FALL 2017 Between Fire and Water

Making a Monster

The Balance of Sound

Commuter Marriages

The magazine of Lehigh University’s College of Arts and Sciences

ZOELLNER ARTS CENTER: Still Groundbreaking

COLLEGE OF ARTS & SCIENCES Contents Message from the Dean

16 when many pundits to impact their respective fields. CONTRIBUTORS expound the virtues Ricardo Viera, director and curator of technical training, of Lehigh University Art Galleries, yet an arts education has grown a teaching collection from EDITOR is critical in fostering 2,500 pieces to 15,000 and created Robert Nichols the abilities required a renowned hands-on learning CAS ADVISORY BOARD of graduates as they environment for Lehigh students. Donald E. Hall, dean enter careers. Students Stephanie Watts, associate professor Diane Hyland, Jackie Krasas, Dominic Packer, 20 who perform on stage, of English, is receiving well-deserved Cameron Wesson, associate deans scotch roman work backstage, create national and international acclaim GRAPHIC DESIGNER in the studio, or find for her ground-breaking new novel. 12 Kayley LeFaiver a voice through the During my tenure as dean, I CONTRIBUTING WRITERS written word, develop have had many opportunities to Violet Baron skills such as innovation, creativity, meet with alumni who speak of the Leslie Feldman critical thinking, communication, enduring mark that Lehigh’s arts Lori Friedman collaboration, and self-direction. programs left on them. If you haven’t Geoff Gehman ’89 M.A. Teaching the arts is, at its most been to campus in a while, I invite ON THE COVER: Jennifer Marangos In a State of basic element, teaching experi- you to come back and attend a Robert Nichols Rejuvenescence mentation, risk-taking, and new performance or spend time in one Kurt Pfitzer by David Cerulli at knowledge generation. Americans of our galleries. Lehigh’s reputation Zoellner Arts Center 22 05 Christopher Quirk Weld Royal ’88 for the Arts argues: “teaching is due to the energetic people who creativity develops critical thinking, form the heart of an educational PHOTOGRAPHERS engages students and fosters institution and the soul of students’ Daria Amato innovation.” Lehigh promotes its educational experience. A university’s UP FRONT FEATURES Douglas Benedict Christa Neu ability to develop leadership and reputation is also strengthened MESSAGE FROM THE DEAN LIKE A GREAT COMET Nathalie Schueller innovative skills in our students by the support of its alumni. 01 Fostering a Creative Campus 10 Actor, singer, composer Gelsey Bell ’04 and these talents come to the I welcome comments from pushes artistic boundaries with her Acumen is published twice a year fore in the College of Arts and alumni and look forward to the multi-dimensional career by the College of Arts and Sciences Sciences. When exposed to the feedback I receive with each THE ARTS at Lehigh University. arts, students learn to approach issue. If you know of someone Between Fire and Water … Haunted … STILL GROUNDBREAKING 02 COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES challenges as opportunities. Closer Than They Appear Zoellner Arts Center builds on a rich cultural 12 Lehigh University Working with their professors, heritage as it shapes a creative campus Fostering a 9 West Packer Avenue their fellow musicians, artists, AN ADVOCATE FOR THE ARTS Bethlehem, PA 18015 actors, and technical staff, THE HUMANITIES www.cas.lehigh.edu As head of Lehigh University Art Galleries, Creative Campus they learn to collaborate and Harraga … Making a Monster … 16 04 Ricardo Viera has assembled a world-class READER FEEDBACK: problem solve. Their critical The Whole Person art collection that provides students with Please send comments to: thinking skills improve and This issue explores the important impact of the arts at Lehigh hands-on experiences found nowhere else [email protected] they learn valuable perspec- THE NATURAL SCIENCES © 2017 Lehigh University. tives in dialogue with others. MAKING MUSIC, WRITING CODE AND The Balance of Sound … The College is home to an 06 CREATING A PORTFOLIO CAREER Weakly Coordinating Anions … 18 The fall 2017 issue of Acumen amazing community of faculty How a software entrepreneur builds a facebook.com/CAS_Lehigh The Foundation of Everything marks the five-year anniversary of and students. In this issue, music publishing business twitter.com/Lehigh_CAS the College of Arts and Sciences you will meet Gelsey Bell ’04 NO ONE IS COMING TO SAVE US producing a magazine about and who is finding success as THE SOCIAL SCIENCES Stephanie Powell Watts re-envisions for its alumni. Since 2012, I’ve a singer, composer, and actress. who will make a good story, send War and Democratic Transitions … 20 08 The Great Gatsby in her new novel enjoyed discovering wonderful You will discover Casey Rule ’11, us a note at acumen@lehigh. Historicist Narratives … stories about CAS alumni making who has founded an online choral edu. Please enjoy this issue of Commuter Marriages A LEGACY OF LEARNING a difference in many ways. publishing company, as well as Acumen. I look forward to hearing Lewis Baer ’72 is proud of his family’s INSERT FSC 22 This issue thematically explores theatre major and Horger Scholar your thoughts and comments. connection to Lehigh LOGO HERE. the importance of the arts at Lehigh Kalyani Singh. Lewis Baer ’72 talks STANDING AT THE INTERSECTION and the impact they make on many about his lifelong connections Donald E. Hall OF ART AND POLITICS of our students. We live in a time to Lehigh. Our faculty continue Herbert and Ann Siegel Dean

24 Acumen is printed using vegetable-based inks. NEU CHRISTA IMAGE: COVER DOUGLAS BENEDICT THEISPOT.COM, TSONG / JING Kalyani Singh ’18 prepares for a future of theatre and social justice LEHIGH UNIVERSITY • COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES 1 The Arts

ART by New Orleans Voodoo Priestess were open and all of the Italian MUSIC Dance Company. Salerni’s 2012 THEATRE disorienting to not have a horizon Miriam Williams. Chupa’s work was homes that had an altar opened ballet FABLES was written for line. If you alter the horizon line, the Between Fire and Water on display as part of a summerlong their homes to the public. The idea Haunted RIOULT. Supported by a grant Closer Than audience is more willing to accept Each March 19, residents of New exhibition at Bethlehem’s Banana was to open your home to strangers Haunted, a dance opera for bari- from Lehigh’s Humanities Center, They Appear where they are, which, in this case, Orleans celebrate the Catholic feast Factory. The collection of 33 and feed the poor. At some point, tone, three dancers, string quartet Salerni performed three scenes Closer Than They Appear is a play is a simultaneous imagined and real of St. Joseph. The feast of St. Joseph photographs chronicles the Mardi Gras Indians and percussion, is the latest from Haunted in a workshop this that tells the story of an encounter space. It’s virtual. The objective is to was brought to New Orleans by Williams’ altar room started celebrating on collaboration between California’s spring at Zoellner Arts Center. between an American soldier and an thousands of Sicilians who came between Hurricane St. Joseph’s Day. The poet laureate Dana Gioia and “We got some good feedback Iraqi girl in Fallujah in 2003. Scenic to the city in the late 1800s. On Katrina and a fire assumption is before Lehigh composer Paul Salerni. from the performance, and I subse- design for this new play is a current Anna Chupa’s altar, on display at a that destroyed I-10 went in, there Haunted is a 200-line poem quently went out to California to project of Melpomene Katakalos. recent exhibition, Sicilian traditions Williams’ temple wasn’t a sharp divi- that is a first-person tale of a young work on the piece with Dana,” Written by Christine Evans, Closer merge with New Orleans Voodoo in 2016. sion between neigh- man who feels out of place in his Salerni says. “Given what we learned Than They Appear is a ghost story influences to honor the patron saint. Long interested borhoods that the wealthy lover’s family mansion from the workshop, we revamped for the digital war age. Written for The story goes that Sicily was in Vodun, Chupa interstate imposed.” one weekend. He sees the ghost the structure of the piece, cutting multimedia performance, it incorpo- ravaged by drought and famine has for decades As part of the of a beautiful woman who tells much of the spoken narration and rates projections from Virtual Iraq, centuries ago. The people prayed been attracted to the St. Joseph Day tradi- him, “You don’t belong here.” The re-imagining the final moments an immersive virtual reality program to their patron, St. Joseph, for connections between tion, families take pride poem is part of Gioia’s latest book, of the piece. We also watched a used in veterans’ Post-Traumatic deliverance from these trials. The spiritual altars, the Mardi Gras in setting up an altar in the 99 Poems: New and Selected. video of Michael’s choreography Stress Disorder therapy. It tracks the rains came, the crops grew, and Indians’ appearance on St. Joseph’s living room—or perhaps taking over Salerni, the NEH Distinguished for the third scene, a dance twin fates of Michael, an African- the people of Sicily never forgot feast day and the importance of an entire garage. Many families Chair in the Humanities and of seduction and betrayal. The American veteran, and Zaynab, their promises to honor St. Joseph. Black Hawk in New Orleans. Black contribute either baked items or professor of music, thought it beauty of that dance confirmed an Iraqi teenager who is video Sicilian families would lay out Hawk was a Native American Sauk cash to the cause. The faithful will would make an interesting opera. blogging from Fallujah’s war zone baked goods and other delica- and Fox tribe leader who lived from then go around the city, from altar “I got this idea about a year Paul Salerni through the lens of the technologies cies on a table for St. Joseph’s 1767 to 1838 and possessed a to altar, visiting family and friends. ago,” says Salerni. “Dana was at the that aid and connect them. Their totally immerse the audience in the Melpomene Katakalos’ Day. These traditions traveled with reputation as both a warrior who They will stop for a prayer or two, West Chester poetry conference, worlds collide in Michael’s virtual experience. It’s interesting to explore scenic design of Closer Than They Appear. arriving immigrants and assimi- resisted governmental oppression then leave some coins to help offset which he founded, so I went down therapy room through the powerful virtual reality and bring it to the stage lated into New Orleans culture. and a man who could show mercy. the costs of setting up the altar. and spoke with him. We’ve worked Virtual Iraq animated landscapes. in a way that looks at this sense For more than 20 years, Chupa, “There is no causal intersection Left-over money is then donated together many times, and I’ve been In the end, the war trauma Michael of what’s on the edge of reality.” professor of design and chair of the between the Sicilian traditions and to the poor. On the way out, guests trying to get him to write a libretto recalls, and Zaynab experiences, Katakalos worked with media department of art, architecture and St. Joseph and the Voodoo tradi- will stop and pick up a “lucky for a second opera. When I saw demands and receives a reckoning. designer Jared Mezzocchi to create design, has been photographing tions,” Chupa says. “On St. Joseph’s bean,” a fava bean symbolizing the this poem, I said this could turn This is a revisited script for images for the scenery. The intent the evolution of an altar created Day, all of the Italian grocery stores restoration of the crops in Sicily. into something unique. Dana also Katakalos, an assistant professor was to create overlapping images saw the possibilities, suggesting of theatre. She originally designed that support the narrative and add that much of the story could be it three years ago for the HERE Arts to the sense of overlapping reali- Money left at St. Joseph’s altar (above). Anna Chupa’s photographs chronicle the communicated through dance. So our conviction that dance could Center in New York City, where, in a ties. Doing this allowed Mezzocchi connections between Sicilian traditions, we decided on a mixture of opera, communicate much of the story.” workshop setting, artists experienced to project images of Zaynab into Voodoo, and Black Hawk in New Orleans. narration, slides and ballet. Dana Salerni envisions completing the technology for the first time. Michael’s reality—and vice versa. The likes to call it a ‘dance opera.’ And the work by the end of the year “That was a great experience in video is shot so as to convey to the the theme is timely because the with a premiere performance New York, but we’ve always wanted relationship that develops between interest in ghosts is big these days.” at Lehigh during the 2018-19 to tour it,” she says. “We wanted to the soldier and this young girl. Written as a six-scene, one-act season. After a quick count, he revive it in some way because it’s “It was great. We were sketching opera, Haunted is the second says he and Gioia have worked still very relevant. Three years later, on notebook paper and really working operatic venture between Gioia together on nearly 20 projects. the technology is more advanced. together because we’re creating and Salerni. The pair created Tony Gioia is an internationally It’s amazing. It’s brought new ideas this total environment in tandem,” Caruso’s Final Broadcast, for which acclaimed and award-winning to the script. Before, it was very says Katakalos. “That relationship Gioia wrote the libretto and Salerni poet. Before his role as poet narrative. Now it’s much more liminal is crucial because what surfaces I composed the music. The work won laureate, he was chairman of the space, which affects the set.” pick, what edges I pick really matter. the National Opera Association award National Endowment for the Arts. At The set is designed to convey a There was this wonderful back and for best new chamber opera and was Lehigh, Salerni teaches composi- sense of disorientation. Edges of the forth of information, as I created premiered in Los Angeles in 2008. tion and theory and directs the set transition smoothly into the floor these wonderful surfaces on which Joining this project is choreog- Lehigh University Very Modern to reduce the audience’s perception he can create these layered images. rapher Michael Spencer Phillips, Ensemble (LUVME). Salerni’s latest that they are in a specific space. It’s more interesting to create whom Salerni knows from Phillips’ CD, Speaking of Love, features “It’s difficult to discern what is something that an audience hasn’t

