Hey. . . Stella! New Professorship to Honor President Wiesel MICHAEL DAMES Orsten N
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news¬es NOVEMBER 20, 1998 VOLUME 9, NUMBER 9 THE ROCKEFELLER UNIVERSITY Hey. Stella! New professorship to honor President Wiesel MICHAEL DAMES orsten N. Wiesel’s presidency will be honored with the creation of Tthe Torsten N. Wiesel Professorship. The professorship, which recognizes Wiesel’s leadership through- out a period of growth and revitaliza- tion, was announced last night (Nov. 19) by Board Chairman Emeritus Richard Furlaud at a dinner held in Wiesel’s honor at the Rainbow Room in Rockefeller Center. Members of the Board of Trustees and other leading benefactors of the university con- tributed gifts totalling $5.4 million to endow the chair. Retiring President Torsten Weisel will have a new pro- “The usual grant required to endow fessorship named in his honor. The announcement a university professorship is $3 million, was made last night at a party at the Rainbow Room. but the Board wanted this to be a special chair,” said Furlaud. “We set our sights The Torsten N. Wiesel Professorship on $5 million and exceeded it.” Three will be reserved for an outstanding million dollars will be designated as senior scientist recruited from outside endowment, and $2.4 million will be the university. A search for a senior sci- used to construct and equip a modern entist to fill the chair will commence Passersby did a double-take when they saw Frank Stella posing with his sculpture The Tail laboratory facility. shortly. last week in the Weiss Building. “Who is that man touching our art?” people wondered before realizing that it was the artist himself. Stella was on campus for a panel discussion on museum expansion (see article below) and strolled over to Weiss to see his sculpture. The Tail, part of a Cohn forum series inspired by Melville’s Moby Dick, was donated to the university by David Rockefeller. It is not Stella’s only connection to the RU campus, however; his son, Michael Stella, was a summer RU alumnus Barry Bloom ’63 to helper in the Hanafusa lab in 1989. discuss ethics of an AIDS vaccine At RU, art world mulls museum aesthetics arry Bloom, a Rockefeller University alumnus, will discuss Bethical issues in AIDS vaccines on at the next Cohn Forum on Mon., Nov. MICHAEL DAMES 30. Although combinatorial drug thera- pies have had promising results combat- BLOOM OF BARRY COURTESY ting HIV (the virus that causes AIDS), they are not widely available outside of the industrialized world (see “The Road to Remission and the Challenges Ahead,” News&Notes, Oct. 30). A vaccine sounds like the answer to the epidemic, but how should it be tested? Bloom notes that Barry Bloom will discuss ethics of an AIDS vaccine any patient in a vaccine trial who on Mon., Nov. 30. He has recently been named becomes infected with HIV must, ethi- Dean of Harvard’s Faculty of Public Health. Architect Philip Johnson’s witticisms drew appreciative laughter from his fellow panelists. From left to right: cally, be offered combination therapy if it artist Frank Stella; Johnson; moderator Suzanne Stephens; Bernard Tschumi, dean of Columbia School of is available; thus researchers won’t be Distinguished Research in Infectious Architecture; Maxwell Anderson, director of the Whitney Museum ; and author Victoria Newhouse. able to know whether the vaccine or the Diseases. Last June, Harvard University therapy was responsible for protection President Neil Rudenstine announced that Architect Wallace K. Harrison, who Suzanne Stephens, included such art against the disease. The developing Bloom had been chosen the next dean of designed several buildings on the RU world stars as Frank Stella; architect nations, where combination therapy is Harvard’s Faculty of Public Health. He campus, once said that “without the Philip Johnson; the dean of the not readily available, may be a better will start this new job on Jan. 1, 1999. other arts, architecture is like a bald Columbia School of Architecture, clinical testing ground, but trials in the The Cohn Forum is a series of collo- baby or a bald old man.” Fittingly, Bernard Tschumi; and the director of developing world, if they are not done quia on issues in health and biomedi- Harrison’s Caspary Auditorium was the the Whitney Museum, Maxwell well, inevitably raise ethical issues. cine. Bloom’s lecture will take place in setting for a recent panel discussion Anderson. The panelists came at the Bloom will try to present these issues the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Dining about the relationship between a muse- problem from different backgrounds, and will take questions from the floor Room at 5:30 p.m. and will be preceded um’s architecture and the art it displays. trying to find a way to balance aesthet- afterward. by a sherry reception at 5:00 