Fall 2003

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Contents

Features

Letters

Observations

Centennial spotlight

On campus

Faculty focus

Arts on view

Sports

Advancement

Class notes

Connections
Enrichments

by Beverly Harrison Miller ’67
Alumni Association President

A love of art was an unexpected gift Skidmore gave me as a student.
     I spent first through twelfth grades hating art. I couldn’t “do” art, and my art teacher regularly underscored that. Only once did one of my creations make it to the hallway bulletin board, but even then in dismal last place: bottom row, far right. It was such a signal event that I still remember, forty-five years later, that it was a picture of brownstones in New York City (I thought maybe I could draw a house and have it be recognizable).
     That I hated art class more than the dreaded chemistry and math classes shows the depth of my feeling. At least I had a chance of understanding some math and some chemistry. I saw no chance that I could draw anything that resembled reality. (Still can’t.)
     When I went off to Skidmore, I viewed my life as a tabula rasa. Art of course permeates the campus, and so I signed up for the art history course for nonmajors when I was a sophomore. We called it Cocktail Art—we learned enough to be able to talk somewhat knowledgeably about art at a cocktail party.
     In fact, I learned not only about the history of art, and about artists, but about textures, proportions, and color. I was entranced, and selected American art and architecture as emphases in my American studies major.
     Only recently, as I looked at my front garden—a weaving of colors and textures, heights and placements—I realized that I can indeed “do” art, and I learned it from those art history courses at Skidmore. I can take the raw materials of plants and create beauty that lasts from early spring here in New England until past first frost.
     As well from those courses, I developed a continuing interest in architecture and have lived in antique houses—a federal house in Charleston, a row house in Boston’s South End, a colonial in Concord. Several years ago at the end of a long trip, we went out of our way to see Fallingwater, Frank Lloyd Wright’s splendid house near Pittsburgh.
     These are my unexpected gifts from Skidmore. This fall a new contingent of first-year students has just arrived on campus, and I know that they’ll each graduate with their own unexpected gifts.