work as a dancer with the RIOULT ANNA CHUPA, DOUGLAS BENEDICT, COURTESY OF MELPOMENE KATAKALOS songs of poems by Gioia. real and what is not,” she says. “It’s experienced that adds to the story.”

2 ACUMEN • FALL 2017 LEHIGH UNIVERSITY • COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES 3 The Humanities

MODERN LANGUAGES & LITERATURES discussion regarding transnation- grants as intruders. The intruder is 17th birthday, he was locked up in lenges traditional emphasis on phenomena are emergent in under- alism and notes that these works an ambivalent figure of the relation- the Massachusetts State Prison, the concept of substance itself, in lying biochemical processes. Harraga demonstrate a need to reassess ship that occurs when a concrete where he grew into adulthood and addition to challenging the split “Philosophy and science In 1976, French philosopher Michel the idea of migration between or abstract subject or object is old age. He finally died in 1932, between substance and mind. have been caught in this meta- Foucault described the advent of a France and North Africa, he says. introduced and/or is designated still in prison and still notorious. “The world of particles and physical split,” he says. “You either new logic of government, specific to Berrada is comparing two ways and perceived as an intruder some- Making a Monster is a branch atoms is a world of facts,” he says. posit two separate metaphysical Western liberal societies. He called in which people look at the world. where in a set, domain or series. of Keetley’s earlier research into “The world of thoughts, which can realms—Aristotle’s matter and form, it biopolitics, a complex concept On one hand is biopolitics and the world of 19th-century criminals, be true or false, and reasoning, Descartes’ non-thinking substance that has been used in social theory demographics; the other espouses particularly fictional, first-person which can be rational or irrational, and thinking substance—or you to examine the strategies and the views of the oppressed. Berrada ENGLISH narratives of female serial killers. is a world of normativity. I argue try to explain everything on the mechanisms through which human examines works that give voice that these two worlds of the mind mental side, in which case you lives are managed under regimes to those who cannot speak and Making a Monster and of facts have been split since get an idealism with someone of authority over knowledge, power whose authors provide alterna- When 12-year-old Jesse Pomeroy PHILOSOPHY the pre-Socratic Greeks. It’s not like Hegel or Green, or you try to and the processes of subjectiva- tive views as to what constitutes tortured seven small boys in the necessary that it be this way. explain everything on the natural tion. With Foucault’s biopolitics as borders. These narratives represent Boston area and then went on to The Whole Person It’s possible to think of mental world side, like Hobbes, Hume and a springboard, Taïeb Berrada is the details and the experience of brutally murder two other children, The history of science is a narra- phenomena as emerging from other the contemporary world. We have examining Francophone literature harraga, bring to light a fragment of one of the most striking aspects for any child, and he was living in tive of how humans view the world sorts of phenomena, but to get been caught in this assumption that and its relationships to addressing the journey and explore it with new of the case was his inability to constant, severe pain. That’s likely around them and the reexamination to that point, we have to go back everything is natural, but everything migration and immi- meanings. He is particularly inter- answer the question of why he did why it distorted his personality so of our assumptions about our place through and undo what I consider is natural without emergence. But gration policies. ested in the metonymic functioning what he did. Whether in court or much he became what we now call in the world. Theoretical psychologist to be some errors that go back over in order to get to emergence, we Berrada, asso- of harraga narratives (a fragment in the newspapers, many experts a psychopath. Back then, many Mark Bickhard has focused consider- 2,000 years. Without an underlying have to go back to process.” ciate professor or a part that refers to a whole): tried to explain his horrifying acts. argued that he was ‘morally insane.’” able energy trying to understand how basic process for metaphysics, we of French and biopolitics as a representation Despite those efforts, and attempts Other authors have recently minds emerge from, and yet remain can’t get started on understanding Francophone of the whole (anonymous crowds since, the mystery remains. asserted that Pomeroy was beaten as integrated with, the world of facts. these emergent phenomena.” studies in the of clandestine migrants crossing In her latest book, Making a a child by his father and came to take This is a problem because Part of his current research department of borders) vs. harraga narratives as Monster, Dawn Keetley, professor pleasure in the torture of others. It has the standard understanding holds focuses on the central nervous modern languages a representation of only a fragment and chair of English, details the story commonly been held that Pomeroy did that we cannot derive norms from system, trying to explain how and literatures, is of the whole but that generate a of Pomeroy’s crimes and the intense to other young boys what his father facts, yet minds and persons are different sorts of phenomena using Foucault to counter-discourse to biopolitics. public outcry. She explores the two did to him, but Keetley argues that inherently normative. There is a of the mind are realized investigate various By using this metonymy, it gives governing theories at the time—that there is no evidence this is the case. historic split between the world of in its processes. This Migrants living in a aspects of illegal immigration in us an alternative or a contrasting he was molded psychologically “I haven’t found a shred of hard minds and the world of facts, and requires an account of camp walk past a sign France by analyzing novels and view to biopolitics and, therefore, a before birth when his pregnant evidence that Jesse Pomeroy’s father this split is a basic metaphysical how normative mental posted along a road that leads to the films and critiquing the current political stance against dominant mother visited a slaughterhouse and beat him,” she says. “I know that’s division in Western thought. town of Calais. postmodern and postcolonial inter- discourses on illegal migration. that he imitated brutal acts found our favorite theory of what causes Bickhard, the Henry R. Luce pretations of displacement and exile. “These works help me better in popular dime novels. And she psychopathic torturers and killers— Professor of Cognitive Robotics The phenomenon of harraga, where understand the ideas surrounding offers a new theory—that Pomeroy that it’s about child abuse. He could and the Philosophy of Knowledge, illegal immigrants burn their docu- immigration and the concept of suffered a devastating reaction to have been abused as a child, but explains that “a new metaphysics ments and cross borders between borders—not in terms of geopolitical a smallpox vaccination, altering his there is no evidence to support it. He is needed if we are to develop true North Africa and Europe, has been terms, but rather a reconceptualiza- brain and creating a psychopath. was an avid reader of dime novels models of the normativities of mind. the topic of many literary and tion of borders,” Berrada says. “They “Boston was in the midst of from the time he was about 9 years It is only when science studies cinematic works. Berrada posits that are not aligned. They are more a set a smallpox epidemic at the time,” old, particularly Western dime novels minds and persons that we run into the concept of borders has itself of networks. Borders are much more she says. “The commonwealth told about life on the frontier. How he this fundamental problem of norma- Mark Bickhard’s changed. It is more than geographic, diffused. It’s more the experience everyone to have their children tortured young boys is very similar tivity—of true and false, rational and work focuses on and his current book project exam- of the border that counts the most. vaccinated, but the vaccination to descriptions in dime novels. There irrational and so on—in the factual understanding ines the ways in which these works In a way, a border starts at home. wasn’t all that safe. His mother took is a connection, and his reading world.” In his book project, The how minds emerge from, help readers reconsider, reshape and Migrants lack political representation, him to a public clinic, and he had a did have an effect on his life.” Whole Person, he tests this divide and yet remain redefine the notion of borders within so these narrative have replaced it.” horrible reaction. His mother noted Pomeroy was the youngest between the world of minds and integrated with, which individuals as well as their Berrada’s project is an expan- how from age one month to six person to face the death penalty in the world of facts. He focuses on the world of facts. bodies are confined to a space of sion of work he addressed in his last months, he was covered in weeping Massachusetts. He was sentenced the evolutionary and developmental “discipline and punishment” before book, La figure de l’intrus: represen- abscesses, including one over his to be executed, but his judgment emergence of normative phenomena becoming disposable commodities. tations postcoloniales (The Figure of eye, which left a permanent white was commuted by the governor to out of prior forms of process. These narratives about, or by, illegal the Intrusion: Maghreb Post-Colonial cast. That must have had all kinds life in prison in solitary confine- Bickhard, who holds dual faculty immigrants constitute a “clandestine” Representations). In that work, he of effects on his personality. That’s ment. On Sept. 7, 1876, just appointments in the departments

argument that interrupts mainstream addressed ideas surrounding immi- a critical period developmentally DENIS CHARLET / AFP GETTY IMAGES, ANNA & ELENA BALBUSSO THEISPOT.COM, SCIENCE SOURCE under three months shy of his of philosophy and psychology, chal-

4 ACUMEN • FALL 2017 LEHIGH UNIVERSITY • COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES 5 The Natural Sciences

BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES Matthew Kelley, discovered that a disrupted side of the brain takes Synthesizing porous materials potential utility of P-WCAs as cies, the vibrations of strings bone morphogenic protein (Bmp-7) on all low-frequency characteristics. with interconnected WCA building solid state electrolytes. The weakly can be associated with the The Balance of Sound is expressed in the developing With tools we’ve developed in the blocks (P-WCAs) is the focus of new coordinated metal cations in the various particles we are Sound is everywhere, and hearing cochlea and signals tonotopic lab during our recent studies, we research by Landskron. Similarly nanopores of P-WCAs are expected familiar with. One of these sounds is critical as we specificity in the ear. Exposure to can quickly assess the brain in an to the molecular WCAs, there are to be highly electrophilic adsorption these corresponds navigate our surroundings. To make Bmp-7, along with another protein animal with the disrupted ear and no strong coordination sites for sites for gas molecules that enter to the graviton, sense of sound, a major function called chordin, balance one another determine if the normal tonotopic the cations; differently, the cations the nanopores, which is relevant the particle that is of the ear is to separate frequen- to control cell fate. The relative gradient exists in the brain.” are located inside nanopores. for gas separation and storage. believed to carry cies. This is the process that allows dose of each protein tells each cell Using the new genetically To produce these frameworks, “We are investigating these the gravitational you to appreciate the complexity of whether to become tuned manipulated animals, Burger Landskron will develop strate- properties broadly because force. The way in music and language. It achieves this to low or high hopes to be able to resolve the gies to identify reactions that will we’re accessing a new class of which strings and by processing each frequency in a frequencies. degree on which the highly interconnect tetrahedral boron compounds so we don’t know membranes arrange separate “channel,” as neurons in specialized properties of (III) as well as octahedral phos- in which area our materials will themselves and the ear respond to low or high these neurons depend for phorus (V) using organic bridging perform best,” Landskron says. “We interact with each frequencies independently. normal input from the ear. ligands to form porous structures. have to look at all these properties other gives rise Optical light obtained with the Hubble Space Telescope of a galaxy located 850 million light years from Earth (above). In the coiled tube of These are the first studies Funded by the Department of systematically and see what’s the to the properties Conceptual illustration derived from string theory, showing the inner ear, or to investigate the developmental Energy, his laboratory will then most promising area. Once we know of the subatomic strings and superstrings (left). cochlea, vibrations dependence of brain neurons on study the energy-relevant proper- that, we can focus on a specific particles we observe. produced by sounds their input from the ear to establish ties for P-WCAs that are created application and further tailor these “The idea behind string theory “Holographic techniques were are so entangled and interact are converted to their frequency-specific properties. from this new structural feature. materials toward these applications.” is simple,” says Cremonini. “Look originally developed for simple so strongly that we can’t really neural activity These studies will give scientists a “These materials promise to In related research efforts, deep inside any particle and you’ll systems that are well behaved, have understand their behavior using before being sent greater understanding of the prin- have a host of interesting properties, Landskron’s lab investigates other see this tiny vibrating string. This a lot of symmetry and are not too the techniques we would normally to the brain. Due to ciples the brain uses to create its reaching from ion conducting to ion nanoporous materials, which are is the fundamental unit we have realistic,” she says. “We’ve found use for regular superconductors or mechanical proper- exquisite and complex organization. exchange to catalytic to adsorp- highly important for a range of been searching for, the fundamental that these techniques are much conventional metals. Holographic ties of this tube, low tive properties,” says Landskron, critical technological challenges entity that makes up everything.” broader and quite powerful. I’m techniques give us a way to write frequencies resonate at one associate professor of chemistry. facing society. The applications of String theory, says Cremonini, asking how much we can extend tractable calculations that make it end and high frequencies at the CHEMISTRY The weak coordination of nanoporous materials span many is, to date, the best framework and generalize these ideas to more possible to model these systems other, similar to a musical instru- cations in the nanopores suggests areas, including greenhouse gas devised to bridge the two incompat- complex systems with less symmetry, and their unusual properties.” ment. This mapping of “frequency Weakly that the ions can be exchanged, he reduction, to catalytic converters, ible theories that describe how the which are closer to our universe Cremonini is also exploring how to place” is called tonotopy. Coordinating Anions says. The exchange is expected to to air and water purification, to universe works. Albert Einstein’s and, therefore, more realistic.” gravity emerges from microscopic, This tonotopic organization is Anions (ions with net negative coincide with high ion mobility and energy storage applications. general theory of relativity teaches In her NSF project, Cremonini quantum-mechanical constitu- then repeated everywhere in the charges) that interact weakly high ion conductivity, suggesting that gravity is the bending of space is seeking to use holographic tech- ents. She hopes her answers will brain where sounds are processed. Burger, associate professor of with cations (ions with positive and time; it is deterministic and niques to study quantum phases shed light on the structure of The tonotopic organization of hearing biological sciences, together with charges) are known as PHYSICS describes large-scale phenomena. of matter whose behavior is poorly space-time, the beginning and is of particular interest to neurosci- graduate student Lashaka Jones weakly coordinating anions Quantum mechanics is probabi- understood, precisely because of early evolution of the universe, entist R. Michael Burger. His lab has is taking advantage of this finding (WCAs). An anion is weakly The Foundation listic; it governs the behavior of such strong interactions. An example and the physics of black holes. recently identified several properties to create chicken embryos that coordinating when its charge of Everything atomic and subatomic particles. is that of high-temperature supercon- “String theory has given us a of auditory neurons that appear to develop with one normal and one is delocalized over the entire The secrets to some of the universe’s In a project funded by the ductors, which achieve superconduc- lot of insights into the relation- “tune” to their own frequencies along non-tonotopic ear using a technique surface of the anion rather biggest mysteries, Sera Cremonini National Science Foundation, tivity at temperatures as high as -70 ship between general relativity and the tonotopy within the brain. The called in-ovo (in the egg) plasmid than localized at a specific believes, may very well lie in the Cremonini studies the microstructure degrees Celsius, compared to the quantum mechanics, especially in key question is, how did this perfect electroporation to manipulate atom. These anions have behavior of its tiniest constituents. of space-time, the four-dimensional -240-degree threshold for ordinary the last 20 years,” she says. “One tuning arise in development? Burger expression of the Bmp-7 gene. many technological applica- Cremonini, assistant professor continuum into which the three metallic superconducting materials. of the great successes of string thinks it may be explained by one “We can cut a window in the tions and are the focus of of physics, probes these questions physical dimensions are woven with Because they have strongly inter- theory is that it has given us a of two theories. One suggests that egg at an early stage, when the research by Kai Landskron. through the lens of string theory, time. Using holography, she hopes acting constituents, says Cremonini, way to calculate the microscopic the tonotopic properties first arise animal looks more like a worm,” he WCAs have been found to which proposes that every particle in to shed light on phenomena ranging high-temperature superconductors bits that make up certain black in the ear, then during development, says. “With a microscope, we can be very useful for the stabiliza- the universe is made of tiny, vibrating from the immediate aftermath of are much more challenging to model holes, and it has reproduced the ear drives the tuning of neurons see the primordial ear tissue, and tion of highly electrophilic, strings of energy. Strings are one- the Big Bang to the structure and than regular superconductors. their entropy very precisely. This is in the brain. Alternatively, the brain’s we drive the gene for Bmp into this organometallic cations for dimensional objects, possessing properties of black holes to the “High-temperature super- remarkable, and it is a must for organization may develop indepen- ear. We can then make the entire applications in catalysis. Due to length but not width. They can be behavior of unconventional materials conductors are very interesting any theory of quantum gravity. dently of the ear, instead relying on cochlea behave like a low-frequency the weak interaction between open ended, form a closed loop or like high-temperature superconduc- materials, but there’s no deep “Maybe there is another theory cues present in the developing brain ear. The animal develops with one cation and anion, there is a attach to membranes, or branes, tors. The goal of Cremonini’s current understanding of why they super- that can describe all of these itself to establish tonotopic patterns. normal ear and one tonotopically low tendency for ion pairing in which could be tiny or could fill the research is to expand the scope of conduct,” she says. “The behavior of phenomena,” Cremonini adds. “That’s A collaborator of Burger’s at the disrupted ear, which will allow us to solution, and this property is Kai Landskron entire universe. Like guitar strings problems to which holographic tech- the constituents of those materials possible, but so far, string theory

National Institutes of Health, Dr. examine whether the brain on the utilized in battery electrolytes. ISTOCKPHOTO.COM, DOUGLAS BENEDICT, CAROL & MIKE WERNER / SCIENCE SOURCE, SOURCE tuned to produce different frequen- niques can be effectively applied. is very strange. Their electrons is the best framework we have.”

