Its not every day that a math or science student sits down to share a meal and conversation with art history buffs.
But thats the idea behind West Virginia Universitys Faculty Dinner Series. Organized by WVU Student Affairs, the program gives sophomores and juniors an opportunity to network with fellow classmates and hear presentations by outstanding faculty from a variety of academic disciplines.
Tuesdays (Oct. 24) event begins at 6 p.m. at Hatfields in the Mountainlair and is the second in the faculty series.
On this weeks menu are lasagna and a heaping of conversation about the life of Blanche Lazzella well-known West Virginia artist who graduated from WVU served up by College of Creative Arts Dean Bernie Schultz and his wife, Cookie, a senior lecturer in humanities in the Eberly College of Arts and Sciences.
What were going to talk about is a local person who made it really big in artthe fact that she was a native of Maidsville and an alumna of WVU ,Bernie Schultz said.
Lazzell went on to study in New York and Paris with notable artists of her day and by 1905 had earned three degrees, highly unusual for a woman of that time. She is considered by many art historians as one of Americas foremost modernists.
Lazzell spent much of her professional life between Morgantown and Provincetown, Mass., Schultz noted, and was a founding member of a modernist group in Provincetown, helping to disseminate the Cubist style of painting to the United States in the 1920s,30s and40s.
Faculty Speakers
Cookie Schultz has done extensive research on Lazzell during fellowships with both the National Endowment for the Humanities and the West Virginia Humanities Council. She penned a chapter,Studies in France, 1912-13,for the bookBlanche Lazzell: The Life and work of an American Modernist,published by the WVU Press in 2004. She is also currently writing a childrens book about the artist.
Mrs. Schultzother publications include the instructors manual for the sixth edition of H.W. JansonsThe History of Art.She was also a recent contributor to The West Virginia Encyclopedia.
Mrs. Schultz has been on WVU s humanities faculty since 1986 and serves as an adviser in the Universitys Honors College. She has received numerous honors for teaching excellence, including two Golden Apple awards and a Non-Agriculture, Forestry and Consumer Sciences Faculty Award of Merit from WVU s Davis College. Last year, she was inducted as a distinguished member into the National Society of Collegiate Scholars.
In addition to being a dean, Bernie Schultz serves as the director of the Creative Arts Center and a professor of art history at WVU . He chaired the Division of Art from 1989 to 1994 and served as the associate dean for academic affairs in the College of Creative Arts from 1994 to 2000.
A distinguished teacher, Dean Schultz has been the recipient of curriculum development grants. His research centers on the interdisciplinary relationships between art history and medical history.
He is the author ofArt Anatomy in Renaissance Italyand co-author ofArt Past/Art Present,among other books.
In 1997, he received the Neil S. Bucklew Award for Social Justice at WVU , and he was recently honored with the Governors Award for Leadership in the Arts for the State of West Virginia.
Faculty Dinner Series
The faculty series is part of WVU s Sophomore/Junior Year Experience, a package of programs and services aimed at helping students succeed in college. Other presentations are planned for Nov. 29, Jan. 29, Feb. 27 and March 20.
Tuesdays menu includes lasagna, broccoli, tossed salad and espresso cake.
A few spots remain. WVU sophomores and juniors interested in attending the free presentation and dinner should e-mail betsy.streisel@mail.wvu.edu as soon as possible.
Sophomore/Junior Year Experience on the Net: http://studentaffairs.wvu.edu/sjy_exp/index.html