Dean’s Insider: A farewell and a new chapter for the College of Fine Arts
One last excelsior.
After 15 years as dean and five before as senior associate dean, this is my final week “deaning” for the College of Fine Arts. I want to take this parting moment to say thank you to all of our friends, supporters and advocates, both on and off campus.
I’ve been flattered by the observation that this has been a period of great change for the college. Some of that change was sought out, and some was thrust upon us. Embracing change has come not a moment too soon in the fast-changing worlds of education, technology, culture and commerce. The creative disciplines that make up this college—and those newly finding their way in—are at a confluence of wild streams of innovation that make for hazards as well as world-changing opportunities, if we harness them.
I’m immodest enough to believe the College of Fine Arts is the most innovative public arts college in the country.
As a creative college, I’ve asked that we embrace the future as much as nurture our past; we’re big enough to be modernists in the morning and classicists in the evening. We can honor the high traditions of our shared culture while being irreverently populist in our inclusivity. I’ve insisted that we celebrate the well-turned hand every bit as much as the sagacious insight and the perfected performance just the same as startling acts of spontaneity. I’ve asked that we recognize the creativity in technological invention and entrepreneurial adventure as much as in selfless acts of artistic genius. I’ve never let the arts be treated as a decorative embellishment on this ambitious Forty Acres in this headstrong state. I’ve insisted that our students’ interests always figured first in measures of our own accomplishments as a faculty and a college.
The vision, so far as there was one, emerged of its own out of these contentious and sometimes irreconcilable aspirations.
And if we as a college have become all that, it’s in no small part because of the ambition and steadfast commitment of our Fine Arts Advisory Council, and our many friends and alumni. I’ve been humbled by your generosity, honored by your trust, and blessed by your friendship.
I am hugely optimistic about our future, as well as the future of the arts in public education—and all the more so for the rejuvenating leadership of our new dean, Dr. Ramón H. Rivera-Servera.
Being dean of the College of Fine Arts has been an enormously rewarding, creative challenge. I’ll miss it—most of it, anyway. And all of you. Thank you.
I could not be more eager to get back to teaching, and writing and thinking—more deeply and calmly—about the place of the arts in our lives, with the hope that I might contribute a bit of truth and beauty to a world in need of both.
In the next issue of Dean’s Insider and moving forward, you’ll be hearing from Dr. Rivera-Servera in this newsletter. I hope you’ll join me in giving him your warmest welcome.
