Posted on Jan 7, 2000

Fleet Financial Group has contributed $20,000 to the
College to support the Ralph and Marjorie Kenney Center, President Roger
H. Hull announced. The gift adds to a $15,000 donation made by Fleet to
the Center in February of this year.

“The Ralph and Marjorie Kenney Center will play a
vital role in the revitalization of the College Park neighborhood,”
Hull said. “Fleet's on-going support demonstrates its commitment to
this important initiative, and to the belief that individuals and
institutions alike have an obligation to make a difference in the
communities of which they are a part.”

The center, named in memory of 1929 Union graduate Ralph
Kenney (recognizing a $1 million gift from Marjorie Kenney in June), will
feature health/wellness workshops and youth programs sponsored by Ellis
and St. Clare's hospitals and Schenectady-based Girls Inc. of the
Greater Capital Region. The Center will also include a homework center and
skills development program, which links Union student mentors with
children from the Van Corlaer Elementary School to help them prepare for
the New York State Pupil Assessment Tests. Fleet funds will be used to
supply the center with computers and other technology, furnishings and
recreation equipment.

“Fleet is pleased to support Union College and the
Kenney Center,” said Herm Ames, president of Fleet Bank Upstate.
“Providing a resource center that can be accessed by the entire
community is going to have a positive impact on the neighborhood.”

Posted on Jan 7, 2000

Friday, Jan. 7 through Monday, Jan. 10, 8 p.m.
Reamer Auditorium.
Film committee presents The Sixth Sense.

Thursday, Jan. 13, 4:30 p.m.
Mandeville Gallery, Nott Memorial.
Opening reception and gallery talk by the artist for “Walter Hatke:
Paintings, Drawings & Prints.” Exhibit, through March 14,
includes about 40 works by the artist over the last 30 years.

Thursday, Jan. 13, 7 p.m.
Olin 115.
Sociology of Human Rights film series presents Prime Time War about
the press coverage of the Arab-Israeli conflict.

Saturday, Jan. 15, 6:30 p.m.
Olin Observatory.
Public open house.

Sunday, Jan. 16, 3 p.m.
Memorial Chapel.
Chamber series presents Emerson String Quartet with Edgar Meyer, double
bass, and Wu Han, piano.

Posted on Jan 7, 2000

It
may seem odd that Walter Hatke, who endlessly exhorts his students to pay
attention to the details of the human form, has scarcely any people in his
own works. It's a little bit like ee cummings preaching the importance
of grammar and punctuation.

“What I'm after usually has more to do with the
light and those quiet moments than any (human figure) can express,”
says Hatke, the May I. Baker Professor of Fine Arts. “It's more
contemplative or meditative in a way. A figure adds a whole new dynamic
that I'm not particularly interested in.”

“Walter Hatke: Paintings, Drawings &
Prints” opens Thursday, Jan. 13, at 4:30 p.m. in the Nott Memorial's
Mandeville Gallery.

Hatke, who fell in love with Virginia Woolf's To
the Lighthouse for the way she described rooms as having lives of
their own, conveys in his own works small traces of humanity. “I like
to give the sense that someone is about to open a door and walk into a
room or has just stepped out for a moment,” he admits.

On the rare occasion that the human form finds its way
into his works, it is usually as a small element to balance a painting. In
his just-finished Trestle, for example, Hatke called on his
17-year-old son, Graham, to stand in “as a small compositional
note.”

Hatke describes his works as “a combination of
light and moments of time put together, sometimes with some deceitful
chicanery.” Among his “deceitful chicanery,” autumn leaves
and blossoming day lilies in the same painting, a blue boat in Trestle
(a tip of the hat to Winslow Homer's classic Blue Boat) and a
crucifix (or is it simply a telephone pole?) in the lower right corner of Knolls,
a painting that depicts a glowing sky over a small slice of the
industrial horizon of the Knolls Atomic Power Lab in Niskayuna. (Knolls,
featured in a recent Mandeville show, is not slated for the current
exhibition.)

If his landscapes – Knolls, for example –
seem to pay homage to the 17th century Dutch painters, Hatke attributes
his “Netherlandish” tendency to his love of the sky – the
clouds, the air, the colors, the sunlight. “We look at the sky a lot
in the Midwest,” says Hatke, a native of Kansas. “We paid a lot
of attention to atmosphere and the air. We could see storms coming for
days.” When Hatke lived in New York City and Pennsylvania, the sky
took on different features in his works. Once in Schenectady, he found
himself incorporating the sky, much as did Thomas Cole, Frederic Church
and other Hudson River painters.

Hatke paints daily for about eight hours, taking two or
three months for most works. By the time he is finished, “I've had
my fill and I'm happy to see them go,” he says. “Like kids,
you want them to grow up, go off and find a happy home.”

Hatke's day begins with a half-hour workout on the
rowing machine in his home studio. As he rows, he stares at the opposite
wall, drawing inspiration as the morning sun arcs across the objects on
the wall. Many of his interiors – often simple household objects –
were born in these morning workouts.

