This May, the Cultural Endeavors Committee of the Cornell Council for the Arts announced the recipients of its 1998-99 Distinguished Alumni and Distinguished Student in the Arts awards. Alumna Susan Rothenberg '66 and Pablo Garcia, who graduated this spring, were chosen for the respective honors.
Rothenberg has made quite a name for herself over the years as a painter. Originally intending to major in sculpting, she was forced to switch to painting after failing a sculpting course, she said, and has hardly looked back.
After graduating from Cornell with a bachelor of fine arts in painting, she studied for a short time at the Corcoran School of Art at Georgetown University before embarking on her prolific painting career. Internationally, Rothenberg has had over 60 solo exhibitions of her work, in addition to participating in over 200 group showings. She has been recognized often for her talents, through numerous grants (including one from the National Endowment for the Arts) and awards (such as the 1985 Grand Prix at the 16th International Biennial of Graphic Art in Yugoslavia). Her paintings will be on display at the Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art on campus from Aug. 22 through Oct. 25.
Recognizing this painter's works at a glance would be difficult, as she has used many different contents and styles over her career, finding success in each. Like her painting, Rothenberg has dabbed her personal brush in many pursuits over the years. She performed in Joan Jonas' performance art pieces in 1970, taught art at the California Institute for the Arts in the late 1970s and is an avid horse rider. Today she lives in New Mexico with her two loves -- her studio and her husband, conceptual artist Bruce Nauman.
Garcia has excelled in more than one artistic field, as his multidisciplinary background helps illustrate. After spending two years in the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute School of Architecture, he came to Cornell in 1994 as a architecture major. At Cornell he continued to excel in this area, culminating with his final architecture thesis, which examined the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library. According to Garcia, the library is a "construct of the former president's failing memory and conjectures its eventual release of history and data to the general public. The current building acts as a parasite addition, slowly expanding its territory as the underground vaults are breached and emptied."
However, as Milton Curry, Cornell assistant professor of architecture, said, the "insights [Garcia] brought to his work in film from his architecture background" are what make him stand out for the Cornell Council for the Arts honor. Highly active at both the Center for Theatre Arts and Risley Theatre, Garcia also is an emerging filmmaker. His 1996-97 film Kodachrome received a Cornell Council for the Arts grant and led to his certification as a program producer at Ithaca's Pegasys public access television station. During a semester in Rome, he completed an independent study film project, partially funded by the architecture department and Cornell Abroad's Rome program.
"The depth of Pablo's interest in the interdisciplinary connection between architectural space and film gives him a lot of promise for future development," Curry said.
This is only the second time the arts recognition awards have been extended, last year being the inaugural year of what has become an annual project of the Cultural Endeavors Committee. The committee, which operates under the Cornell Council for the Arts, was formed with the mission to "raise the visibility of the arts to trustees, Council members and other alumni, and to place Cornell in a position to recruit talented students interested in the arts."
According to Tom Scharff, a member of the committee, the alumni and student arts recognition awards are vehicles to continue to raise consciousness for the arts at Cornell. Said Scharff, "The award recognizes the importance of keeping an unbroken chain between the achievers of yesterday, today and tomorrow."
To fulfill this goal, the committee solicits and considers alumni and undergraduate nominations in an open process. The alumnus or alumna eventually honored has achieved national or international success in the arts and has a reasonable affiliation with the university. The recipient of the alumni award is expected to spend time with current Cornell students of the arts, giving the undergraduates the opportunity to learn from their experience and success. The attainment of excellence in the arts is the only requirement for the student award.
The awards ceremony is scheduled for the evening of Saturday, Sept. 12, at a reception in the lobby of the Johnson Museum on campus.
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