By establishing the Schwartz Discover Grant for Undergraduate Student Research and other experiential learning funds at Rochester, this alumni couple has made a difference in thousands of lives.

Each fall, dozens of students gather for a poster session on the Ģ����ý’s River Campus, sharing research they’ve spent months exploring—from engineering innovations to social science discoveries. For many, it’s the first time they’ve seen themselves as real researchers. And for most, the opportunity wouldn’t have been possible without the generosity of Richard “Dick” Schwartz ’63, ’66 (MS) and his late wife, Vicki Proschel Schwartz ’62.

“It’s an amazing experience to stand in a room full of undergraduates who are thrilled to talk about what they learned over the summer,” says Dick. “That kind of feedback is powerful.”

So powerful, in fact, that Dick and Vicki have increased their support every year for the Schwartz Discover Grant for Undergraduate Summer Research program, which began in 2022. Their goal: to help students engage in research early, giving them the confidence and experience to pursue opportunities that will enrich their lives and careers.

Ģ����ý 70 grant recipients each year receive up to $5,000 to help cover cost-of-living expenses during the summer. The funding allows them to fully focus on research, which often requires 40 hours of dedicated work per week.

Lilli Tamm ’25, a biochemistry major graduating this spring, says receiving the Schwartz Discover Grant for the summer after her sophomore year marked a turning point in her life. “Thinking back to the researcher I was becoming then, I could only spend a few hours each week dedicated to research during the academic year,” she explains. “Then, when I received the Schwartz Discover Grant, I could spend the summer dedicated to my research and really became a full-time scientist.”

And become one she did. That research project spanned three semesters and gradually narrowed to focus on cell membrane proteins—vital structures that influence how the body functions and responds to disease. Receiving the Schwartz Discover Grant opened the door to a competitive summer internship in pharmaceutical research following Tamm’s junior year. The experience also helped her stand out as the University’s 2024 Astronaut Scholar, a national honor recognizing the country’s top undergraduate STEM researchers. Ultimately, it culminated in her acceptance into a PhD program at Stanford University in cellular and molecular physiology.

Deep and lasting impact

Dick and Vicki Schwartz at the Schwartz Discover Grant Research Showcase, 2023

The Schwartz Discover Grant program is just one way Dick and Vicki have shaped the undergraduate experience. Over the years, they’ve established a variety of funds to support immersive learning in research, internships, the arts, and community engagement. In 2002, the couple established a student scholarship, which they later enhanced with additional funding and renamed the Proschel/Schwartz Meliora Scholarship—further amplifying support for students with demonstrated financial need

“Dick and Vicki have changed so many lives,” says Emily Rendek, director of the University’s Office of Undergraduate Research. “With all the programs they’ve supported, they’ve made experiential learning possible for thousands of students, creating pivotal opportunities that benefit our students right now. They’ve had a direct role in the future of research, scholarship, creativity, and engagement in a variety of scientific and technological areas as well as the humanities.”

For the couple, supporting experiential education has always been rooted in a shared belief that learning happens everywhere, not just through lectures and labs, but through collaboration, curiosity, and real-world application. That philosophy continues to guide their giving: help others, see the impact, and do good right now.

A legacy of learning and service

Schwartz Discover Grant Research recipients with Emily Rendek (first row, far left) and Vicki and Dick Schwartz (first row, far right), 2023

Dick says his own values of service and education were modeled by his parents, especially his father, a surgeon with the Department of Veterans Affairs. “My dad chose a medical career path with regular hours because it gave him more time to dedicate to our family and to those activities he believed in,” he says. Vicki’s parents, both teachers, also emphasized the power of education to transform lives.

As undergraduates, both Dick and Vicki were deeply involved in campus life. Dick spent his summers interning in a variety of settings, including Tropel, a Rochester-based startup founded by his professor, optics legend . For his second summer internship, he joined a friend in San Diego to assist with optics projects at the University of California. After that, Dick interned at an aerospace technology company in Boston. By the time he earned his master’s degree from the Institute of Optics, Dick had also interned with Xerox—setting the stage for a smooth transition into full-time work and a 30-year career in research and development there.

“Those internships were invaluable to me,” he says. “They gave me confidence, expanded my networks, and gave me a chance to apply what I’d been learning in a professional setting. Vicki and I always wanted others to have these kinds of vital opportunities, which is why we’ve established them.”

Vicki, whose roots were in the humanities, earned her degree in English with honors, completed a master’s in teaching at Harvard University, and then taught high school English for several years. The couple’s distinctive academic paths helped shape an approach to philanthropy that will benefit students in both STEM and the arts for years to come.

Philanthropy as a shared commitment

Giving back was always a personal decision and a shared commitment for the couple, who had two children together, Steven and Douglas, and were married 57 years at the time of Vicki’s passing in 2023. “Every year, we’d look forward to meeting students who participated in the programs we supported,” Dick says. “We loved hearing their stories, why they chose the University, and what they hoped to do in the future.”

Today, Dick continues their legacy through a donor-advised fund (DAF), which offers flexibility and transparency. It allows him to support the causes he and Vicki have cared about the most while staying actively involved in choosing when and how to give.