From R.S. is a painting of a metered postage label. Tacked to
his studio walls for years, it had begun to fade. It just struck me one
day that I needed to make a painting about that. The label arrived on a
package from the late Robert Schoelkopf, a close friend and New York City
gallery director, whom Hatke says was “very non-chalant about the
business of art” and who “would support artists to the very end.”
Next to the postmark are the words “Art Saves Lives,” words that have
become important to Hatke. “Art has saved my life more than once,” he
says. “It saves lives in a spiritual kind of way. It's something that
is intrinsically life giving.”

Hatke, who has taught at Union since 1986, earned his bachelor's
degree from DePauw University, and his master's and MFA degrees from the
University of Iowa. His works have appeared recently in the John Pence
Gallery, San Francisco; Gerald Peters Gallery in Santa Fe; and at MB
Modern Gallery in New York.

Hatke, who has taught at Union since 1986, earned his
bachelor's degree from DePauw University, and his master's and MFA
degrees from the University of Iowa. His works have appeared recently in
the John Pence Gallery, San Francisco; Gerald Peters Gallery in Santa Fe;
and at MB Modern Gallery in New York.

“Walter Hatke: Paintings, Drawings & Prints” includes about 40
works by the artist over the last 30 years. The exhibition runs through
March 14 in the Nott Memorial's Mandeville Gallery.

Posted on Jan 6, 2000

Schenectady, N.Y. (Jan. 6, 2000) – The Emerson String Quartet, widely regarded as the premier quartet before the public, will perform with Edgar Meyer, double bass, and Wu Han, piano, at Union College's Memorial Chapel on Sunday, Jan. 16 at 3 p.m. as part of the Schenectady Museum-Union College Concert Series.

The performance, which represents the quartet's sixteenth Series appearance, will include a light-hearted pre-concert recital featuring Meyer, members of the Emerson, and Wu Han performing his compositions for double bass and piano. The concert program to follow is highlighted by Meyer's Quintet, written for the Emersons, and a performance of Schubert's great masterpiece, the Trout Quintet.

The complete program includes:

3 p.m.: Pre-concert recital: Handel/Meyer – Sonata for viola & double bass; Bartok – Duos for Two Violins; Rossini – Duo for cello & double bass; Meyer – Pieces for Bass & Piano

4 p.m.: Shostakovich – Quartet No. 1 in C, Op. 49; Meyer – Quintet; Schubert – Trout Quintet

The Emerson String Quartet, which takes its name from the great American poet Ralph Waldo Emerson, was founded in 1976. Members include Philip Setzer and Eugene Drucker, violins; Lawrence Dutton, viola; and David Finckel, cello.

Acclaimed for its artistry and dynamic performance style, the Emerson String Quartet has amassed an impressive list of achievements: an exclusive Deutsche Grammophon recording contract; four Grammy Awards – one for “Best Classical Album” and three for “Best Chamber Music Performance,” and Gramophone Magazine's “Record of the Year” award.

The New York Times has called the Quartet “one of the hottest quartets,” and praises its “consistently insightful, polished concert performances” and “series of brilliant recordings for Deutsche Grammophon.” The Financial Times (London) remarked, “As one of the foremost chamber ensembles around today, the Emerson provides a special kind of musical nourishment all too rare.”

The Quartet has an extensive 1999-2000 season. In the spring of 2000, the group will perform the complete cycle of Shostakovich Quartets in a five-concert series at both New York's Tully Hall and the Barbican Center in London. Also, the Quartet will participate in a Shostakovich symposium and collaborate with renowned director Simon McBurney in a theatrical work featuring Shostakovich's 15th Quartet.

The 2000 season includes performances at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. and the Hartt School of Music. Other North American venues include Chicago, Boston, Cleveland, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Seattle and Mexico City, among others. International highlights will be appearances in Paris, Zurich, Geneva and tours of Germany and Italy.

Prominently established as a master instrumentalist, and hailed by San Diego Magazine as “…quite simply, the best bassist alive,” Edgar Meyer's virtuosity and musicianship combined with his gift for composition has garnered him praise from audiences world-wide. Well known as a cross over artist, collaborations are a cornerstone of Meyer's work. From 1986-1992, he was a member of the progressive bluegrass band “Strength in Numbers,” whose members include Sam Bush, Jerry Douglas, Bela Fleck and Mark O'Connor. He also performs regularly as a guest bass player for an assortment of recording artists, such as Garth Brooks, Bruce Conklin, Mary Chapin Carpenter, Hank Williams, the Indigo Girls and Lyle Lovett.

Wu Han, orchestral soloist, recitalist, and chamber musician, has garnered a reputation as a performer whose impassioned music making and style are bringing new life to the concert stage. A frequent guest soloist with today's leading orchestras, she has performed at many of the world's most prestigious venues: London's Wigmore Hall; New York's Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center The Metropolitan Museum of Art and 92nd Street Y; and major points throughout Europe and Asia.

The Schenectady Museum-Union College chamber concerts are made possible, in part, by a grant from the New York State Council on the Arts and the Schenectady County Initiative Program. Memorial Chapel is located near the center of the Union campus. Parking is available on campus and on nearby side streets.

Tickets, at $20 ($10 for students), are available in advance at the Schenectady Museum (518) 382-7890 and at the door. For more information, call 372-3651.