same name, but rose less sweet?

You almost couldn’t see the ele-phant in the room. There was al-ready a crowd as I entered the RoseArt Museum Wednesday night forthe opening of “The Rose At Bran-deis: Works from the Collection.” Idispatched my umbrella praying Iwould find it again, said hello to thestudent handing out “Save the Rose”buttons and proceeded inside. Whenyou’ve been to a few art openings,they start to look the same: lots ofcoiffed women in black couture,shiny lapel pins and name tags, toomany pairs of tortoiseshell glassesto count and the requisite tables ofwhite Zinfandel and cheese cubesthat were more dressed up than thepatrons in attendance. A neat jazztrio filled the museum with music asold friends reconnected and profes-sors mingled with students. Amidstthe buzzing crowd and more cordialhand-shaking than a U.N. GeneralAssembly meeting, there was theart.

“There” is a bit of an understate-ment. From the moment I leave theRose’s shallow foyer I am sur-rounded by art. There’s RenéMagritte on my right and Picasso onmy left sharing a wall with GeorgesBraque and a few friends. The paint-ings wrapped the walls of the upperfloor of the Fineberg Gallery and theFoster Gallery and were arrangedaccording to period or movementfrom Modernism and Social Realismto Pop and Abstract Expressionism.It was a kind of populist approach todisplaying the work that seemed ap-propriate for an opening attended bywell over 500 people, according tothe staff.

As I collected a glass of TurningLeaf, a group of people parted waysjust as I was looking up. Behindthem, revealed to me as though bythe Muses, a stunning RobertoMatta painting with bright neonpink and green in a swirling hurri-cane of grey, like a great electricalstorm was unfolding in front of me. Idon’t remember how many shoul-ders I nudged or how many pardonsI uttered; I needed to be closer. Thisis the power of some of these pieceswhich will be on display until theend of the academic year.

Later on as I talked with somefriends, Office of the Arts DirectorScott Edmiston approached andasked me my favorite piece. I told

him about the Matta, but Edmistonprefers the social realism of Regi-nald Marsh. We asked Roy Daweswho, with Adelina Jedrzejczak, cu-rated the showing of over 120 worksfrom the collection. Roy has a softspot for De Kooning and he eagerlyexplained some of the artist’s influ-ences before other parties requiredhis attention. Some I spoke withfound the orgiastic arrangement ofthe work on display difficult. Attimes, the proximity of pieces feltharrowing or rushed. Still otherswere simply in awe of the vast andimpressive works on display, and tobe fair, the view of Ana Mendieta’striptych “Body Tracks” (1989) withRona Pondick’s “Red Bowl” (1993) inthe foreground was surprisingly hu-morous and thoughtful. To be sure,there were as many diverse opin-ions about the art on the walls asthere were about the status of themuseum itself and its collection. Theelephant was beginning to rear itshead.

Early in the evening there was anotable presence of “Save the Rose”buttons, even a T-shirt or two, butfor some the message was an unwel-come guest. You can, or have al-ready, read about Prof. Shula

Reinharz (SOC) and the curious caseof the “Save the Rose” buttons on p.3 of the News section. It’s worth not-ing that in responding to the inci-dent, Reinharz said “The Rose hasalready been saved.” For some therewas a celebratory air to the evening,and Provost Marty Krauss told TheDaily News Tribune, “The Rose issaved, that’s the headline for thisevent.” The view that Wednesday’sopening was the end of just anotherchapter in the museum’s historywas not universally shared. Manyawait the outcome of a case that willbe heard by the Suffolk ProbateCourt on July 29, a continuation ofthe Oct. 13 hearing in which a lim-ited injunction was imposed to pre-vent the sale of works from thecollection contributed by the plain-tiffs. Some students and facultychose not to attend the opening at allon principle. Others were simplyhappy to be part of the spectacle andenjoy the art.