In addition to their philanthropic support, Dick and Vicki spent decades as volunteer leaders at their alma mater, serving on reunion committees and class councils as well as the Lifelong Learning Advisory Council and the University Libraries National Council. They have also been members of the University’s Wilson Society, which honors and celebrates those who have established life-income plans or named the Ģ����ý as a beneficiary of their estate, and the George Eastman Circle, the University’s leadership annual giving society. Additionally, Dick serves on Hajim’s National Council and the Rochester Philanthropy Council and has chaired or supported many nonprofit organizations throughout the Rochester community.

Throughout all his involvement, Dick’s greatest joy comes from seeing tangible outcomes: students exploring their potential, the University offering transformative programs, and communities made stronger in the process. “It’s a win-win-win,” he adds. “Students benefit, the University benefits, and society overall benefits. Plus, I get the joy of knowing I helped make a difference.”

Burger’s latest gift continues her legacy of philanthropy and engagement, establishes a new directorship, and launches a pilot undergraduate research program.

Rochester Trustee Barbara J. Burger ’83—a respected leader in energy transition, corporate and non-profit board member, thought leader, speaker, and community builder—has made a $2,000,000 commitment to support research, innovation, and the student experience at the URochester. Burger’s philanthropy builds on a series of gifts she has made to the University, aligning her lifelong dedication to fostering exceptional education, research excellence, and the success of faculty and staff—cornerstones of the University’s 2030 strategic plan. This gift is a continuation of Burger’s years of support, furthering the impact of her overall philanthropy while exploring new areas of discovery.

Burger’s gift will specifically provide $1,000,000 to establish the Barbara J. Burger iZone Directorship. Her commitment to iZone began in 2015 when she made a lead gift of $1,000,000 to River Campus Libraries to create the space. Named in her honor, the Barbara J. Burger iZone is a collaborative creative problem-solving environment that opened in 2018, providing students with resources to explore ideas and develop innovative projects that drive social, cultural, and community impact.

Burger’s latest gift will also provide more than $250,000 to launch the Barbara J. Burger Chemical Sustainability Scholars pilot program. Open to chemistry and chemical engineering majors after their first or sophomore year, the pilot program will provide a new pathway for exploring professional interests during a 15-month research project.

Having dedicated her career to the energy industry, Burger is keenly interested in energy transition, focusing on improving the energy system’s access, reliability, and affordability, and reducing its impact on communities and the environment. This pilot program at the University, she says, will provide an opportunity for students to address this issue directly. Additionally, $750,000 will be allocated to a general fund, reserved for future designation to support initiatives that align with the University’s priorities and Burger’s philanthropic goals.

“Barbara’s multifaceted gift highlights her unwavering advocacy for education and innovation, and underscores her dedication as an alumna, volunteer leader, and trailblazer in science and technology,” says Sarah C. Mangelsdorf, Ģ����ý president and G. Robert Witmer, Jr. University Professor. “We are tremendously grateful for her ongoing partnership and her tireless pursuit of excellence.”

Says Burger, “When I was a student here, people invested in me, sharing their time, knowledge, and financial resources. This is a key driver in me helping the next generation. Today, I have the opportunity to give back, both philanthropically and through my ideas, energy, and the relationships I develop within the Rochester family.”

A history of impact

Burger has been a longstanding supporter of the University, contributing significantly to enhance the student experience, making gifts that complement and amplify one another. For instance, her $1,250,000 gift two years ago doubled the number of students receiving the Barbara J. Burger Endowed Scholarships in the Sciences. It also provided funds for iZone to support staff and student professional development, technology, and student-centered programs. Additionally, her 2022 gift launched a five-year within the University’s River Campus Libraries, offering 22 students hands-on experience in areas like publishing, event programming, marketing, and curriculum design, all under the mentorship of library staff.

Burger’s significant influence as a University philanthropist began in 2006, when she, along with other chemistry alumni, faculty, staff, and friends, established an endowed professorship in honor of Professor Emeritus Andrew S. Kende. A few years later, she became the lead funder to a second professorship named for a mentor and key figure in her life, Professor Emeritus Richard S. Eisenberg. Over the years, Burger has also generously given to the Department of Athletics and Recreation. This includes significant support for the Timothy G. Hale Endowment for Competitive Excellence in athletics, a fund that benefits the University’s cross country and track and field programs. As an undergraduate, Burger participated in both sports as well as on the field hockey team.

“Barbara’s deep interest in student success and in providing opportunities for learners to flourish in and out of the classroom is a testament to her commitment to academic excellence,” adds Nicole Sampson, University provost. “She is completely dedicated to creating experiences and opportunities that advance discovery and innovations across many fields, and to inspiring meaningful outcomes for students, faculty, staff, and the entire University community. Her focused and far-reaching support is truly inspiring.”

A distinguished career

Barbara J. Burger is a Chevron “graduate” where she finished as the vice president of innovation and president of Chevron Technology Ventures. During her career, she held leadership positions across the company’s businesses as well as a wide range of civic and industry organizations.

