Office for the Arts Marks 25th Year

By Nina Solomita

Special to the Gazette

Question: What do John Lithgow '67, Whoopi Goldberg, and 3,000 Harvard-Radcliffe undergraduates have in common? Answer: A direct connection to the Office for the Arts (OFA) at Harvard and Radcliffe, which this month kicks off a yearlong celebration of its 25th birthday.

The OFA was established in 1973 by then-Radcliffe President Matina Horner and then-Harvard President Derek Bok to continue Radcliffe's programs in dance, theater, and ceramics and to create new programs in the arts for undergraduates. This month, a commemorative issue of Arts Spectrum, the OFA's monthly newsletter, will be released, filled with reminiscences from Harvard-Radcliffe alumni/ae of their University arts experiences and the reverberations in their present lives.

From the OFA quarters shared with the Harvard Bands at 74 Mount Auburn St., Myra Mayman, director of the office since its inception, is both thoughtful and passionate as she reflects on the past 25 years.

"When I was hired, my job was to grow something," she says, and, now the wide array of offerings in the arts for students includes extracurricular classes in the Radcliffe Dance and Radcliffe Ceramics programs, and figure drawing at Currier House; grants for arts projects and subsidies for music lessons; a variety of visiting artist programs through which professional artists work with students in collaborative projects, as well as facilities such as Radcliffe's Agassiz Theatre and Rieman Center for the Performing Arts plus the Memorial/Lowell Complex, which includes Sanders Theatre, Lowell Hall, and the Loker Commons Coffee House.

From Mayman's perspective, direct experience in the arts and the artistic process is essential to the development of a person's full potential because it encompasses the experiential and the theoretical. "When the two work together, there's a level of understanding that's complete -- absolutely intellectual and visceral, and everything locks into place. It's learning that is potent, memorable, and life-changing."

Whatever the student's chosen field of study may be, the OFA exists to provide "artistic exercise of the brain," says Mayman. This exercise "develops flexibility of mind, understanding of other people's perspectives and their individuality, ability to question what is normally assumed, to see negative spaces and make something with them and to deal with reality and change, and find meaning in the disparate aspects of life," she says.

"One of the rewards of being in a place so long is that you begin to see the impact of the OFA's programs on alumni/ae. For example, I'll hear from someone -- 'I'm now a doctor in Bainbridge Island, Washington, but I'm still playing the violin and it's a really important part of my life.' Or, just this morning, I was reading in the New York Times about a new action series on television that was written and produced by Carlton Cuse '81. As a senior he knew he wanted to go into the film or TV business and he'd need a film in order to get started. He got a $400 grant from the OFA, which he and his classmate Hans Tobeason parlayed into $15,000 and made a film about the Harvard crew. Cut to 17 years later; he's doing what he set out to do."

Exposure to working artists is a vivid and memorable way to learn, and several OFA programs are designed to bring students and artists together for workshops, seminars, and performance. The popular Learning from Performers program, instituted by Mayman and Jerold Kayden, now associate professor of urban planning at the Graduate School of Design, has brought to Harvard exciting artists and performers. Last year these included Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Paula Vogel, composer Maury Yeston, performance artist Laurie Anderson, and jazz vocalist Sheila Jordan. This year the program celebrates the OFA's 25th anniversary by hosting several alumni/ae who graduated after 1973 as visiting artists, including conductor/composer Jonathan Sheffer '75, visual artist Amanda Guest '87, and theatrical director/producer Diane Paulus '88.

On Monday, Nov. 9, Whoopi Goldberg will hold an informal conversation with students at Sanders Theatre. The event will be open to the Harvard-Radcliffe community by ticket lottery. For jazz lovers, in April 1999 the Jazz Artists in Residence series will bring in pianist/composer Randy Weston and arranger/composer Melba Liston, who will compose a new work and appear with the Harvard Jazz Band in concert.

This year also marks the return of the Freshman Theater Program after a three-year hiatus. Award-winning theater director Eric Engel (director of the University's Memorial/Lowell Complex) and award-winning guest actor Dossy Peabody '74 will lead a collaborative first-year/professional production of The Corn is Green, Emlyn William's powerful drama set in an 1890s Welsh mining town. The production will kick off the 1998-99 Agassiz Theatre season on Oct. 23.

The annual ARTS FIRST festival, initiated by actor John Lithgow '67 and Harvard President Neil L. Rudenstine, is a campus-wide celebration of the arts open to the entire community and a perfect venue for the breadth of undergraduate artistic expression. Approximately 2,000 students present concerts, theatricals, dance productions, exhibitions, and multimedia installations. ARTS FIRST '99 will take place May 6-9, 1999.

For more information about events, programs, classes, grants, prizes, and publications sponsored by the Office for the Arts and what is being created next, call 495-8676 or visit the office at 74 Mount Auburn St.