Noteworthy
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N E W S , T I M E LY F A C T S , A N D O T H E R
CURIOSITIES
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The First of Many
A NEW LSU MURAL HONORS THE UNIVERSITY'S FIRST BLACK PROFESSOR
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or many, the year 1971 doesn’t seem too long ago, but for the history of Louisiana State University, it marked a pivotal moment that changed the makeup of the school forever. It marked the year it hired its first Black professor, the Alexandriaborn and Urbana-Champlain-educated architect Julian T. White. This summer, the College of Art & Design teamed up with the Baton Rouge-based Walls Project and the LSU Foundation to commission a mural in White’s honor, a three-panel goliath celebrating his
thirty-three years in education and acknowledging the mark he's made since his passing in 2011. Painted by Lafayette muralist Robert Dafford, whose near-five-hundred works can be found across the United States, Canada, France, Belgium, and England, the Julian T. White mural hangs sixty feet above the college’s atrium and depicts White leading a procession of students from the university’s iconic bell tower through the varied architecture and live oaks of LSU’s campus (also among them are Boyd Professor and Philip W. West Professor of Analytical
& Environmental Chemistry, Isiah Warner). In the tradition of Benozzo Gozzoli’s paneled mural the “Procession of the Magi” in Florence’s Palazzo Medici-Riccardi, which inspired Dafford, the artist’s medium works to exalt White’s legacy in a larger-than-life approach appropriate for someone who opened so many doors for students and professors of the future. One such student was Ken Tipton, Jr., the leader of Baton Rouge’s Tipton Associates architecture firm, who was also once an adjunct professor working under White.
“Julian White was a talented architect and an exceptionally gifted teacher,” he said. “He met prejudice and hardship and with grace and passion. He was a mentor to many and modeled what it meant to be a professional for generations of students. For many of us, Julian White was the definitive face of Architecture at LSU. He changed the world one student at a time—architects and architecture in this State are indebted to his influence. I, for one, am forever grateful.” —Christina Leo
Preserving the Past for a Better Future THE LOUISIANA LANDMARKS SOCIETY HONORS SEVENTEEN ADMIRABLE PROJECTS IN PRESERVATION
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1905 Thomas fostering resurgences in Sully home, neighborhoods across the city. restored in And reusing old buildings— absolute fidelity well there’s nothing better.” to its former glory using Because the traditional Sully’s original blueprints; awards ceremony was James Freret’s asymmetrical cancelled in early March due two-story corner porch to the COVID-19 pandemic, resurrected from one of the Society has spent the past his watercolors; the sole several months developing survivor South-brick Creole alternative ways to honor its 1626 Oretha Castle Haley Boulevard, one of the seventeen recipients of this year's award, was built in 1913 and has been cottage of a circa 1835 row winners and to share their vacant for decades until its 2019 restoration. Photos courtesy of Louisiana Landmarks Society. repurposed into The Jewel of work with the public. In July, their outstanding achievements in In addition to the talent required the South; the Historic New they released a virtual tour of the achieve such remarkable winning projects via a three-episode Orleans’ Collection’s reclaiming of historic restoration, renovation, and to transformations, the teams who documentary series, available online the Seignouret Brulatour House; a new design. “Our committee was a very vocal oversaw these projects demonstrated alongside a self-guided driving tour, rare saved example of Walter Dorwin group,” said awards committee deep commitments to preservation which will include a map and digital Teague’s Moderne style 1949 Texaco Sandra Stokes. “Very through meticulous research, catalogue from which one can read Service Station; and no less than chair three schoolhouses—neighborhood opinionated and passionate about sometimes painstaking artistry, and the inspiring stories of each winning landmarks—saved and reborn to preservation, about the restoration of of course—significant investments. project. “These awards really showcase highlight architectural details in neighborhoods. And they’ve selected “People are looking for things to Aztec revival, Spanish Renaissance, such a spectrum of winners, ranging the diversity and talent of our local do,” said Stokes. “Hopefully this and Victorian eclectic styles: New from individual residences—a double developers and architects,” said multi-faceted, multi-disciplined Orleans has always been fertile shotgun single-family home—to the Stokes. “When they do restorations approach will not only honor these ground for ushering the treasures of restoration of schools to commercial like this, they are demonstrating a projects, but will bring even more buildings. It’s all across town, from real commitment to the future of people to explore the history and its past into the future. For its 2020 Awards for Excellence the French Quarter to the Bywater New Orleans. Because it’s not just the communities here in the New in Historic Preservation, the to the Central City area, projects on about preserving old things. We Orleans area.” Louisiana Landmarks Society is smaller scales and massive scales and really promote quality of life, creating —Jordan LaHaye honoring seventeen such projects for everything in between.” residential areas and opportunities, Louisianalandmarks.org 8
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