Today, Burger remains focused on the challenges in energy transition, equity, and access to education. She has built an advisory and director portfolio with firms including Bloom Energy, Heliogen, Milestone Environmental Services, Emerald Technology Ventures, Energy Impact Partners, Marunouchi Innovation Partners, Syzygy Plasmonics, and Epicore Biosystems. She also proudly serves as the board president of the Houston Symphony.

Burger is an alumna of the URochester, where she serves on the Board of Trustees and chairs the University Libraries National Council. In addition to establishing the Barbara J. Burger Endowed Scholarship in the Sciences and the Barbara J. Burger iZone at the URochester, she supports graduate women in chemistry who will pursue careers beyond academia and serves on the Resnick Sustainability Institute Strategic Advisory Board at Caltech. She holds a bachelor’s in chemistry from the URochester, a PhD in chemistry from Caltech, and an MBA from UC Berkeley.

Update: Learn about the inaugural cohort of Barbara J. Burger Chemical Sustainability Scholars in this May 7, 2025 Ģ����ý New Center story.

Talent, drive, and donor generosity fuel the ambitions of this scholarship recipient

Budge is the recipient of multiple scholarships, including significant support from the Joyce Osborn Violin Scholarship, made possible through the generosity of Joyce Osborn and the Wegman Family Scholarship Challenge.

By the time Ashni Budge arrived at the , she’d already dedicated most of her life to music. She started playing the violin at just three years old. When she was five, she added the piano to her repertoire.

At about that same time, Budge’s family discovered that she had perfect pitch. Budge attributes that to her grandmother, a professional Chinese opera singer. “She taught my younger brother and me to sing,” says Budge, who grew up outside of Los Angeles. “I have vivid memories of the two of us performing and of me putting on operas for our family.”

In middle school, Budge joined the band and, even though it didn’t have a string section, she wasn’t deterred. That’s when she picked up the clarinet, which she continued playing throughout high school. She joined the choir, too.

When it came time to decide on a college, Budge knew Eastman was for her. She was drawn to its renowned reputation and that it is part of the URochester, a leading private research university with a flexible undergraduate curriculum. She was also excited to travel and live on the other side of the country.

Being a scholarship recipient has made it all possible for Budge. “Without the generosity of others, I couldn’t afford to be here,” she adds. “I can’t believe that people who don’t even know me have provided me with scholarships. Someday, I hope to help others in a similar way.”

Budge and Nicholas Garcia-Hettinger ’24E, a Hamlin Family Scholarship Fund recipient, in the Wolk Atrium, Eastman School of Music

In the meantime, Budge is taking advantage of every opportunity. Not only is she an applied music major studying violin at Eastman, she is also a psychology major and brain and cognitive sciences minor at the University’s School of Arts & Sciences. Along the way, she’s performed in live-to-picture renditions of Danny Elfman’s Batman, cofounded a string quartet with friends, called the Avant Quartet, and earned the prestigious position of concertmaster for the Eastman Philharmonia. Budge has been recognized for her academic achievements, too. She’s on the dean’s list and was inducted into Psi Chi, the International Honor Society for psychology students, as a sophomore.

In 2022, Budge and her quartet participated in what’s become a life-changing experience for her: Eastman-to-Go. This one-semester chamber music course provides select ensembles opportunities to bring music into the Greater Rochester community, with a focus on presenting classical music to new, young audiences. Budge loved it, and so did the people with whom she interacted.

For instance, at the Dr. Charles T. Lunsford School No. 19, one of the schools they visited, Budge’s influence was so significant that she was invited back for the 2023–24 academic year to give violin lessons to fifth graders. “Working with them has been among the best experiences of my life,” says Budge. “We even played a few pieces with the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra over the winter holidays, which was a thrill for us all.”

Next up for Budge? In the short term, she’s practicing for a Sibelius violin concerto and a performance of Schubert’s Cello Quintet in C Major. Long term, she hopes to go to graduate school for music. She’s even considering law school someday.

Whatever Budge does, she knows music will always play a part.

Artist and musician Dave Chisholm ’13E (DMA) presents a graphic novel on jazz legend Miles Davis.

Dave Chisholm ’13E (DMA) became fascinated with Miles Davis as a child listening to his parents’ jazz records. At 11, he started playing the trumpet, and in college and at the , he studied Davis and other jazz greats.

Now the jazz trumpeter, composer, and visual artist has realized a dream: crafting a graphic novel about the legendary musician, with participation from Davis’s own family members. In collaboration with Z2 Comics and the Miles Davis estate, Chisholm has published Miles Davis and the Search for Sound, a brilliantly colored, 150-plus-page exploration of Davis’s storied life and career, told through the jazz icon’s own words.

Chisholm and Z2 had previously collaborated on several jazz-themed books, including Chasin’ the Bird, a graphic novel about Charlie Parker, which piqued the interest of Davis’s son, Erin. As Erin Davis writes in the foreword to Chisholm’s latest book, “I was completely drawn in by Dave’s approach to Bird’s story.”

Erin Davis was connected with Z2 to explore the idea of a similar book about his father. When the project got under way, Chisholm spent several months researching and scripting the story, and nine or so months more creating the artwork. Erin Davis and Miles’s nephew, Vincent, provided Chisholm some additional insights along the way, with Vincent sharing recollections of visits to see “Uncle Miles” in New York City.