p.m. All Victoria Newhouse (who wrote a book ic ideals with the messy realities of Bloom is currently an investigator at are welcome. The Cohn Forum’s website about Harrison) was on the RU campus budgets and staff limitations. They did the Howard Hughes Medical Institute is http://www.rockefeller.edu.pubinfo. to discuss her new book, Wings that not agree on how museums should and the Weinstock Professor of cohn.html. Don’t Fly. solve their space crunch, but the Microbiology and Immunology at the By “wings,” Newhouse means the evening did highlight the close inter- Albert Einstein College of Medicine in additions to museums that, in her view, play between art and its setting. New York. His laboratory at Albert Around campus often destroy the integrity of their origi- Johnson quipped that Stella is an Einstein has played a key role in recent 2 nal structures. (She dismissed I.M. Pei’s artist who wants to be an architect, breakthroughs in tuberculosis research. famous pyramid, for example, saying while he is “an architect who wants to Bloom has also served on a number of Parting parties that it made the Louvre look like a shop- be a painter.” Then with masterful national committees relating to public 3 ping mall.) comic timing, the 92-year-old dead- health, and in 1991 he received the first The discussion panel, moderated by panned, “I don’t think I’ll make it.” Bristol-Myers Squibb Award for 4 Calendar 2 news¬es NOVEMBER 20, 1998 Music news at RU RU tennis court lighting is upgraded With “Dr. Ruth” Westheimer he U.S. Open makes night tennis seem so glamorous, so quintessen- narrating, a children’s story Ttially New York. Now RU tennis aficionados can have that Center Court gets a grown-up twist experience right here on campus. As part of a broader effort to improve the quality of life at the university, new, brighter lights have been installed to make after- LEIF CARLSSON dark play easier on the eyes. The lights are pinpointed to illuminate only the court, so residents of nearby buildings The campus put up with a temporary eyesore to won’t have to feel as though they too are get new lights that are easier on sore eyes. at the stadium. Employee Recognition Program 1998 List of Honorees The Employee Recognition Program will take place at 3:00 p.m., Mon., Nov. 30, in the Weiss Cafe. The following employees will be honored for their service to RU. The Goldilocks cast and composer took a curtain call after their Tri-institutional Noon Recital last Friday. From left to right: Frank Almond (violin), Bruce Adolphe (composer), Richard Brice (viola), Ruth Westheimer 20 Years Roman Burzynski Ian Huggins (narrator), Constance Emmerich (piano), Daniel Rothmuller (cello) and Ronald Roseman (oboe). Adelaide Acquaviva James Carozza Ann Jackson Michael Chen Kathleen Cassidy Jacqueline Mulero oldilocks and the Three Bears may Perhaps this is an update (with a nod to Carmine Denisi Margaret Conde Sonoko Ogawa sound like an odd choice to fol- Yogi Bear?), or perhaps it’s just a vehicle George Drummond Marta Delgado Jane Otto Glow a program of Haydn and for Adolphe’s classical arrangement of Armand Gazes Ismael Diaz Maggi Pack Mozart, but the casting of “Dr. Ruth” 99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall, which the Arquelio Negron Anthony Drummond Ruben Peraza Westheimer as the narrator made last Goldilocks family “sings” on the way to Michael Perrino Chandra Edwards Ecie Prince Friday’s recital by An die Musik ( a wind, the park. Either way, the music was Elauterio Robles Sonia Espejon-Reynes Dennis Rivera string and piano quintet) even more strong enough to avoid being upstaged Cecilia Unson-O’Brien Lanie Fleischer Romualda Rodriguez intriguing. Composer Bruce Adolphe by the recital’s celebrity narrator. Rosemary Williams Victoria Freedman Magdalena Rondiak was on hand to introduce his new work, Anyone who has ever heard Andrew Gallina Ismael Ramon Serra which is in the tradition of Prokofiev’s Westheimer’s radio programs knows that 10 Years Celia Gonzalez Eileen Silver Peter and the Wolf, with different instru- the famous sex therapist has a distincitve Anthony Agosto Sara Gonzalez Monica Sweeney ments playing different roles (for exam- voice, but not the kind usually associat- Andres Asencio Robert Gualtieri Clifton Watt ple, the cello, viola, and violin portray ed with the concert stage. Her rendition Milton Brown Michael Hayre Csaba Laszlo Zemlenyi Papa Bear, Mama Bear and Baby Bear, offered what Adolphe called “subtext,” Alex Buenaventura Angela Howell respectively). allowing the composition to work on What kind of composer tries to several levels. express musically a cold bowl of por- The audience laughed nervously ridge? Obviously one with a great sense when she got to the “somebody’s been Potpourri of humor, and Adolphe’s wit permeates sleeping in my bed” line, as though they the piece.