6 ACUMEN • FALL 2017 LEHIGH UNIVERSITY • COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES 7 The Social Sciences

PSYCHOLOGY he says. “Historicist narratives are operate in tension: indepen- • More than 75 percent quite effective at removing harsh- dence and interdependence. described the usefulness of Historicist Narratives ness from blame responses.” “Although the study participants communication technolo- It happens every day. A husband To date, Gill’s published work positioned themselves as highly gies for task sharing. blames his wife for her perceived has centered on demonstrating that individualistic, interdependence • A substantial minority inter- shortcomings. Workers blame a historicist narratives can temper was a key theme in their responses preted their cohabitation supervisor for his office bullying. One blame (other researchers had as well,” says Lindemann. “Perhaps as paradoxically facilitating social group blames another for the cast doubt on this possi- more surprisingly, a substantial their interdependence—15.5 social problems in their community. bility) and on providing a minority of respondents indicated percent of respondents Sometimes, blame can be construc- thorough examination of that their non-cohabitation, in fact, from nine couples engaged tive and can motivate its target to why they do so. He has impacts the quality of subsequent enhanced their interdependence.” in this narrative. Supporters of Raffi Hovannisian rally change. All too often, however, blame shown, for example, communication between the partners Lindemann acknowledges that • Sixty-six percent of respon- against Armenian President Serzh is overly harsh. Harsh blame can be that perceptions of the extent of (e.g., is it more supportive, less married couples may live apart for dents said they had felt judged Sarkisian's victory in 2013 elections. detrimental to relationships and is the transgressor’s prior emotional hostile?). Other planned activities a number of reasons. However, her negatively for their lifestyle— the focus of research by Michael Gill. suffering and perceptions of the include trying to understand when study specifically focuses on college- mostly by family members. INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS the war with Azerbaijan and the bad security environments— “Blaming permeates every type degree of intentionality behind his and why jurors—in realistic “mock educated, dual-earning couples, • Female respondents spent continued state of belligerence change the distribution of power of human relationship,” says Gill, bad actions cannot account for jury” contexts—will be receptive as prior research has suggested more time discussing War and Democratic after the ceasefire was signed in between the state and society associate professor of psychology. the effect of historicist narratives. to historicist narratives regarding that commuter marriage is more both individualism and Transitions 1994, he says. He is exploring the in favor of the state, he says. “Whether it’s intergroup or interper- So what does? criminal offenders. Existing research common in this group than in other interdependence. Political science scholars continue broader topic of war and democratic “Such environments empower sonal, the way we handle situations Gill focuses on perceptions of suggests that jurors are often dismis- segments of the population. • The narrative about non- to explore a fundamental ques- transition for an upcoming book. the state and weaken society. This in which we disapprove of another’s free will and makes the novel argu- sive of such narratives. This work will Among her findings: cohabitation facilitating tion: Why have some post- “There is no consensus in the is natural because a state that is behavior has a tremendous impact ment that everyday people utilize two have implications for how to bring an • The majority of respon- interconnectedness was communist societies succeeded literature on how war and demo- in a bad security environment—or on relationships and on society.” distinct free will concepts: freedom of element of mercy into the criminal dents identified as highly more common (though not in their transitions to democra- cratic change are related,” he says. is fighting a war—has to have an Gill’s Blame Lab examines how action and control of self-formation. justice system, which existing interdependent despite the exclusive) among respon- cies while others have failed? A popular international relations increased and uncontrolled execu- harsh, spiteful blame can be shaped Freedom of action refers to a evidence suggests has beneficial individualized structures dents who lived geographi- The topic is of particular interest to theory known as the democratic tive authority,” Grigoryan adds. “It into something calmer and more person’s “in the moment” capacity to effects on important outcomes of commuter marriages. cally farther apart and saw Arman Grigoryan, assistant professor peace theory maintains that there has to have the ability to extract constructive. At the core of his work choose actions (e.g., Can she choose such as criminal recidivism. • Many respondents—empha- each other less frequently. of international relations, who studies is something special about democ- resources from its society. It has is the historicist narrative. He defines to do either X or Y at this moment?). sizing, in particular, the Lindemann presents commuter Armenia, one of the 15 constituent racies and their foreign policy— to have the ability to deter resis- a historicist narrative as a storied Existing theories focus on this co-management of tasks— marriage as particularly fertile republics of the Soviet Union, particularly the way they relate to tance against that extraction. It account of the life history of a concept. In contrast to freedom of SOCIOLOGY underscored how integrated ground to examine the cultural becoming independent following other democracies. It posits that has to have the ability to make wrongdoer, which explains his or her action, control of self-formation refers their partners were in their tension between marital inter- the referendum of Sept. 21, 1991. liberal democracies have carved all sorts of difficult and unpopular acquisition of disagreeable traits in to whether a person is the architect Commuter Marriages everyday activities despite dependence and the shift In the years immediately out a zone of peace that can be decisions. It has to have the terms of an unfortunate life history. of her stable, dispositional will (e.g., The concept of marriage may their geographic separation. toward the “individualization” preceding independence, a conflict credited to liberal governments and ability to make quick decisions “The story provides an under- Is she the creator of her stable be in flux, but commuter of the American marriage. had erupted between Armenia a commitment to liberal politics. without worrying about checks and standing of the process tendency to be hypercritical?). Gill’s marriages—in which spouses This shift has been largely and its neighbor, Azerbaijan. By Grigoryan argues against this idea. balances. And, it has to have the by which a person or research finds that historicist narra- live apart in service to their driven, she says, by “…the decline 1992, the conflict had escalated “The evidence actually suggests ability to control information.” group came to have tives have no effect on perceived dual professional careers— of the male breadwinner/female into a full-blown war. By the time a reverse causal arrow where None of these things, he points some objection- freedom of action. Narratives appear to confirm that homemaker model, decreasing a Russian-negotiated ceasefire peace causes democracy rather out, are good for democracy. Armenia able quality,” mitigate blame when they reduce married people still see inter- task specialization between the took hold in 1994, 30,000 lives than democracy causing peace. is vulnerable to what Grigoryan calls perceived control of self-formation. dependence as a key feature genders, the increasing democra- had been lost and 1 million Countries that have been able a “psychological predisposition Funded by a College of Arts and of their unions, according tization of marital decision-making people had been displaced. to settle their differences one toward totalitarianism common in Sciences New Directions Fellowship, to research by sociolo- and the increasing ability of “In the first half of the ’90s, way or the other,” he adds, “have war societies where dissent becomes Gill’s research is now taking his lab gist Danielle Lindemann. each partner to provide finan- Armenia was often referred to in had an easier time becoming equivalent to treason.” He believes work into real-world contexts. As one Lindemann, assistant cially for himself or herself.” the Western media as an ‘island and remaining democratic.” that democratizing Armenia depends part of this project, graduate student professor of sociology, “Commuter marriages may be of democracy,” says Grigoryan. “It By contrast, he says, countries on recognizing the detrimental Stephanie Cerce will study blame explored how the seemingly Danielle Lindemann’s research viewed as an extreme manifestation had a government that had been that continue to experience intense effects that the war or the state of within married couples. She will have conflicting cultural norms of brings new light on the cultural of major transitions in the nature understanding of marriage. elected in free and fair elections conflicts or enduring rivalries—even belligerence with Azerbaijan plays. one partner identify an aggravating personal autonomy and a of work and family that have been and had embarked on a fertile if not active wars—encounter “a “Unless a genuine effort is characteristic of the other. After commitment to the institu- taking place in the U.S. since the period of legislative reforms.” serious democratic deficit there.” made to resolve our conflicts identifying the characteristic, some tion of marriage play out “on the • Nearly half engaged with the 1970s,” says Lindemann. “The results However, its early promise One of the reasons scholars with our neighbors,” he says, partners will be induced to generate ground” from the viewpoint of the theme of “apart together- not only shed light on this under- failed to materialize. have identified to explain why “we can scarcely hope a historicist narrative about it, participants. Her analysis found ness”—thinking of themselves studied population, but also broaden The main culprit behind Armenia’s wars are bad for democracy is that Armenia will ever whereas others will not. The goal is to that commuter couples engage in as connected despite the our understanding of the evolving

failed transition to democracy was that wars—or, more generally, become a democracy.” KAREN MINASYAN / AFP GETTY IMAGES, MICHAEL AUSTIN THEISPOT.COM, BRIAN VANDER BRUG LOS ANGELES TIMES IMAGES examine whether narrative generation discourses about two subjects that physical separation. cultural meaning of marriage.”

8 ACUMEN • FALL 2017 LEHIGH UNIVERSITY • COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES 9 Feature

ith his 1952 composition 4’33”, John Cage “The idea grew out of an interest in seeing how, as social beings, we challenged the definition of music by having are affected by the architecture and the spaces we’re in—and how that the pianist close the lid over the keyboard and sit changes the musical experience,” she said. playing nothing for the designated four minutes The piece was the prototype for her more recent Bathroom Songs, and 33 seconds. The lid was opened and closed which Bell has performed internationally. In the performance, Bell only to designate new movements. At first, the piece seemed an act of invites audience members into a bathroom and does basic grooming tasks musical insouciance, and contemporary accounts report that some audi- like brushing her teeth and hair, interspersing these with solo singing. ence members were indeed miffed. But in silence blossomed a koan—the “I’m very interested in the emotional space of bathrooms, as well as chance to appreciate the richness of ever-present ambient sound. Cage the sonic possibilities,” she said. “I bring the audience into the bathroom, Like a Whad devised a way to dissolve for a few minutes the veil between art and but some people are, of course, uncomfortable because it’s a small and life; he later said about his approach to composition that his concerns private space, or they are not sure if they can watch me or laugh. So I play had become social rather than musical. with those ambiguities and how they change the situation. It’s small in A similarly broad spirit of the possibilities for music and perfor- scale and theoretically low stakes, but I think that’s what makes it work.” mance animates the work of Gelsey Bell ’04. Her artistic output—which Bell has a highly polished singing voice, but in her own compositions, Great Comet includes performances, theater, songs, musical collaborations and now a she will frequently strip that away in favor of a more elemental approach, role in an acclaimed Broadway musical—almost always has an element exploring the edges of the terrain of vocal utterance. The sounds she creates that reaches beyond the recognized domain of her medium and into the are sometimes resonant, sometimes vulnerable and sometimes jarring. Actor, singer, composer Gelsey Bell ’04 real-time life of her audience members. “I’ve spent a lot of time learning from the singers around me and It would not have taken a Tiresias to foretell Bell’s life in theater and also trying various things out,” she said. “I work with composers who pushes artistic boundaries with her music. Her mother is an accomplished pianist and played frequently are interested in putting a lot of different techniques in the same space.” in the Northern California home where Bell grew up. Bell took piano Recently, Bell performed in a Broadway musical, but as you might multi-dimensional career lessons as a child, and her nickname in elementary school was “Melody expect, it wasn't your typical musical. Bell played Princess Mary/Opera Box” because she sang all the time. In high school, she switched from Singer/Maidservant in Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812 at BY CHRIS QUIRK piano to voice lessons, and she traveled east for a summer program at New the Imperial Theatre. It was a staging of a section of War and Peace, but York University in musical theater writing. While there, she decided she a staging that surrounded the audience with the play. At one point in wanted to attend college near—but not in—New York City. the show, Bell’s character snagged a man from the audience as a stand-in “I was looking for a very balanced liberal arts college experience,” Bell suitor. The production won two Tony Awards, including the prize for said. “Lehigh was perfect for that.” Best Scenic Design of a Musical, a nod to the adventurous way in which Bell won a choral scholarship to Lehigh and came to Bethlehem, where the play encompasses the audience. The New York Times called the show she was a dual major in theatre and music and a minor in philosophy. “intoxicatingly good” and dubbed it “the most innovative and the best “The Humanities Center was quite a bustling place, and many of my new musical to open on Broadway since Hamilton.” most positive experiences from Lehigh were my classes there, spending Bell’s current dance card is as full as ever. She recently completed her time with a lot of people who were not necessarily involved in the arts.” doctorate in performance studies at New York University and just released Bell recalls, in particular, a course taught by her philosophy adviser, Gordon Bearn, that helped her

lay the intellectual foundation for her later work. “I was looking for a very balanced liberal arts

The course centered on Fluxus, an interdisciplinary,  college experience. Lehigh was perfect for that.” rebellious art movement begun in the 1960s that combined the chaotic methods of Dada with often biting sociopolitical commentary. Bell also partici- pated in a philosophy reading group that examined the work of Deleuze Ciphony, an album on which she collaborated with fellow composer and and other post-structuralists, along with perennial philosophical themes. instrumentalist John King. She is an active member of thingNY and “We might take an hour to just talk about altruism. Does it actually Varispeed; both are composer/performer collectives. This summer, she exist, and what real benefit does it produce for the world? That was traveled to Kyoto to study Noh theater and worked there with a Japanese one of the magical things about being at Lehigh—having a space where choreographer to develop a feminist re-envisioning of that classical genre. people in their early 20s, and often from very different backgrounds, Earlier this year, the Foundation for Contemporary Arts awarded Bell a could air things like that out,” Bell said. $40,000 grant in the Music/Sound category. The grant will fund some of While Bell had plenty of musical DNA from her mother, her father Bell’s future projects, including an upcoming solo album. was a professor of philosophy, and Bell credits, in part, the academic Culling from a wide range of techniques and styles to create her own milieu and erudite banter around the home for the conceptual slant performance works, to literally voice those of contemporary composers, of her art. One of Bell’s first forays into performance was Song Cycle in and to explore improvisation, Bell’s work is not tied to an object-based Time/Space, an alternative campus tour with musical accompaniment economy, rethinking the way music and performance can function on a featuring a soloist and chorus that walked the audience through different societal level. Like Cage, Bell continues to create music that transports

CHRISTA NEU locations—including a bathroom. the listener to the moment where he is. ●