The title of the book alludes to Davis’s lifelong quest for sound. Raised in East St. Louis, Illinois, he made visits to see extended family in rural Arkansas. There, he was captivated by the sounds of blues, gospel, and honky-tonk coming from the homes he walked by. Those early experiences sparked Davis’s relentless innovation in the pursuit of “that” sound, Chisholm explains.

Later in life, after Davis suffered a debilitating stroke that left his right hand temporarily paralyzed, his doctor handed him a pencil, encouraging him to draw as a form of therapy to regain hand strength. “The pencil gave him another voice,” says Chisholm.

In his foreword, Erin Davis tells how Miles’s capacity for expressing himself through his artwork grew. “He went deep into sketching with pencils, pens, and light markers, eventually filling up dozens (maybe hundreds) of sketchbooks,” he writes. “To me, his fine-line work really has its own identity that speaks to the viewer like his trumpet and his music speak to the listener.”

Chisholm has a similar, innate grasp of the connection between visual and sound art. He adapted his artistic style to mirror the diverse phases of Davis’s music, as chronicled in the narrative.

For the text, Chisholm drew from a wealth of published interviews and Davis’s autobiography. Davis’s unapologetic and candid self-portrayal inspired Chisholm to use the icon’s own words, allowing readers to delve into Davis’s intricate character. “Davis was such a complicated person, gifted musically but with his share of personal challenges,” Chisholm says.

If Davis could have read the book, Chisholm would like to think he would have appreciated seeing his candor reflected. And what does Chisholm hope readers take away? “If readers put down this novel and then want to learn more about Miles Davis and jazz music, I’d be happy.”

Always open, always free

Outside the Memorial Art Gallery (MAG), the Centennial Sculpture Park greets and welcomes visitors. Adorned with sculptures from many renowned contemporary artists, the park—which is always open and always free—offers a vibrant place for the community to gather, reflect, and find inspiration.

In early June 2023, MAG completed the final phase of its Centennial Sculpture Park, which now includes major works by seven celebrated artists: Sanford Biggers, Deborah Butterfield, Pia Camil, Tony Cragg, Rashid Johnson, Jun Kaneko, and Nathan Mabry. This array of new art joins sculptures by Wendell Castle, Jackie Ferrara, Tom Otterness, and Albert Paley that have been on permanent display since the park opened in 2013 as a way to mark MAG’s 100-year anniversary.

“The Centennial Sculpture Park exemplifies what MAG is—an ever-evolving, urban museum,” says Michael Marsh, MAG’s chief operating officer and interim director of the gallery. “The park beautifies our grounds, introduces people to great art, and enriches the visitor experience. We invite everyone to explore it.”

SANFORD BIGGERS

(American, b. 1970)
Oracle
In the spring of 2021, Sanford Biggers’ 25-foot Oracle sculpture at Rockefeller Center caught the attention of MAG. Many months later, MAG commissioned a 9-foot version of it. Biggers’ website notes that his Oracle sculptures are part of an ongoing Chimera series, which consists of works that merge mythology and history, including Greco-Roman and African sculptures. Biggers’ work is an interplay of narrative, perspective, and history that speaks to current social, political, and economic concerns while also examining the context from which they came.

DEBORAH BUTTERFIELD

(American, b. 1949)

Untitled
Gift of Robert B. and Pamela Goergen

PIA CAMIL

(Mexican, b. 1980)
Lover’s Rainbow
The monumental 42-by-16 1/2-foot sculpture is made of painted stainless steel rebar, a material typically used to reinforce concrete’s structural integrity that is only visible when a building is in ruins or incomplete. With Lover’s Rainbow, Camil creates a vision of hope and love using a material that speaks to the challenge of building something that will last. For MAG, this is an iconic work for its expansion and a landmark for the City of Rochester that may soon prompt people to say, “Let’s meet at MAG’s rainbow.”

TONY CRAGG

(British, b. 1949)

Versus
Gift of David Brush

RASHID JOHNSON

(American, b. 1970)
Broken Pavilion
Students from the Rochester City School District’s neighboring School of the Arts (SOTA) inspired this commissioned piece. When Johnson visited MAG to explore ideas, he was drawn to the Black and Brown SOTA students mingling on Prince Street. He designed this piece to face the school yet welcome everyone—from SOTA’s developing artists to community members to museum visitors. The interior of this expansive 10-by-40-foot sculpture features non-gendered, non-raced faces, and its overall curved form invites in and embraces those who explore the pavilion.

The Rashid Johnson Community Pavilion is supported through a gift from Constellation Brands, the Sands Family Foundation, and Abby and Doug Bennett.

JUN KANEKO

(American, born in Japan, b. 1942)
Untitled, Dango
MAG’s Dango (Japanese for “dumpling”) is one in a series of monumental, glazed works created by Kaneko. Of the sculpture, Ceramics Monthly says, “In the unity of physical form and surface pattern, the Dango is like a Pyrenean boulder incised with ancient petroglyphs.” Kaneko is drawn to installations that promote civic interactions and has completed more than 60 public art commissions. Over his career, Kaneko has also partnered with industrial facilities to realize many large-scale, hand-built sculptures.

