Art in the Atrium unveiled
(August 26, 2002) The college's "Art in the Atrium", a First Amendment interpretation by artist Richard Heipp, was unveiled today in the Weimer Hall atrium, Dean Terry Hynes announced.
The artwork is installed between the 2nd and 3rd floor on the north wall of the atrium. Hynes recommends viewing the artwork from the exterior corridor outside rooms 2050-2060.
The piece consists of four panels, each approximately 4' x 4'. Each panel has several layers of meaning, Hynes said. Here is some of what the piece is meant to convey (you may see other things in it, too, of course).
The entire piece is a tribute to the shared connections of all our fields with the First Amendment. Each of the four panels bears at the bottom a phrase from that Amendment.
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Visually, the first panel (moving from left to right) is based on a photo by Margaret Bourke-White, a major photojournalist of the 20th century. The typewriter keys represent the importance to our fields of the word and verbal elements of communication, well crafted, and often conveyed with the aid of some form of technology. |
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The next panel is based on a classic pose often struck by Richard Nixon when he was president: a picture of the president (exiting his helicopter in this case) trying to communicate a message of victory, with the ironic quality that ultimately became associated with this image. It was the persistence of the press that helped expose the fundamental violations committed by Nixon and members of his administration. The steady media focus on this story helped the country to weather that crisis without the kind of upheaval of government that has occurred sometimes in other places at such critical moments. The U.S. flag in the upper right corner suggests the ability of this democracy to survive--particularly because of the power rooted in the First Amendment. |
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The third panel might be seen as simply a representation of another of the fields of communication for which we prepare students: it is a picture of a person operating an "old-fashioned" film camera (or even old TV camera, if one did not know better). The image is actually from a photo of Leni Riefenstahl's cinematographer from her documentary of the 1936 Olympics. She, of course, represents someone who mastered the craft of her field of communication but was totally naive about the political uses to which her documentaries were put under Adolph Hitler. |
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The final panel is of Rodin's sculpture, The Thinker, which is apropos in that critical and analytical thinking skills/abilities are the root of effective, thoughtful journalism and communications of all kinds. This particular version of The Thinker, however, is based on a reproduction that was in front of the Museum of Art in Cleveland. That piece was destroyed by vandals or demonstrators--reflecting some of the fragility of the First Amendment when individual voices are drowned out by a mob. |
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The Art in the Atrium project, begun as part of the college's 50th/75th anniversaries in 2000, was our major commemorative piece, designed--to borrow UF's 150th motto--to honor the past and help us shape the future. Prof. Sandra Chance, chair, and members of the college's Celebration 2000 committee, issued the request for proposals and worked with faculty, staff and students to develop consensus on the proposal accepted for the atrium.
The artist, Richard Heipp, is a faculty member in UF's Department of Art. Public art is his specialty and his works have been installed in many parts of Florida and the U.S. as well as in other countries. This is the first commissioned work of Richard Heipp's that will be a permanent installation at UF.
The Campaign for the University of Florida