10 ACUMEN • FALL 2017 LEHIGH UNIVERSITY • COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES 11 Feature stillGROUNDBREAKING Broughal Middle School, in just about any space that could be ‘adapted’ initial construction of the building. I remember standing in the audience Zoellner Arts Center builds on a rich cultural to accommodate a performance. area of the Diamond Theatre in awe of how much it resembled an ancient “Staging performances was daunting and difficult,” she says. “At most Greek theatre. Later, when we first moved into the building, I frequently heritage as it shapes a creative campus of these venues, the stage had to be built, folding chairs set out, lighting would get lost in the lower level, where the costume shop is located. and sound instruments loaded in and set up, dressing rooms jerry-rigged. “As the faculty member specializing in costume design, it was my I think both artists and audience members made allowances for less-than- job to pack the entire costume inventory that was stored in the attic of by JENNIFER MARANGOS desirable venues. That was to the credit of both groups. Chandler-Ullman and organize it in Zoellner Arts Center. I was also “After Zoellner was inaugurated, professional staff including tech- responsible for outfitting the Zoellner costume shop in terms of tools, nical support, box office and marketing personnel took over for student machinery and equipment. It was a very exciting time because we were and subcontracted personnel who were engaged on a show-by-show venturing out in new territory and were recipients of considerable invest- basis,” she says. ment on the part of the university,” she says. ccording to all public accounts, the official ground- Hoelscher emphasizes that theatre has always been an important breaking for Zoellner Arts Center, currently celebrating aspect of the Lehigh education, dating back to the days when the univer- its 20th anniversary season, took place on April 7, 1995. Fostering Creativity sity’s students were exclusively male engineers. In 1884, those students Only a handful of people are aware that the ground created the Mustard and Cheese Drama Society, writing, producing and was actually broken a few nights before. Indeed, Zoellner Arts Center facilitated a whole new level for perfor- performing plays at Lehigh and even touring the surrounding community. “Just before the ‘official’ groundbreaking for Zoellner mances and presentations at Lehigh University. The 105,000-square-foot Arts Center in the spring of 1995, Bob Thompson, (music facility on Lehigh’s Asa Packer Campus, which is home to the department (top to bottom) MOMIX: department chair) Nadine Sine and I made our way to the of music, the department of theatre, the art galleries and the guest artist Botanica, a piano lesson, Far from Renning’s Bar Kristin Chenoweth, LU future site of the arts center,” recalls Deborah Sacarakis, series, officially opened for the 1997-98 season, with construction taking Department of Theatre's Zoellner’s artistic director. “In a late-night, impromptu place the year before. Funded by a $6 million gift from the late Robert Students were instrumental in bringing theatrical professionals to Lehigh Gem of the Ocean ceremony, we dug a little hole in the earth with a spoon E. Zoellner ’54, the building was designed by Philadelphia architectural University to advise the M&C Drama Society and advocated for theatre and declared the location duly dedicated to arts. Dr. Sine is firm Dagit Saylor and houses three theatres: a 1,000-seat proscenium to be recognized as a valuable academic pursuit, complementing the still in possession of the ceremonial spoon. The potential theatre (Baker Hall), a 300-seat thrust theatre (Diamond Theatre) and a other areas of study available at Lehigh. envisioned for the center was invigorating and inspirational.” 125-seat black box theatre. It also contains a two-story art gallery, several Sine first came to Lehigh in 1980, becoming department chair in Sine says: “The spoon with a carefully typed label commemorating the rehearsal rooms, a recording studio, dance studio, scene shop, costume 1992, which she describes as “the moment when the university first gave aevent still sits in my office.” shop, dressing rooms and green room, practice rooms, classrooms, a serious consideration to building an arts center. We worked very hard to This incident actually speaks volumes about the resourcefulness, music library, box office, faculty and staff offices, and three large lobbies make it a reality. It was an exhausting process but worth every bit of it.” tenacity, ingenuity and imagination that characterized the arts at Lehigh suitable for receptions. A 345-car parking deck is attached to the center. Zoellner has totally transformed the music department, according to University in the decades before Zoellner Arts Center. There was no Zoellner Arts Center when Erica Hoelscher, who is Sine, who has remained department chair for all but three of the past 25 “Without question, there was an active and remarkable cultural life today the chairperson of Lehigh’s department of theatre, came to Lehigh years (except for the 2006-09 period). at the university prior to the construction of the center,” Sacarakis says. as a visiting professor in August 1995. “While we did some excellent work in our old quarters in Lamberton “Performances, however, were staged in the old dining room in Lamberton “When I first arrived at Lehigh,” Hoelscher recalls, “the Zoellner Arts (Hall), having such a wonderful, acoustically superior concert hall has put Hall, in Wilbur Powerhouse, in Grace Hall, in the Asa Packer Dining Center was a large hole in the ground. Shortly after, the entire department us on the map in the Lehigh Valley region,” she says. “We have used Baker

Room, in Packard Lab Auditorium, in Whitaker Lab Auditorium, in COURTESY OF ZOELLNER ARTS CENTER, CHRISTA NEU faculty and staff put on hard hats and came over to tour the foundation and Hall in every possible configuration, including some the architects never

12 ACUMEN • FALL 2017 LEHIGH UNIVERSITY • COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES 13 ZOELLNER OVER THE YEARS

1997-1998 New York Philharmonic w/Kurt Masur • James Earl Jones • Ravi Shankar & Anoushka Shankar • The Parsons Dance Company Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? • LU Choral Arts: Great Beginnings

1998-1999 Metropolitan Opera Orchestra w/James Levine • Brigadoon • Philadanco • envisioned. The faculty has nearly doubled in size, and hundreds of students “Creative inquiry is now an important avenue of cross-disciplinary Flying Karamazov Brothers • A Raisin in the Sun • LU Philharmonic: An All-Beethoven Program are participating every semester, even though we have few majors. That we study at Lehigh, and the department of theatre has long been associated 1999-2000 Sergei Nakariakov accompanied by the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra • are able to do high-level performances with non-majors is a testament to with interdisciplinary pedagogy,” she explains. “I hope that the university The Masters of Modern Ballet: Suzanne Farrell/Kennedy Center Millennium Project • London the dedication of the students and the top-notch faculty who direct them. will see the wisdom, practicality and marketability of educating students City Opera: The Magic Flute • Drummers of West Africa • The Foreigner • LU Jazz Ensemble & “Those of us who were around in the days before Zoellner can attest with the ability to work in a team, appreciate philosophical, ideological the Overtones to the impact the center has had on the entire campus. It gave the arts a and political perspectives that differ from their own, who are innovative, 2000-2001 Vienna Mozart Orchestra • Betty Buckley • Chicago • Natalie MacMaster • A visible presence, and all the activity there has provoked an entirely new imaginative and empathetic, and who value diversity and collaboration. All Streetcar Named Desire • LU Wind Ensemble: Fall Festival of Sounds atmosphere throughout the university,” she says. of those area skills that can be acquired through participation in the arts.” From a numbers perspective, Zoellner’s impact on the department of 2001-2002 Palette • Jose Feliciano • Gospel Music Festival: The Campbell Brothers • theatre is clear. Since 1996, Hoelscher says, student enrollment in theatre Lehigh Faculty Trio: Chou, Bakamjian, Albulescu • Joshua Bell • Compagnie Kafig • Macbeth department courses has increased 64 percent, and since the department Itzhak Perlman • The Shanghai Ballet: White-Haired Girl • The Stanislavsky (top to bottom) Arturo Looking Ahead 2002-2003 moved to Zoellner, the number of students involved in theatre produc- Opera Company: La Boheme Empire Brass • All That Fall • LU Choir: Renaissance Masters Sandoval, LU Choral tions has tripled to more than 1,500 students per year. Visioning the center’s next 20 years, Cassano says that Zoellner’s ultimate and More Arts, students working in the costume shop, LU “The department of theatre’s long-term commitment to diversity is value to Lehigh and the surrounding community will likely extend far Marilyn Horne & Barbara Cook • Roberta Flack • Rent • Hal Holbrook in Philharmonic Orchestra, reflected in our productions, one-quarter of which are plays highlighting beyond the artists trained inside the building’s classrooms. 2003-2004 Mark Twain Tonight! • The Misanthrope • LU Philharmonic: Invitation to the Dance! Ballet Folklorico de minority themes, marginalized or alternative voices,” she says. “Our “We train artists, we develop artists, and we are—at our core and Mexico, Urinetown, graduates pursue further studies at top-tier institutions, such as Yale, primary focus—about the art,” he says. “But what we also do well, perhaps Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra w/ Wynton Marsalis • Cyndi Lauper • Russell The Laramie Project 2004-2005 NYU, Brandeis, Columbia and Northwestern, or enter the industry in even better, is train advocates, leaders and the next generation of audi- Simmons: Def Poetry Jam on Broadway • Prague Symphony Orchestra • A Funny Thing the country’s most competitive markets. ences. Music and theatre have about three to four dozen majors. But Happened On The Way To The Forum • LU Jazz Ensemble, Band & Combo “Lehigh theatre alumni are working in television, film and theatres every year, we have about 1,000 students from all four colleges who 2005-2006 Bernadette Peters • An Evening of Classic Lily Tomlin • Ballet Flamenco Jose across the United States, as well as in other professions, such as education, participate in performances, in design, technical and audience services. Porcel • Ladysmith Black Mambazo • Proof • LU Wind Ensemble: Penned in Pennsylvania law, business, arts administration and public relations. Many of our grad- They find their passion in the arts at Lehigh. They find how to use their uates leave Lehigh to pursue professional and doctoral degrees from the creativity in the arts in their academics. They find their outlet for expres- 2006-2007 NY Philharmonic w/Lorin Maazel • Canadian Brass • Momix: Lunar Sea • most prestigious educational institutions in the country,” Hoelscher says. sion in performance. They also connect with their passion through their Cirque Eloize: Rain Inherit The Wind • LU Jazz Faculty: CD Release Party Sine says one of her earliest memories of Zoellner is a sensation of experiences in attending transformational events. These are the next 2007-2008 The Boston Pops • Queen Latifah • A Prairie Home Companion with Garrison calm that came over her while standing in the balcony during the first generation of leaders who will hopefully go into their communities and Keilloor • Small Steps, Tiny Revolutions with Pascal Rioult Dance Theatre • The Shape of rehearsal in Baker Hall in January 1997. have the arts as a part of their lives.” Things • LU Symphonic Band “I was feeling a wave of relief upon hearing the wonderful acoustics “Zoellner Arts Center still has a lot of potential to make a bigger in the hall,” Sine recalls. “Having great acoustics is never a given in even impact,” he says. 2008-2009 Marvin Hamlisch & Joel Grey: An Evening of Broadway Hits Boz Scaggs • The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee • Dublin Philharmonic Orchestra • A Doll’s the most celebrated venues and cities, so it was joy to hear the music in Zoellner has been, and will continue to be, a part of a rich cultural House • LU Choral Arts: Spirituals our new hall.” heritage in Bethlehem and the Lehigh Valley, according to Sacarakis. For Sine, the stellar Baker Hall acoustics also bring to mind a partic- “As recorded by the early Moravians,” she explains, “Bethlehem resi- 2009-2010 Natalie Cole • Lucnica Slovak National Folkloric Ballet TAO: The Martial ular guest artist event—a Zoellner gala performance by Tony Bennett. dents were creating and recreating music, literature and other arts in the Art of Drumming • Bobby McFerrin • Dead Man’s Cell Phone • LU Philharmonic: Mozart & Tchaikovsky Few can forget “the moment in which he put the microphone down and 1700s. In that regard, Lehigh University Choral Arts fits into the long and sang without amplification. It was another testament to the wonderful great tradition of singing that predated the city’s founding. Similarly with 2010-2011 Elizabeth Gilbert • Paul Salerni: The Life and Love of Joe Coogan • New Orleans acoustic of Baker Hall,” Sine says. orchestral work, the early Moravians had one of the nation’s first orchestras, Nights w/ Allen Toussaint • Yo-Yo Ma • Antigone • Fusion Fest: The Music of Stevie Wonder Andy Cassano, who became part of the Zoellner team in the fall of and we continue that tradition with the Lehigh University Philharmonic. 2012, says it’s difficult to name the most notable Zoellner performers “With the construction of Zoellner, the aesthetic of the venue finally 2011-2012 An Evening with Tony Bennett • Todd Rundgren Young Frankenstein • The Apology of Socrates • DRUMline Live • The Little Foxes • East Winds Quintet: Four + One or performances that have occurred so far during his tenure as admin- came closer to matching the aesthetic of the productions and art being istrative director, but he also lists Bennett’s “mic drop” among the presented,” she says. “It’s always a pleasure and interesting to welcome 2012-2013 Kristin Chenoweth • Rock of Ages • MOMIX: Botanica • Ballet Folklorico de most memorable. back to campus, alums who have participated in the performing arts at Mexico • The Laramie Project • Emi Kagawa, Piano “Oh goodness ... that’s hard,” Cassano says. “I could tell you about Lehigh and to share with them performances in our beautiful center. 2013-2014 Matthew Morrison • Idan Raichel • John Lithgow Stories by Heart • Mnozil when Arturo Sandoval came here and gave one of the best performances Whether those students graduated before the center opened in 1997 or Brass • Ramsey Lewis and His Electric Band • The Pillowman • LU Choral Arts: Forever Thine I have ever heard. I could tell you about when Kristin Chenoweth walked after, they are part of the Zoellner Arts Center story. There are many out for her show with a 40-ounce Wawa soda and said, ‘It’s good to dedicated alumni, faculty, administrators and staff members—some no 2014-2015 Smokey Robinson • Peter and the Starcatcher • Gipsy Kings • Darlene Love • be home’—part of her childhood was in Pennsylvania—and instanta- longer with us—whose work built a strong foundation and whose gener- Romeo and Juliet • LU Philharmonic: Concerto Marathon neously connected with 1,000 people before singing one note.” osity enabled the vision to be realized. They are all part of Zoellner Arts 2015-2016 Postmodern Jukebox • Sheila E. • God of Carnage • Moscow Festival Ballet: As administrative director, Cassano oversees all the organizational Center’s living legacy.” Giselle • Patti Labelle • LU Jazz Rep Orchestra: Big Band Tribute functions at Zoellner and all of its 250-plus annual events. That includes Sacarakis says that she has come to view Zoellner as “the heart” of the leading the staff who service all the technical, production and audience Lehigh campus. 2016-2017 Vanessa Williams • Taj Express: The Bollywood Musical Revue • Cirque services, marketing and advertising, fundraising and finance as well as “It’s pretty unbelievable when I take time for recollection and reflec- Éloize: Saloon • The Illusionists • Tartuffe • Michael Jorgensen, Violin • Joey Alexander Trio coordinating with the artist director and the guest artist series. tion. It is still exciting and inspirational,” she says. “I can only hope that, 2017-2018 Kinky Boots • Hamilton’s Leslie Odom, Jr. • The Wailin’ Jennys • David Sedaris Hoelscher says she hopes that Zoellner Arts Center will have an even as Tony Bennett sang on stage at Zoellner Arts Center (fall 2011), ‘The • New Music Festival: From Boston to Bethlehem & Beyond • Compagnie Herve Koubi •