The Memorial Art Gallery gratefully acknowledges Gwen M. Greene for her generous gift to the Centennial Sculpture Park in memory of her husband, John D. Greene.

NATHAN MABRY

(American, b. 1978)

Process Art
(An Eye for An Eye)

This story also appears in the summer 2023 issue of Buzz magazine.

When it comes to images of Black people, viewers have expectations, says Bridget Cooks ’02 (PhD). Her aim is to disrupt them.

SCHOLAR AND CURATOR: Cooks is an alumnus of the Graduate Program in Visual and Cultural Studies.

A few years ago, Bridget Cooks ’02 (PhD)—an expert on visual culture, a curator, and a professor of art history and African American studies at the University of California, Irvine—posed a difficult question, first to herself as a Black American and then to several contemporary Black artists.

It was sometime after a white supremacist’s murder of eight congregants and their pastor at Charleston’s Mother Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church; after the fatal beating of Freddie Gray by Baltimore police officers, and the shooting death of motorist Philandro Castile by police in Minnesota; but still well before the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, and the deaths of Breonna Taylor in Louisville and Daniel Prude in Rochester, all at the hands of police, during the spring and summer of 2020.

She asked: “How can we acknowledge that death; how can we acknowledge that threat and find some kind of will to go on?”

Her aim, she says, was to acknowledge personal and collective trauma, and then “to look at how artists, as creative problem solvers, are trying to survive and resist and create in a moment of spectacular Black death and anti-Blackness.”

Cooks selected artists who responded to her call and mounted an exhibit. The Black Index, which received its lead funding from the Ford Foundation, opened on the Irvine campus and traveled nationally for a year. It won national acclaim in the art world and, for Cooks, a 2022 Award for Excellence from the Association of Art Museum Curators.

ARTIFICIAL AI: The Black Index includes a series of works by Dennis Delgado ’97, whom Cooks met while at Rochester. In Do the Right Thing, Delgado, uses facial recognition software to create a composite image of faces from the landmark 1989 film by director Spike Lee. The composite, which draws from a database of all facial images the software can recognize, underscores the software’s omission from the database of many Black faces. Research has indeed shown that widely used facial recognition software does a poor job recognizing darker skin tones. Delgado majored in film studies at Rochester, and later earned an MFA from City College of New York.

Photo courtesy of Dennis Delgado

In part because the exhibit coincided with the COVID-19 pandemic, it had an especially robust website, and at , viewers can still navigate it along with recordings of several accompanying conversations and lectures.

These latter images, far more pervasive in American life than ones created by Black people, compromise the full humanity of their Black subjects in favor of categorizations, she argues. To see the works in The Black Index is, for most viewers, to confront the unexpected.

A series of drawings by Lava Thomas, for example, transforms mug shots of Black women arrested for participation in the 1955 Montgomery Bus Boycott into dignified portraits. Dennis Delgado ’97, whom Cooks met at Rochester, uses facial recognition software to create composite images in a series he calls “The Dark Database.” Delgado constructed the composites from a database of facial images taken from films such as Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing and Ryan Coogler’s Black Panther. The resulting images are lighter than one might expect, given the preponderance of Black actors in the films. That’s precisely because, as research and tests have confirmed, the technology is ill-suited to recognizing darker skin tones. Many Black faces are simply not included in the vast datasets on which facial recognition software relies.

When Cooks entered the Graduate Program in Visual and Cultural Studies in the fall of 1993, Rochester was the only university in the country offering a graduate degree in the field. While art history tended to focus on an evolving canon of masterpieces, visual and cultural studies was dedicated to the study of images with reference to the social and cultural contexts of their creation and consumption. The program aligned well with Cooks’s approach to the study of art.

Her dissertation became the basis for her 2011 book Exhibiting Blackness: African Americans and the American Art Museum (University of Massachusetts Press). In it she traced the efforts of major museums to exhibit work by Black artists, beginning with the Art Institute of Chicago in 1927 right up to the early 21st century. Those efforts, intended to be forward looking, revealed a preoccupation with situating Black artists in reference to a white norm or in correcting past omissions. Neither context considered Black artists on their own terms.

The Black Index does. Cooks points to 100 ink drawings by Kenyatta A. C. Hinkle inspired by records of Black women who are murdered or disappear every year in the United States with little attention. Hinkle calls them “unportraits.” They’re not representative, in the traditional sense.

“She makes these impossible bodies,” says Cooks. “Women with six breasts, with five legs, with multiple heads. They’re moving; they’re doing things. There’s something magical and witchy about them.” Like the depictions of Black subjects by the other artists, they invite viewers to notice the gap between their expectations and what they see before them. They compel us “to be aware of how much we don’t know about these women, to be disoriented a bit, to become curious about who they are.”

The Black Index suggests a path forward for museums that have articulated the goal of diversity, equity, and inclusion in their exhibitions, collections, and programming. Cooks sees some bright spots, citing the University’s Memorial Art Gallery, which has taken significant steps toward those ends in the past decade. “I was impressed,” says Cooks, recalling a visit to the museum. “I loved the labels. I loved the selection of artwork.”