For everyone, it seems to comedown to the issue of legacy. I wentback to the Rose in the morningafter the cocktail napkins had beenswept up to take a closer look at thewonderfully assembled photogra-phy in the lower gallery. It’s always

been a good museum for moments ofreflection. The space invites memo-ries and frames them. What welearn from the Rose is that our gen-eration faces an increasing numberof difficult decisions whose effectsfar outweigh the choices made bythose who came before us. Regard-less of what side of the issue onetakes, it is worth remembering thata university does not only exist forthe students who attend each year,but for the thousands of studentswho came before and the many thou-sands who will come after. In June,the court will attempt to decide someof the legal issues involved, but afterWednesday night’s opening, it is leftto us to resolve what kind of a legacywe wish to leave. If there is a lessonto be learned from the evening, it’sthat no voice should be left out.Take a cue from the art on the walls:Each piece speaks with its ownvoice. In the Foster Gallery, the loudcondensed colors of Gene Davis’“Moondog” stand in defiant opposi-tion to Sam Francis’ “White Ring.”Yet there they are, side by side,hopefully for years to come. Willthese paintings play a role in the ed-ucation of students in generations tocome? It seems the jury is still out.

Visitors to the Rose Art Museum’snew exhibit can interact with the arton display with the help of a cellphone tour conceived and executed bythe students of Prof. Mark Auslan-der’s (ANTH) “Cross-Cultural Artsand Aesthetics” class. After dialing anumber and entering a code for eachwork of art, guests are treated to thecomments of the contributors regard-ing each artwork.

The cell phone tour puts the Rose ingood company. “Hundreds of muse-ums, aquariums, and walking toursin cities around the world are nowusing cell phone-based tours, and wethink this technology will becomemore and more common,” Auslanderwrote in an e-mail to justArts. How-ever, his class sought to create com-mentary that would stand out fromthe pack. “A lot of the tours just use asingle voice that sort of lectures toviewers,” he points out. “At Brandeiswe thought we’d try to incorporate asmany voices as possible, in as manylanguages and styles as possible, sothat as many people as possible wouldfeel included and represented in thetour.”

The project’s creators reflect thesemany backgrounds, with Prof. An-dreas Teuber (PHIL) and the artistSteve Miller contributing their disci-plines to the anthropological focus ofthe class. Additionally, the class wascross-listed in the International andGlobal Studies major, attracting stu-dents such as Daniela Modiano ’11and Ji Yun Lee ’11 to enroll.

Lee, who contributed three com-mentaries to the tour, said, “I reallytook to Prof. Teuber’s suggestion thatwe should try to ask the viewers ques-tions about the paintings—aboutwhat they see, what they feel andwhat they think about it. His recom-mendations served as a basis for mostof my commentaries.”

Modiano’s commentary on RoyLichtenstein’s “Forget It! Forget Me!”envisions two dialogues between thecharacters that appear in the paint-ing, identified as Lois Lane and ClarkKent, regarding their future as a cou-ple. Lane, voiced by Modiano, asksKent, voiced by Jonathan Turbin(GRAD), to stop talking about “ethics,humanities and the value of art,”while Kent dreams of escaping to theplanet Krypton. In the metacriticalsecond dialogue, the pair spars overwhether the Rose’s collection ought tobe sold at auction. Modiano, who hasnever been involved in scriptwritingbefore, says she went through three orfour drafts before settling on her finalproduct. She discarded a version link-ing Lichtenstein’s painting to theproblem of anti-Semitism, whichModiano says she has encountered inher native Greece.

In inspiring museum visitors to, asLee puts it, “use their own imagina-tion and look back on their memo-ries,” the project has sought to makethe exhibit accessible to members ofother cultures. Two students haverecorded segments in both Japaneseand English. Auslander’s class is nowcollaborating with women in theWaltham Family School who are na-tive speakers of Hatian Creole, Span-ish, Cantonese and Lao to recordcommentaries on the artwork in theirnative languages. This cooperationhighlights the importance of the Roseas a center of cultural dialogue. “Ourmost important goal is to demonstratethat the important works in the Rose’spermanent collection really are vitalto the overall academic mission atBrandeis, encouraging interdiscipli-nary inquiry and the creative play ofmind,” says Auslander.

THE JUSTICE ● TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2009 21

THE ROSE REOPENS

Studentsadd artinsights

By SARAH BAYERJUSTICE EDITOR

■ One anthropology classhas planned a cell phonetour of the Rose’s artworkto engage the community.