more central role at Lehigh in the future. COURTESY OF ZOELLNER ARTS CENTER Best Is Yet To Come.’” ● ERTH'S Dinosaur Zoo • LU Jazz Orchestra, Ensemble, Funk Band & Combo

14 ACUMEN • FALL 2017 LEHIGH UNIVERSITY • COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES 15 Feature

As head of Lehigh University Art Galleries, Ricardo Viera has assembled a world-class art collection that provides before Cuban President Fidel Castro died and Fink urged Viera to close the show early, students with hands-on experiences found nowhere else the communist country opened to capitalism. a radical proposal from someone who swats The request was very satisfying to Viera, who controversy like a piñata filled with hornets. left Cuba for Miami in 1962, one of 14,000- Viera’s response—“Over my dead body”— plus children of anti-Castro parents imported strengthened his admiration for Viera as an an advocate for the during Operation Peter Pan. intellectual dragon slayer. Viera has also made Lehigh a hub for “Ricardo wants to break through the status folk works by self-taught, visionary outsiders. quo into real thinking and impulses and feel- Collaborating with Norman Girardot, ings,” says Fink. “How often do you stand with professor emeritus of religion studies, he’s a person and have a decent intellectual conver- organized exhibits, installations and residen- sation and feel like you’re being hugged?” cies by the late Mr. Imagination (aka Gregory Since then Viera has engaged in many intel- Warmack), who created scepters and thrones lectual embraces. In 2011 he curated an exhibit ARTS with bottle caps, and the late Rev. Howard of photographs by women to celebrate the 40th by Geoff Gehman ’89 M.A. Finster, who fashioned mazes featuring space anniversary of the admission of female students ships, herringboned angels and a baby prophet to Lehigh. There were so many styles and named Elvis Presley. subjects, the exhibit was less about gender and Art allows Viera to moderate a universal more about the democracy of photography. wo years ago Ricardo gallery, contains 21 drawings by Wifredo Lam, Railroad, discovered in Linderman Library, university. He encourages conversations between In 2012 he marked the re-election of Barack Viera celebrated Lehigh’s the world modernist from Cuba, Viera’s home- for pivotal photos by such pioneers as Julia viewers by suggesting conversations between Obama with West African shop-advertising 150th birthday with a five- land. It’s one of the first cultural exchanges Margaret Cameron and Diane Arbus. In 1976 objects, by turning objects into characters. portraits of America’s first African-American layer cake of stories. between Cuba and the U.S. since the countries he received a collection of American masters, “I like to create parallels, and parallel president as a tribal king, superhero and friend The university’s curator/ became diplomatic allies in 2015. Three years including Weegee and Edward Weston. A universes, by balancing time, era and environ- of Tupac Shakur, the martyred rapper. director of galleries and in the making, it was seeded 20 years ago during gift from photographer and Academy Award- ment,” says Viera. “I like to take the weight off Three years ago Viera began planning an museum operation orga- Viera’s first trip to Cuba in 35 years. winning filmmaker Lou Stoumen ’39, a native artists and put it on viewers, so they can not exhibit fusing his present with his past. He grew nized an exhibit of 56 photographs depicting For decades Viera has been imprinting Lehigh of nearby Hellertown, established Lehigh’s first only see what artists produce, but feel what they up admiring Lam’s dynamic blend of abstrac- three centuries in South Bethlehem. He filled with his protean personalities: son of a tailor; group of teaching images. induce. You can learn what is right and what is tionism, surrealism and Afro-Cubanism. His TMaginnes Hall’s four floors with portraits of graphic designer; printmaker; installation artist; Today, Lehigh’s photo collection is prized wrong, and if there is a right and a wrong.” admiration grew in 1997 when he discovered everyone from a boxer to a football kicker, baseball fan; gourmet cook; bonsai tender; oper- for its diversity of subjects and styles, formats Viera challenged notions of wrong and right a private collection of the artist’s drawings in everything from a farmers market to Bethlehem atic singer; husband of a classical pianist. and donors. Viera has accepted donations of in a 2004 exhibit of Larry Fink’s large format Havana while serving as a Spanish-speaking Steel’s Machine Shop No. 2. He added living “I am a very curious individual,” he says. “I celebrity Polaroids from the Andy Warhol photos comparing members of President consultant to a Philadelphia organization’s color to the black-and-white photos by commis- love to solve puzzles; I love to complete mazes. Foundation and Cartier-Bresson prints from TV George W. Bush’s cabinet to prostitutes, clowns cultural bridge-building project. In 2015, he sioning a conversation with them by Bill I love to teach, and reach, people with new news anchor and former White House commu- and other sordid figures in pre-Nazi Germany. began a series of intricate, intense negotiations George ’73, a founding member of Touchstone ideas, unfamiliar ways of looking at familiar nications director George Stephanopoulos. He He chose the pictures because they were the with the drawings’ owner, Lam’s grandnephew Theatre’s ensemble, who collaborated with things, passion and compassion. I love to work has a particularly rewarding partnership with first color images by a master of black-and- Juan Castillo Vasquez; the Lam Foundation Viera in a street version of “Don Quixote.” with, and learn from, the best. Life humbles Richard Thall ’55 and his wife, Alice, owners of white social commentary, and because they in Paris, which is run by the artist’s son Eskil; The shows exemplify Viera’s skill at turning me, and I love that.” an extremely wide range of boundary-pushing were “well-composed political cartoons” based and the Cuban government, because Lam is exhibits into experiences. For 44 years he’s Viera’s early years at Lehigh were quite pictures. The couple’s gifts make up a Viera- on paintings by Max Beckmann, George Grosz part of the Cuban National Patrimony. The been engaging and engulfing Lehigh viewers humbling. One of his first offices was a closet curated exhibit of images by the highly influ- and other notorious German Expressionists. process confirmed Viera’s view of his homeland with a global village of remarkably eclectic, in Chandler-Ullmann Hall that resonated with ential abstract realist Aaron Suskind. Installed “The Forbidden Pictures” immediately as a surreal home for dictators, major-league remarkably magnetic objects: historic base- the fumes of a former organic chemistry lab. His through Dec. 10 in Maginnes Hall, the show became an international sensation, spurring a baseball players, and drivers of American cars ball artifacts; avant-garde photographs by first major role was emergency caretaker. He includes some of the 45 Suskind prints that furor extending to the talk show of pundit Bill from the ’50s. Japanese women; multi-media installations by moved paintings from the University Center the Thalls donated to honor Viera’s 45 years O’Reilly. Conservatives denounced Fink as a Viera regards the Lam show as his Lehigh Latin Americans; West African sign paint- to the Allentown Art Museum to save them at Lehigh. lunatic and a heretic. Viera was castigated as a swan song. He pauses to contemplate what he’ll ings of America’s first African-American presi- from student projectiles of brussel sprouts, Viera has put Lehigh on the map of traitor and a terrorist. Some critics erroneously wear to the opening reception. “Should I,” he dent. At the same time he’s supervised an spoon-launched pats of butter, “anything that adventurous Latin American art, using his demanded his deportation to Mexico. says with an impish grin, “dress like a swan?” ● academy/laboratory of conferences, concerts, was round, by the pound.” leverage as a guest curator for the Smithsonian happenings, outdoor contemporary sculpture, Viera quickly began making Lehigh’s perma- Institution and cultural envoy for the U.S. museum-studies programs and a permanent nent collection significantly bigger and dramat- State Department. One of his most impressive (top to bottom, left to right) Mujer – Caballo Reclinada by teaching gallery for selections from the perma- ically better. Armed with a minor budget and efforts was “Viajeros (Travelers),” a 2005 show Wifredo Lam; De la Etapa Práctica “Gory” (Gory Practical nent art collection, which he’s expanded from major ambition, he became an expert nego- of 142 images and seven videos of Cuba by Stage) by Glexis Novoa; Zinnias and Apple by Janet Fish; tiator. He exchanged oversized prints from an North Americans, including Cuban expatri- Cloud by Luis Cruz Azaceta; Playboy #94 (Ray Charles) by over 2,500 pieces to more than 15,000. Richard Misrach; Howdy Doody by Andy Warhol; Peru #229 Viera will retire next fall. His final show, incomplete portfolio of William Henry Rau’s ates. The project began when several photog- by Aaron Siskind; Firebirds (detail) by Romare Bearden; Casa

displayed through Dec.10 in Zoellner’s main 19th-century photographs of the Lehigh Valley raphers asked Viera to organize an exhibit DOUGLAS BENEDICT, IMAGES COURTESY OF LEHIGH UNIVERSITY ART GALLERIES Morey, from the series: Esto no lo arregla nadie (Nobody Can Fix This) by (Tulio Martí and Mariajosé García) Colectivo Gama; Bayonet Attack, from The Great Patriotic War: Portfolio 16 ACUMEN • FALL 2017 LEHIGH UNIVERSITY • COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES I by Dmitri Baltermants; Monument by Man Ray 17 Feature