But for many, much larger museums, she has seen little progress. “I think the problems are many,” she says. Major museums tend to be hierarchical, run and largely funded by boards whose members are often at odds with their younger, more progressive curatorial staffs. Until there is widespread change in the composition of boards, she concludes, “we’re not going to see systematic change.”

At the Intersection of Optics and Art

Pioneering Silicon Valley scientist Jay Last ’51 often said his background in optics helped him better appreciate the forms and colors found in the art that he collected. Photo by Max S. Gerber for the URochester.

Considered one of the fathers of Silicon Valley, Jay Last ’51, ’11 (Honorary) had an extraordinary career in science, technology, and art. As an early leader in the development of semiconductors, he helped usher in the computer revolution. A noted African art collector, Last was among the first generation of Westerners to appreciate the continent’s visual art traditions. He died in November at the age of 92.

After graduating as an optics major in 1951, Last earned a PhD in physics from MIT in 1956. Early in his career, he joined a group of eight entrepreneurs who founded the Fairchild Semiconductor Corporation. There, Last helped develop and produce the first integrated circuit chips, work that paved the way for the computer revolution and established Silicon Valley as the epicenter of the digital world.

Often crediting his grounding in optics for providing him with a special appreciation for form and color, Last pursued his interest in art throughout his career. His collection of African art is now housed at UCLA, and his collection of mid-20th-century lithographic labels is part of the Huntington Library in San Marino, California.

“In the early days of my collecting, I and many of my friends were becoming interested in art because it was interesting geometry to us,” Last said in a 2016 interview for Rochester Review. “And the way I’ve collected art, the pieces I really appreciate the most are usually the simplest design forms, or the most imaginative design forms.”

Last is the author of The Color Explosion: Nineteenth-Century American Lithography and the coauthor, with Gordon McClelland, of five other books. In 2015, he published a memoir, African Art and Silicon Chips: A Life in Science and Art. He also founded Hillcrest Press and published books on California art, ethnic art, and graphic arts. He was a founder and member of the board of directors of the Archaeological Conservancy, a national nonprofit organization established in 1980 to preserve US archaeological sites.

Widely recognized as a scientist and humanist, Last received the Maurice Rickards Award from the Ephemera Society of America, and he was awarded the Legends of California Award from the California Historical Society. The University presented him with the institution’s highest award for alumni, the Hutchison Medal, in 2005 and awarded him an honorary degree in 2011.

A generous philanthropist who supported numerous museums and educational institutions, Last helped establish a professorship at Rochester and provided support for humanities fellowships as well as the Writing, Speaking, and Argument Program, the Language Center, and the River Campus Libraries.

His interests reflected a long-standing appreciation for how the sciences and the arts complement one another.

Ileah Welch ’05 and former First Lady Michelle Obama have something in common: both have had portraits painted by Amy Sherald, an artist who’s earning national recognition for helping bring the lives of black Americans to prominence in American art.

ART MAJOR: Welch, the subject of one of seven paintings in Sherald’s highly regarded 2019 exhibition, says the artist’s work captures the experience of African Americans in ways that are rare in major art shows. AMY SHERALD, THE GIRL NEXT DOOR, 2019; OIL ON CANVAS (137.2 X 109.2 X 6.4 CM 54 X 43 X 2 1/2 INCHES) © AMY SHERALD; COURTESY OF THE ARTIST AND HAUSER & WIRTH

Just two years after unveiling her portrait of Obama—a work that’s now in the collection of the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, DC,—Sherald mounted a solo exhibition last fall at Hauser & Wirth, an influential New York City gallery. Titled At the Heart of the Matter . . . , the suite of paintings featured portraits of African Americans.

One of the paintings was of Welch, who says the paintings are particularly moving because they beautifully and simply capture ordinary aspects of daily life for African Americans and the black community. That experience, she says, isn’t often represented in major art exhibitions.

“When I walked in, I saw the painting immediately. It took my breath away,” Welch says. “Amy highlighted the equally important parts of me, and she gave meaning to the small things in the painting, like the lipstick, my hand in my pocket, and the polka dots on the dress.”

Opening last fall, the exhibition was acclaimed for showcasing Sherald’s “smoldering yet self-contained brand of portraiture,” as a review in the New York Times described the exhibition.

Capturing her subjects’ faces in a gray monochrome—a grisaille that the artist has made her signature—Sherald places her subjects in bold settings and vibrant backdrops, resulting in paintings of confident people who “invite close, exclusive looking, a kind of communion.”

Several reviewers cited the exhibition as one of the most important of 2019. For Welch, an anthropology major at Rochester and now a child advocacy lawyer in Washington, DC, it was an unexpected honor to be painted by Sherald.

The story begins in the summer of 2018, when a friend sent Welch a screenshot of an Instagram post. An unnamed artist was holding a casting call in Baltimore that day and was looking for black models of all sizes and shapes, between the ages of 8 and 80. On a whim, Welch and her sister, who was visiting from out of town, headed to the studio.

