, I know that Lisa Yuskavage was here last week when I was away, and I want to tell you that I do have a watercolor of hers in my office, so quite seriously you’re welcome to come down and see it. It’s interesting. I mean I’m sure you have your own thoughts about Lisa after visiting with her, and she’s a remarkable person as an artist and as a person, and I’ve got this painting because a friend of mine bought it and then he took it home and neither his wife nor his daughter would let him hang it in his house, and then he took it to his office, and nobody in the office would let him hang it there, so he was extremely discouraged, and I said, “Well, if you can’t hang it in a university, then there’s probably no place it can be hung,” so he lent it to me, and I now feel like it’s mine. But it is hidden away in a deep corner of my office. So you’re welcome to come and see that. I just want to reiterate what Janet said about Cheryl, that we’re very grateful and appreciative that this program has come here, and we hope to house it in a more generous way as we move forward.

I welcome you all, somewhat belatedly, obviously, and I hope you have a wonderful time and come down to see the Lisa Yuskavage.


	WELCOME Janet Wolff -- Associate Dean for Academic Affairs; School of Fine Arts at Columbia University Dean Bruce Jorgenson -- Dean of School of Fine Arts at Columbia University Wolff: First of all I am really sorry that I wasn’t here, not just for the beginning of it, but for most of it, and I gather that it’s all been going really well with maybe one or two little hitches. So you’ve all been happy then, that’s the main thing. I’m here this week and I’m glad to welcome you, even if late. There are several reasons that I’m really pleased that this worked out, the association with Cheryl and the Institute and the seminar, one of them is that I had a mini-history with Cheryl before this. As you may know, before I came here which was just under a year ago, I was the director of the Ph.D. program in Visual and Cultural Studies at the University of Rochester. It was in that capacity that Cheryl and I were first dealing with one another. Over a number of years I think we sent one student per year, maybe 3-4 years, and I think they were mainly photo critics and photo historians, not photographers, but one of the real strengths of this seminar is that it mixes you guys together in that way. So I knew something about the seminar, and I got fantastic feedback from our own Ph.D. students at Rochester about their participation in it, and I had seen the journals that were produced as a result. So when it turned out that I could continue this association, I was really particularly delighted. Another reason is that one of the things that’s always struck me as a great strength, and something quite unique about this program, is this intersection of theory and practice. I haven’t looked over your records and backgrounds, but I take it that, as usual, there’s a mixture here of photographers and photography critics and photography historians, although it’s interesting that it’s not just the visual media. Looking at the program, it’s absolutely clear that it’s not just photography but video, television, film, and so on. The other intersection is between the practice of the various visual media and critical theory and various historical critical approaches too, which was what our program in Rochester was about, well, is still about actually. That was particularly appealing to me, and it fits in with what Bruce and I are doing here at the school now, and maybe I’ll leave it to Bruce to say a little bit more, he’s been here a little bit longer than me, about the school and how it works. But just in short, to tell you that we have 4 divisions. A school where we have MFA students across 4 different visions; theater, visual arts, creative writing and film. The divisions have something to do with one another, the students take some courses in other divisions, but one of our projects has been to push that forward in many ways, to get the students who come in, the opportunity to work film makers with writers and so on, and across the divisions in a number of ways, and we’re beginning a process of facilitating that more. What we’re also doing is developing interdisciplinary projects in terms of introducing new classes and interdisciplinary approaches to the arts, not just the visual media, but the arts in general. We’re really at the beginning of that, we just heard recently that we got a pretty good grant from the university to develop that, to hire people to do the teaching, the develop the program over the next two years. From our point of view, what you’re doing here fits in exceptionally well. I think it’s going to inspire us to have had the seminar here, and to continue this association with Cheryl and the Institute over the coming years, and you’re at the beginning of that. So for us, too, it’s terrific both because it sets us up in doing what we really do very much want to do here in this school, and because we look forward to seeing what comes out of it, hearing about your post-seminar projects, to seeing the journal that’s produced as a result of that, and maybe keeping in touch with some of you individually. It would be very nice if we have the opportunity to do that. So we are really happy that it’s happening and that you’re here, and pleased to see how well it’s going. I want to thank Cheryl for organizing it, for working with us, for doing it so well and so efficiently, and for choosing us to be the group and the university to be associated with. So I’m going to ask Bruce if he wants to say a couple of things to follow up. And I hope to see you over the next few days. Enjoy the rest of your time here. Jorgenson: I actually don’t have much to add to what Janet said. She said it all very well, as usual, but I would like to, although it might be redundant, to say thank you to Cheryl for bringing the program and you to us. I think over the years as we move forward that we can only anticipate that it will become more integrated into what are plans are. I think one of the traditions, actually for almost a hundred of years, but certainly in the last couple of decades, of academic study in particular in the Ivys, but not exclusively in the Ivys, is this tension between practice and historical or theoretical knowledge. And we’ve, like most schools and departments who deal with artists, try to think through this quite vexed relationship, as it were. I’ve just come from a conference of conservatory leaders, and most conservatories are in the same position of wondering just how much information students should have with regard to history and theory and methodologies they’re in, at the same time that they’re practicing artists. That mix has both social and pedagogical impulses and possibilities, and I think in certain ways you in this more informal summer, at least spring session, actually are an ideal model for how that might work, so we’re really looking to the results of this as the results of the last years that Cheryl has been doing this program, prove to see what kind of a model this might provide for us. I think the only other thing I might say is that we have, I know that Lisa Yuskavage was here last week when I was away, and I want to tell you that I do have a watercolor of hers in my office, so quite seriously you’re welcome to come down and see it. It’s interesting. I mean I’m sure you have your own thoughts about Lisa after visiting with her, and she’s a remarkable person as an artist and as a person, and I’ve got this painting because a friend of mine bought it and then he took it home and neither his wife nor his daughter would let him hang it in his house, and then he took it to his office, and nobody in the office would let him hang it there, so he was extremely discouraged, and I said, “Well, if you can’t hang it in a university, then there’s probably no place it can be hung,” so he lent it to me, and I now feel like it’s mine. But it is hidden away in a deep corner of my office. So you’re welcome to come and see that. I just want to reiterate what Janet said about Cheryl, that we’re very grateful and appreciative that this program has come here, and we hope to house it in a more generous way as we move forward. I welcome you all, somewhat belatedly, obviously, and I hope you have a wonderful time and come down to see the Lisa Yuskavage.