Preparing Students self-publishing adopted similar approaches and What’s more, NoteNova allows composers to How a software for Portfolio Careers appealed to fans all over the world who sought retain full ownership of the copyright to their Rule also took advantage of a new program, music on alternative publishing platforms. music, an unusual approach in the industry. entrepreneur built a one that seemed designed to prepare students Rule has not sought outside investors for portfolio careers or simply the sheer Publishing Classical Compositions because he says he’s concerned he would have number of full-time positions people now After Rule graduated from Lehigh, he spent to compromise on his founding principles for music publishing business hold over a lifetime. The new normal is four three years developing online educational math the sake of higher returns. different jobs by the time a person turns 32, games at Suntex International. He then moved “I designed this business model based on according to recent research by the networking to Wall Street to work as a software engineer what I want to exist as a composer, not neces- Making Music, Writing Code & Creating a Portfolio Career

by Weld Royal ’88 transformation when the band members estab- firm LinkedIn, which analyzed career moves of for Morgan Stanley. He also continued to sarily what’s going to be the most profitable,” lished their own company and self-published 3 million college graduates. compose, winning several significant composi- says Rule. “This is a long-term passion project. their seventh album, In Rainbows, as a download Lehigh’s Integrated Degree in Engineering, tions and developing his own online publishing I’m going to nurture it for years to come.” ● from the band website for the price of “whatever Arts and Sciences (IDEAS) program is admin- platform for his choral music. you want.” The album entered the Billboard istered by the College of Arts and Sciences and As Rule talked to other composers about “I wanted to create something that provides chart, the U.K. Albums Chart and the United the P.C. Rossin College of Engineering and the platform he had created for his own work, ometimes, it takes a name to identify a World Chart at No. 1. It also gave laptop- Applied Science. A four-year honors program, he realized that this platform could be useful to composers with the same flexibility and control trend. Back when the World Wide bearing fans a new way to obtain Radiohead it allows students to earn a bachelor’s degree many other composers, He decided to form a as self-publishing, but without all the hassle, Web emerged 30 years ago, a big music and to connect with the artist. Radiohead with concentrations in both colleges. company, naming it NoteNova Publishing, and thinker wrote an influential business helped to kick off a self-publishing movement “The program appealed to me because it established a business model based on his expe- expense or required technical expertise.” book called the The Age of Unreason that would influence musicians who followed to didn’t focus solely on specific fields of study, rience as a composer, conductor and singer. (1989). In the book, author and manage- explore their own version of a portfolio career. but rather on how to synthesize a wide range “I wanted to create some- ment expert Charles Handy coined the Rule arrived on campus in 2007 and quickly of interests and skills,” said Rule, who pursued thing that provides composers term “portfolio career” to describe the dramatic established himself on the music scene. computer science and music and was in the with the same flexibility and social changes going on in life and the workplace, “Lehigh uniquely caters to students with a first class to graduate from the program. control as self-publishing, but brought on by new technologies, a decline in broad range of interests. This is what excited me without all the hassle, expense full-time positions and other forces that required about the school in the first place,” he recalls. Links Between Musicians or required technical exper- people to abandon established rules and experi- Rule sang with the Lehigh University and Software Developers tise,” recalls Rule. ment with new ways of working with one another. Choir and Glee Club; became the youngest Theories abound about the connections NoteNova bills itself The book was later named by Time among the director ever of the Melismatics, the univer- between musicians and computer science. as a new approach to music most influential business management books. sity’s oldest student-run a cappella group; and Wired magazine explored the issue in “Do publishing, designed for and The term portfolio career is now a main- started another one called Off the Record. Musicians Make Good Programmers?” by composers, directors and stream trend that continues to grow. Today, In between singing and conducting, Rule “In labs doing electronic media around performers. With a carefully an individual’s portfolio might consist of an also composed his own music. He wrote Chicago, the programmers are often musicians curated catalog, the two-and- income-producing activity in an area in which pieces for several Lehigh ensembles, earning who began programming computers late in life, a-half-year-old company now they are highly skilled and a lower-income- the Williams Prize for Composition and a and had none of the normally associated back- publishes several hundred generating pursuit in an area that is personally Henderson Braddick Composition Prize. He grounds (i.e., mathematics),” the author wrote. scores by around 30 composers. or professionally challenging, or both—such was commissioned by the Martindale Center Although the article found limited evidence It sells primarily digital PDFs as starting a business, volunteering abroad and for the Study of Private Enterprise, after being connecting musicians and computer science, of choral scores, as well as hard- making and selling art. Examples abound: tech sent to Iceland as part of its Student Associates the author never talked to Rule, who found new copy sheet music. CEOs who write novels, accountants who Honors program, to write an orchestral piece ways to bring the two together. One example: It breaks from industry begin record labels and musicians who figure based on traditional Icelandic folk music. He Rule’s “Sorted Affairs,” an electronic piece tradition in two important out how to publish their own music. earned the Presidential Scholarship to continue of music inspired by the sorting algorithms ways. First, more than two- When Casey Rule ’11 enrolled at Lehigh, his studies in composition and spend a fifth learned in his programming classes. thirds of the profits on the English rock band Radiohead and a generation year at Lehigh and was awarded a Dale S. Strohl Meanwhile, less than a decade after sale of a piece of music go to of listeners were shaking up music publishing. Award for Research Excellence in Humanities Radiohead had set off a transformation by the original composer; typical Like the Beatles changed the world of music and Social Sciences to organize a concert of starting a company to sell its music on its own publishing contracts give the

a half-century earlier, Radiohead set off a music written during his time on campus. website, musicians looking for the flexibility of NATHALIE SCHUELLER PHOTOGRAPHY composer around 10 percent.

18 ACUMEN • FALL 2017 LEHIGH UNIVERSITY • COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES 19 Feature

Jay Fergusson, once a boy with no family or past can be rewound. And others deny their prospects, returns triumphant after years away, own bitter truths. poised to build a big house on the hill and fill “Nobody wants to live in that uncertainty. it with the girl he left behind. And it is necessary,” said Watts. But that girl didn’t freeze in time where Watts feels this way about the process of he left her, and that’s just the beginning of creating in general. She remembers the agnostic the problem. The book is filled with these effort it took to bring the book into being, when disappointments, complex truths that move there were no guarantees of success or support. far beyond The Great Gatsby’s thin spine. Now “I don’t come from people who have approaching middle age, Ava has her own money, I don’t come from people who know desperate mission to fulfill: conceiving a child, how to negotiate the world of higher educa- against mounting odds. Her mother, Sylvia, tion,” she said. “It was very difficult to be in also poses a challenge to Jay’s grand dreams: the place where I am. But it’s not impossible, She helped raise Jay and knows better than and sometimes you have to just keeping doing anyone about both his past and the likelihood something until you believe you can. And I of his long-shot future. want to stress that.” And yet, Sylvia knows that she can’t stop Part of ambition is seeing others succeed and him from trying. That may be the crucial point feeling disconnected from that success, according in the book: Ava, Sylvia, Jay and the town to Watts. And that is crucial to making it, too. itself will not stop pushing forward despite the “That is the feeling that will keep you going. knockouts they’ve weathered. That ‘it is beyond me, but it can also push me.’” “The energy, the time, the money, the Fear is powerful in that way to Watts; it can No One great emotion you’re going through, and you buoy a person forward. don’t know if it’s going to pan out,” Watts said, “It’s okay to feel it,” she said. “It feels awful, describing the difficulty her characters face. but it’s okay to feel a little bit awful sometimes.” “You have to do that with no way to see to the Watts is considering these challenges as she other side.” contemplates her next book, inspired by themes She related that push to the very real from the Salem witch trials and the power of CREATIVE WRITING AT LEHIGH remnants of the Jim Crow South that her char- teenage girls. It was young women, often, whose The Creative Writing program, an integral acters must navigate. Simmy’s, the town’s fast accusations landed their peers in deep trouble. part of the English department, recog- Is Coming food spot of choice and a historical institution, “The power of that kind of nasty subversive- nizes the importance of creative writing in is a complicated place for the black residents. ness is so interesting to me,” she said. “It is gossip, helping students develop their own powers Less than a lifetime ago, Simmy’s would not let [which] I suppose is a way of taking power.” of expression, empathy and critical reading black patrons order inside; they had to pick up One character in No One could have used their food from a window in the back. In 2016, this kind of power, and Watts is experimenting and thinking. Creative Writing faculty are the characters cannot eat its oversized, greasy the ways she might harness it through a spiri- committed to providing a learning experience burgers without remembering this history, and tual awakening. that enhances students' creative, literary and each reckons with the place in a different way. Watts tells aspiring writers about what an professional lives; to building a community To Save Us “There’s this really strange and interesting aunt calls gray days: “Days when you feel like, of writers, scholars and critics; and to devel- ‘this is not how I should be spending my life. kind of negotiation of how to deal with this oping productive relationships between that How do we recover from great loss—mother “I feel like those ideas are relatable in many place that once barred you, and what do you do Life is too short to be spent doing x.’” creative writing community and the univer- Stephanie Powell Watts from her child, a young man from his dream different contexts,” Watts said, recounting the about that?” said Watts. When this feeling struck in the course of or a town from its main industry, the jobs and loss of the steel industry she senses on the The memory of exclusion does not just her writing, Watts said, it was the people who sity, the region and the larger society. re-envisions The Great identity that have given it life? Stephanie Powell streets of Bethlehem, Pa. “It always feels like it disappear, and it is not clear what should believed in her work, including her department The program uses a combination of tradi- Watts, associate professor of English and author was here one day and then it was gone.” replace it. at Lehigh and its dean and provost, who gave tional studio workshops, lectures, seminars of No One Is Coming To Save Us, asks this ques- She described it as a silent apocalypse for “There’s something about that that’s just her the time and confidence to continue. and literary study to help students acquire Gatsby in her new novel tion again and again in her new novel. the people who remain in a town after the spiritual, or maybe it’s anti-spiritual or some- “It’s been huge for them to see this as some- the tools of good writing and to allow them Watts’ characters must reckon with what industry finally folds. thing,” she laughed. “Faith is that, right? You thing worthwhile and important,” she said. to develop their individual voices within the seems like more than their share of loss and “It affects everyone,” she said. don’t know if you will spend your life doing From approving travel for conferences and long conversation that is the literary tradition. hardship. Poor, African-American and living The novel is, in part, a reframing of The something—and really being caught up in it. interviews to allowing her the space to get the If you would like to learn more about by Violet Baron in a Southern town where livelihoods are Great Gatsby, in a present-day North Carolina You don’t know if it’s going to be okay.” writing done, Watts feels fortunate for the receding with a dying furniture industry, Watts’ setting not unlike her hometown. The once- One option is denial, and all of the char- university’s support. how you can support the Creative Writing players are running as fast as they can toward vital furniture factory is petering out, and the acters try that out. Ava denies that her preg- “Lehigh has been very generous with me,” program, please contact Kelly Stazi at

an unknown and unknowable future. community ranges from struggling to destitute. MARIO TAMA / GETTY IMAGES, CHRISTA NEU nancy may not be viable. Jay denies that the she said. “And that’s invaluable.” ● (610)758-2824 or [email protected].