The artist turned out to be Sherald, and in January 2019, Welch heard from the artist’s studio manager, who said Sherald wanted to paint Welch’s portrait. To fill in more of the back story: the manager later said Sherald had never used an open call to recruit models before. She didn’t like the process and doesn’t plan to do it again.

In the end, the only person Sherald chose to paint from all the people who responded to the call was Welch, who was invited back to Baltimore for a full photo shoot with Sherald. “That’s how Amy works. She takes a million photos and then she paints from them,” Welch says, remembering how nervous she was at the photo shoot. “I’m not a model and I don’t know what it’s like to ‘smile with my eyes’ or to ‘look serious’ for the camera. But Amy was great—so friendly and welcoming—and she made it easy.”

While Welch eventually found out that Sherald had completed a portrait of her, she didn’t know whether it would be in the New York exhibition until she walked into the gallery last fall. The work, a portrait titled “The Girl Next Door,” drew the eyes of reviewers as well, who found in it a companionable self-possession that drew them to wonder about the young woman’s life beyond the frame.

As the New Yorker noted: “Her look is rather guileless—far from the cool savoir of the beach people—but equal, you somehow know, to whatever daily life she is leading. She is praised by Sherald’s brush for the insouciance of her garb: the bouncy dots a tonic exception to the refinement of the abstract designs that the other subjects’ clothes provide for this painter’s aesthetic use. “What’s the neighbor’s name? I’d like to know. I almost feel that I do—on the tip of my tongue, about to come to me.”

“That’s what I felt,” Welch says, as she reflects on the ways the portraits resonate beyond a single viewing. “I saw the portrait of me,” she says. “But I also saw my mother, my sisters, and the women who came before me—and you know her, too.”

NO DRAMA, PLEASE: Michel says she prefers the wings to the spotlight when it comes to her role as a drama teacher at Monticello High School in Charlottesville, Virginia. “I like the kids to take control.”

When Madeline Topkins Michel ’77 took the stage at the Tony Awards ceremony in June to receive the 2019 Excellence in Theatre Education Award, she quickly asserted that the award wasn’t hers alone—it also belonged to her diverse group of drama students at Monticello High School in Charlottesville, Virginia.

“This award is for all of the students who have found their voice and who speak for themselves, their families, and their community through theater and playwriting,” she told the audience at Radio City Music Hall.

Michel heads Monticello’s drama department, but she came to theater through a side door. An English major at Rochester, she later earned her teaching certification in math and English and as a reading specialist.

She took a job with the Baltimore school district and discovered that the classroom is an inherently theatrical place. When faced with skeptical or unmotivated students, she made her class dramatically compelling. “Really early on, I realized the value of theater in teaching,” she says.

She also coached National History Day teams after joining the staff at Monticello. Students compete by carrying out historical research and presenting their conclusions in the format of their choice. Michel’s teams opted for play performance—and when they brought home national gold medals two years in a row, Monticello’s principal decided it was high time that Michel taught drama. Michel is modest and wry about where her career has taken her. “I’m really not a theater person—despite the Tony Award,” she laughs.

But she’s ardent about inclusive theater. A drama program should reflect the makeup of a school’s student body, but that’s not what often happens, she says. “If you have a group of kids who represent the entire school, then what you get on stage is an energy that’s completely different from what you find at most schools. Everybody’s got a backstory—an interesting backstory— and then everybody learns from everyone else.”

As a teacher, she prefers the wings to the spotlight. “I like the kids to take control,” she says. She helps them stage, choreograph, and direct works that speak to them. And they craft new plays, too. This summer, Michel was working with two groups, each writing a play that they were aiming to have in production this August.

In the wake of the white nationalist rally in Charlottesville in 2017, the Monticello drama program staged student Josh St. Hill’s one-act, rap-narrative play, A King’s Story, which examines a community’s response to violence. Student Courtney Grooms wrote the play Necessary Trouble in 2016, about responses to a high school student attending history class dressed in a shirt printed with the Confederate flag. Last fall, the program performed student Kayla Scott’s play #WhileBlack, about gentrification and the racial profiling she experienced in her hometown. Monticello brought home awards for the production from the Virginia Theatre Association.

“When my kids do a show that really has an effect on an audience, people come up afterwards to hug the actors and the playwright,” says Michel. “These were issues they were thinking about and were disturbed by, but they hadn’t seen them dramatized.”

The key to creating an inclusive theater program is patience, she says. In her classroom, “all that’s expected of you is to do what you’re comfortable with. And sometimes it takes a while for people to get comfortable. I have to be willing to let somebody sit in my class and observe for as long as they feel necessary.”

Michel says that taking part in drama builds students’ confidence and presentation skills, something they can carry with them in any endeavor. But it’s not skill building that really motivates Michel or her students.

“It’s that sense of meeting people who are different and building community,” she says. “Ninth graders are there with 12th graders, and I don’t distinguish you by your experience or your reading level or the classes you’ve had before, or anything like that.”

The stage is somewhere everyone belongs, Michel says. In her drama department, “there’s no gatekeeping.”

How does your experience in the performing arts affect your work in other fields?

Professions for some and hobbies for others, the performing arts can assert themselves in anyone’s daily life, often in unexpected ways.