20 ACUMEN • FALL 2017 LEHIGH UNIVERSITY • COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES 21 Feature

Lewis Baer ’72 is proud of his family’s A Legacy of connection to Lehigh

Learningby Leslie Feldman “ I felt the need for real-life actual business experience to translate what I was taught at Lehigh; I wanted to see a real purchase order and trial balance, which big businesses create in the Lewis Baer ’72 has many reasons to be an advocate for the arts at Lehigh. Sports have always been an interest of Baer’s. He played soccer and real world.” – Lewis Baer As head of a New York City-based antiques and prop house, he often lacrosse at Lehigh but gave them both up when he realized he was only raves about his college experience, just like a good friend of his father’s capable of doing two out of three activities (sports, social life, academics) did when Baer was deciding on colleges. in college. “I thought it would be a real stretch for me to get admitted based on “I eliminated the two sports and the commitment of that time for a the academic reputation of the school,” explained Baer. “Lehigh had a better social life and a vastly improved academic standing,” he said. “It business school, too, which didn’t have a language requirement. Also, the was a smart decision for me, but I admire those student athletes who can geographic location was ideal, as I wanted access to both Philadelphia manage that triple play.” learning the various aspects of the business. His other son, Jake, attended “The antiques and decorative arts industry has gone from boom (I grew up in the suburbs) and New York City, where my family’s busi- After his summer internship with AISAC, Baer worked in the Marist College in New York and majored in business and marketing. time in the 20th century to life support in the 21st century. Newel is ness was located. Finally, I thought I could play college-level soccer and Philadelphia office of Lybrand, Ross Bros. and Montgomery, (now “I am proud of all of my children and honored that two of them one of the last major antiques firms still in operation, as most specialized lacrosse and wanted to give that a try, too.” PWC), which was the only “big 8” firm based in Philadelphia. followed in my footsteps by going to Lehigh,” explained Baer. “I knew dealers in the traditional English and French periods have disappeared. Baer is the managing principal of Newel LLC, now in its fourth “I felt the need for real-life actual business experience to translate they would get a wonderful education and enjoy the social aspects of We have been able to survive by maintaining a diversity of our inventory generation, which deals in fine antiques and the decorative arts. He has what I was taught at Lehigh; I wanted to see a real purchase order and college life on the campus as well.” and the flexibility of moving into more contemporary styles. Also, we Ldirected the company, founded as a prop house for Broadway theatre by trial balance, which big businesses create in the real world,” he said. “On the whole, my academic preparation was excellent, but life in have maintained a strong tradition with supplying period and modern his grandfather, since 2001. He started working at Newel as a summer job In the meantime, Baer’s grandfather, who founded Newel, passed the business world is something that a school can never duplicate,” Baer furnishings for set designers in the TV and motion picture industry. between his freshman and sophomore years at Lehigh and has success- away, and after approximately a year at the accounting firm, he was said. “The interpersonal environment of dealing with people and busi- Today, the demand for production product through new mediums like fully guided Newel in an ever-changing industry. The business is one recruited to fill the void in the family business. ness decisions in the outside world is a big stretch. Certainly, having an Hulu, Amazon and Netflix has allowed us to grow.” of leading dealers of decorative arts across the world and is still a critical “I was also the only family member from the third generation avail- internship or some form of outside work experience is important.” Two business accomplishments he is most proud of are the develop- supplier of period sets and furnishings for television, movies and display. able and had built almost a year of experience working at Newel with Baer added, “Over the course of my career, I have implemented ment of a proprietary database system for his company, which has allowed “Working during college was a means to an end, where my grandparents all my summer and vacation experience,” he said. “I also found the computer and database systems that have advanced the company into the it to be cutting edge with the use of technology in an industry that has offered to pay me if I worked, and I was motivated by that opportunity,” accounting world at that time to be quite ridged and not as flexible as digital world. With 40 years as a witness to the art and antiques industry, been slow to adapt to this medium. He is also excited to have son Jake as said Baer. “However, I was never really focused on working at Newel after the potential of a Newel future.” as well as the film and television industries, I have made my observa- the company’s new CEO, representing the fourth generation in the family graduation and never bothered to take any college courses in art history, Baer graduated with honors in the last all-male class, majoring in tions known with a blog that regularly criticizes industry practices and business, giving a bright and vigorous vision for the company’s future. design or architecture. I took electives in advanced accounting and business accounting, and was in Beta Alpha Psi, the accounting honor society. commentaries on trends.” In his spare time, Baer enjoys spending quality time with his wife of and wanted to reap the rewards of my degree and work for an accounting His positive experiences on South Mountain convinced two of his three A resident of Englewood, N.J., Baer has been an active Lehigh 36 years, Lorraine Suhl Baer, his children and his first grandchild, Henry. firm. The summer after I graduated, however, I had gotten an internship children to attend Lehigh as well. alumnus and volunteer, having twice chaired his Reunion Fund He plays tennis and likes to jog occasionally. Giving back to Lehigh is with a British accounting firm in Malta through AISAC, an international Son Noah, who graduated in 2005 with both a Bachelor of Science Committee, and was a founding member of the Lehigh Leadership something very special for Baer. college organization that recruits internships around the world. AISAC degree in finance and a Bachelor of Arts degree in political science, was Council. In addition, he has offered his gallery resources to faculty and “I think it’s all about giving back to the institution what you have was a great college experience, as our Lehigh group made solicitations to definitely influenced by Baer’s attending Lehigh and maintains many students in the theatre and the art, architecture and design departments. accumulated over the years,” he said. “I feel a special opportunity to be Lehigh Valley banks and businesses for foreign student interns.” friends from his fraternity. He then went on to law school and pres- Also, Baer was a trustee at the Dwight-Englewood School, where he able to contribute to two areas of the school that I never thought about Baer was involved in AISAC as well as a fraternity, Tau Epsilon ently works in the structured finance legal department of Deutsche led building fundraising campaigns and a master plan for the school. when attending Lehigh but now are integral with my business experi- Phi, where he was the first brother to play a contact sport (the frat was Bank. Daughter Gabriella graduated in 2015 as a psychology major. She Presently, he is on the Englewood Planning Board, where he recently ence: the theatre department and the art, architecture and design depart- consistently the inter-frat bowling champs); however, the members were liked the location (not too far from home) and academic opportunities directed the 2014 City of Englewood master plan and is a board member ment. Also, with the Zoellner Arts Center at Lehigh, I have a direct always ranked first or second academically, and that was an important as well as exposure to both her brother and dad’s experiences. She is of Regency-Superior, Ltd., an auction house. relationship in an area of the school that few alumni have a professional

quality of the group. now working at Newel, the family business, handling social media and DARIA AMATO PHOTOGRAPHY All in all, Baer is happy with the career path he took. understanding of—its operations and development.” ●

22 ACUMEN • FALL 2017 LEHIGH UNIVERSITY • COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES 23 a performer Profile and Join us in support valedictorian of the arts. yesterday. Support our commitment to helping students find their artistic Standing at the voice and prepare to be the creative leaders tomorrow. Intersection of a dual music and biology Every written line or performance Art and Politics major today. has the potential to create social change and affect our quality of Dual theatre and political science life. Invest in our students’ future major prepares for a future of and invest in our own. theatre and social justice For more information contact an untapped Kelly Stazi at (610) 758-2841. by Robert Nichols future lies ahead.

Kalyani Singh ’18 is a tour de force. She balances her theatre experi- in any way you want. If you are inter- working collectively to create some- An actor, singer and songwriter ence with internships focusing on ested in theatre, you can act, you can thing. Creating something requires with a passion for social justice, social justice. This past summer, she design a show, you can do whatever that you’re entrepreneurial, and she is looking to combine her interned with Just Leadership USA, you want,” she says. “We’re here having these tools is a huge asset.” loves to effect social change. whose mission is to halve the prison with open arms. I totally believe that Singh is exploring her options Singh, the Theodore U. Horger population by 2030. She commuted about theatre at Lehigh. I’ve worked as she looks at opportunities after ’61 Visual & Performing Arts from her home in Parsippany, N.J., on shows with so many people who Lehigh. Her interests lead in many scholar for 2017-18, says it was to Harlem daily to work on criminal are majoring in something other than directions. She’s open to life showing Join Us for The Dialogue, the opportunity to combine her justice advocacy campaigns in an theatre, but they want to be here. her which path to explore next. the podcast of the interests in theatre and political effort to change policies at state They really want to science that drew her to Lehigh. and national levels. In 2016, she be part of produc- College of Arts and Sciences. “I knew I wanted to dual major worked with disadvantaged urban tions. And there are “ I’d like to find a way to merge Lehigh University’s College of Arts and Sciences is in theatre and political science when teenagers in Newark, N.J., on social opportunities to take theatre with politics to help empower pleased to launch The Dialogue, a podcast program I was looking at colleges,” she says. change issues as an education a breadth of courses people and help communities highlighting key voices and ideas in the intersection “Theatre has been an integral part and youth services intern with in theatre. You can of the arts, humanities, mathematics, natural sciences of my life since I was small. I always Jersey Cares. There, she directed, study design, acting, to change for the better.” and social sciences. sang. I played an instrument, I sang shot and edited video journals for whatever your interest. in the choir. I loved performing, ServiceWorks, a program that uses “I definitely appreciate that there “Post-graduation is not the Each monthly episode will focus on a specific theme, and I wanted a school that would community engagement and volun- is this rich, diverse range of experi- end-all,” Singh says. “I can’t think such as the role of journalism, foreign policy, race, allow me to balance both majors.” teer service to help underserved ences by being part of the theatre about what I want to do for the rest gender, technology, or the arts, drawn from talks by Singh says the fit was perfect youth develop the skills needed to department—and not just limiting it to of my life because there are so many College of Arts and Sciences faculty. when she met with Augustine Ripa, prepare for college and careers. acting. I want to act, but the breadth opportunities. I want to perform, professor of theatre, at a Diversity Beyond her academic pursuits, of courses I’ve taken have given me but I also want to be involved with The Dialogue serves listeners interested in research Life Day for accepted students. Singh is also an active member of the a better perspective of what it takes reform work. I want to change policy. and editorials by College of Arts and Sciences faculty. “When I spoke with Gus. I told Mustard and Cheese Drama Society to make a production happen. I’ve I want to affect people’s lives and You can listen to us on SoundCloud or visit us online. him I wanted to make theatre as and Pi Sigma Alpha, the political seen costumes I helped build worn reduce inequality. I want to help To provide feedback or suggest topics for future strong a priority as political science,” science honor society, wherein she will by actors on stage. I helped construct people who are marginalized to podcasts, contact the College of Arts and Sciences. she says. “I liked the vibe I was serve as secretary next year. She will a set. I put my handiwork into some- have a voice. I want to empower getting from him. He’s very welcoming, be the upcoming assistant manager thing, and now I have these skills in people, and theatre can effect www.cas.lehigh.edu very inviting. He said it could be done of Dolce, Lehigh’s all-women’s my back pocket,” she says. “It’s an social change. Theatre can help and that theatre majors often pursue choir, and is treasurer of the Lehigh advantage for me, because when I educate, which is critical to making multiple interests. And since the University Choir. She is energized continue with theatre m y skill set is a difference. I’d like to find a way to department is small, students have by the artistic paths open to her. so wide because I’ve done so much merge theatre with politics to help opportunities to become involved in “One of the great things about the in the theatre department. I feel I’m empower people and help commu-

productions their first semester.” arts at Lehigh is you can be involved equipped to be part of a team that’s nities to change for the better.” CHRISTA NEU

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DARIA AMATO PHOTOGRAPHY

“I think it’s all about giving back to the institution what you have accumulated over the years.” see page 22