In the inaugural Rochester Review alumni forum, three alumni with careers in business and technology—all with long-term involvement in the performing arts—describe how they draw on their arts experiences in the rest of their work lives.

(Illustration: Julia Joshpe)

Angela Kim ’95E

A former concert pianist, Angela Kim is the founder and CEO of Savor Beauty + Spa, transforming some of the Korean skin-care rituals she grew up with to produce organic and easy-to-apply products. The company has three New York City locations and ships worldwide through partners including Nordstrom, Neiman Marcus, and QVC.

I started making lotions and potions as a hobby in my Manhattan kitchen in between practicing Beethoven and Mozart. My chamber music colleagues began asking if they could buy the creams from me, and I became an “accidental entrepreneur.”

I was recently asked what the most challenging aspect of transitioning from concert pianist to businesswoman has been, and my response was leading a cohesive company comprised of a growing team, now with 25 employees.

I had frequently performed with a cellist, a dear friend who is now the principal cellist of one of the nation’s finest chamber orchestras. I told her of my scaling challenges, and she said something that changed my life: “You should run your company like a chamber orchestra,” she told me. “Not like a top-tier orchestra that is run like a major corporation, but like a chamber orchestra that attracts equally talented musicians who are more interested in a collaborative ensemble where their creative and artistic input matters.”

We talked through the idea. I left the brunch with my friend feeling energized and hopeful. I connected on a visceral level with the musical illustration and began to execute it.

In a chamber orchestra, the conductor has the big picture vision. It’s the conductor’s job to hear every intricate detail and determine whether it is contributing or not to the success of the whole.

The concertmaster conveys the conductor’s vision to the principals, who connect their sections to the entire ensemble. The principal’s goal is for their section not to sound like individual voices with different bowings and character, but to blend to become one with the section and, ultimately, with the orchestra.

In business, one can replace the conductor with the CEO, the concertmaster with a COO, the principals with managers, and each section with the different departments operating in a business.

A year after I began executing this new vision, we are more harmonious and cohesive, and I feel supported by the “ensemble” who works together for the overall vision that I have set forth as the “conductor.”

Is our work done? Not by a long shot, but that’s another thing music taught me. The work will never be done, and that’s the beauty of it all.

(Illustration: Julia Joshpe)

Brad Orego ’10, ’11 (T5)

Brad Orego is a user-experience researcher, product designer, entrepreneur, and dancer. He designs and builds products with Prolific Interactive and dances professionally with Kanopy Dance Company in Madison, Wisconsin, and Sokolow Theater Dance Ensemble in New York City.

Historically, I never really made an effort to bring the two worlds of dance and technology together. Then I attended a conference called DevOpsDays Madison. One of the speakers urged me to start thinking about my experience straddling the two, as it’s such a unique perspective in the tech industry. At another event last March, the NYC Service Design Jam, I met Tim Gilligan, a designer who also has a background in theater, and who also urged me to dig into this perspective.

Tim and I recently launched a blog called “Performing Design: Informing Design Practices with Lessons from Performing Arts” (http://performing. design). It turns out there’s a lot more material there than I ever really thought about. For example, I write about embodied cognition, which is a fairly recent concept in cognitive science that explores how we use our bodies—beyond just the brain—to help us perceive, interpret, and understand the world. Embodied cognition is imperative for dancers, who use the physical sensation of moving their bodies through space to both understand and remember choreography. But it helps designers as well by teaching them to try to physically interact with something they’ve sketched out.

I started dancing at Rochester. I never imagined that a ballroom dancing class would have catapulted my interest in all things dance and would inform my approach to technology and problem- solving, nor would I have thought I would have been able to live a life in both worlds. But, I have. My dual degree in computer science and psychology, combined with a minor in dance (I was the first dance minor granted by the University), has given me a perspective that no one else has.

(Illustration: Julia Joshpe)

Mark Perlberg ’78

Mark Perlberg is president and CEO of the human resources firm Oasis Outsourcing, a leading business in the industry with more than 1,000 employees. He also serves on the boards of the Minneapolis-based Playwrights’ Center, which is focused on developing new work, and the nonprofit theater company Palm Beach Dramaworks, where he is cocreator and executive producer of the Master Playwright Series.

I was consumed by theater when I was a student at Rochester. I did some acting and then, as a sophomore, I directed a Drama House production of Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men. I didn’t have any experience with directing at the time, but it showed me I had an aptitude and an appetite for it. I went on to direct two musicals along with many other productions in college, and have continued my involvement in theater to this day.

My experience in theater has benefited my professional work in that, above all else, it has taught me about people. It has given me the “soft” skills that are so important in business. From the stage, I’ve learned that everyone is different and that getting everyone to perform at their best requires the ability to ascertain what makes each one “tick.” Ultimately, a director is in charge of making a performance happen and producing a cohesive event that makes an impact on people.

It’s what a CEO does, too. I love directing and I always have—whether it’s for a stage production or within the parameters of doing business. You have to get people to cooperate with one another to achieve results. You have to build an environment where people can communicate openly and where there’s a high degree of trust. You also have to be comfortable experimenting, building consensus, testing ideas, and responding to audience or customer feedback.

I find I use my directing skills every day.