The Dartmouth 02/04/2020

VOL. CLXXVI NO. 128

CLOUDY HIGH 37 LOW 25

NEWS

CPD DID NOT OFFER SPRING INTERNSHIP FUNDING THROUGH SELF PROGRAM PAGE 2

OPINION

KHAN: WE’RE THE WORST PAGE 4

ARTS

NEW HOOD MUSEUM EXHIBIT EXCITES IMAGINATIONS OF VIEWERS PAGE 7

HISTORIC WOODWORKING SHOP IS AN ARTISTIC ESCAPE FOR STUDENTS PAGE 8

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TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 4, 2020

DHMC invests in Colby-Sawyer health sciences programs B y EMILY LU

The Dartmouth Staff

Fo l l o w i n g the announcement of an expanded partnership between Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center and ColbySawyer College in 2019, Dartmouth-Hitchcock will invest $3.25 million in a variety of Colby-Sawyer health science programs to address the region’s shortage of health care professionals. This multi-year investment aims to

The Dartmouth

In early 2015, Weymouth, MA residents organized for the first time in opposition to a proposed natural gas compressor built in town by Canadian energy transportation company Enbridge. Since the start of the five-year saga between Weymouth town members and Enbridge, the issue has made its way to the Dartmouth community through

Dartmouth pre-law students often turn to informal resources for advice

increase enrollment in the New London college’s nursing program and implement multiple health science programs, with a goal of addressing more than a 1,000 job vacancies within D-H. According to ColbySawyer College president Sue Stuebner ’93, the partnership first began in 1981, when the Mary Hitchcock Memorial School of Nursing closed and Colby-Sawyer introduced a SEE COLBY-SAWYER PAGE 2

Activists urge College to pressure Irving to cancel energy contract B y marco allen

HANOVER, NEW HAMPSHIRE

the College’s connection to Irving Oil. In a open letter posted by community organization Fore River Residents Against The Compressor Station, the group calls on Dartmouth’s faculty, staff, students, the Board of Trustees, administrators and the Arthur L. Irving Institute for Energy and Society to “pressure Irving Oil to cancel its contract with Enbridge.” Written after SEE WEYMOUTH PAGE 5

SEAMORE ZHU/THE DARTMOUTH

Students seeking pre-law advice often turn to student-run associations and the College’s alumni network.

B y IOANA ANDRADA PANTELIMON The Dartmouth

Over the past five years, an average of 12 percent of Dartmouth students from each class year who pursue degrees beyond their undergraduate education have gone on to law school.

However, the main resources available to students interested in law are student-run associations, guidance from professors with legal backgrounds and Dartmouth’s alumni network.

“I don’t really know that Dartmouth has a lot to offer right now,” said Dartmouth Minority Pre-Law Association president Olivia Lovelace ’21. “There is no designated adviser. There aren’t

a lot of designated programs to really help us with preparation for law school admission or the LSAT. It’s all really studentinitiated as far as I can tell.”

Selina Noor ’22, who currently shadows for a legal consulting company, said that when she asked the Center for Professional Development for internship opportunities, she was disappointed with the resources available.

“All they really said is that they can help with [law school] applications and nothing much else,” Noor said.

Max Mickenberg ’21, a member of the Mock Trial Society, echoed this concern by noting that the CPD offers few law-associated internships.

“The majority [of internships]

are in finance and consulting,” Mickenberg said. “I can only remember two law firms that came up over sophomore summer recruiting [in 2019] and then a bazillion consulting firms.”

CPD interim director Monica Wilson described the resources available to pre-law students in an email to The Dartmouth.

“We meet one-on-one with students to discuss their interests and to provide information and support related to the law school application process, LSAT testing, timelines, and law school statistics,” Wilson wrote. “A student just needs to log into our system to schedule an appointment. We routinely post SEE PRE-LAW PAGE 3

PAGE 2

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 4, 2020

THE DARTMOUTH NEWS

CPD did not offer spring internship funding through SELF program B y LAUREN ADLER

The Dartmouth Staff

The Center for Professional Development did not offer funding for spring internships through its Student Experiential Learning Fund, according to a post on the CPD’s website that has since been removed.

SELF money can be granted to any student whose project fits the payment criteria and aligns with their academic interests. CPD interim director Monica Wilson wrote in an email to The Dartmouth that supporting the fund is a “capital campaign priority,” and that the CPD is working to find additional sources of funding.

“Schools across the country are grappling with the challenge of having enough funding to support students with unpaid and low-paid internships,” Wilson wrote.

Wilson did not provide information about the long-term future of the fund.

While Dartmouth’s unique quarter system allows students to pursue internships during less competitive hiring periods, offcampus housing and food in the areas where these internships are typically located can often be prohibitively expensive, especially for unpaid or underpaid internships. While several organizations on campus — the Rockefeller Center for Public Policy, the John Sloan Dickey Center for International Understanding, the Center for Social Impact, the Center for Professional Development and others — can provide funding for students planning off terms, that funding can be limited and hard to get.

“Internship funding is really challenging,” said Center for Social Impact director Tracy DustinEichler. “We are constantly working to figure out ways that we can accept more students [and] accept funding … our group is working really hard, and always thinking about how we can

increase those resources so that we can support more students. Because it’s definitely a limited resource.”

Much of the money that comprises the Center for Social Impact’s stipends comes from donations, either via class sponsorships or individual alumni gifts, which are not guaranteed from year to year, according to Dustin-Eichler. The Center for Social Impact also derives money from an endowed fund, which ensures some level of certainty that funding will exist.

Each center is also limited by the types of projects for which it can grant funding. While in all cases funding can only go to students in unpaid or low-paid internships, the Rockefeller Center generally grants funding to public policy or nonprofit internships, the Dickey Center generally grants funding to students with internships with an international focus and the Center for Social Impact generally funds experiences at nonprofit community service organizations.

Despite the competition for funding, prog ram officer for co-curricular programs at the Rockefeller Center Eric Janisch said he was surprised at the idea that it is hard to find funding, and said that the Rockefeller Center did not dispense all of its internship funds last year.

“I had leftover funding because we’ve been awarding it and students either … choose to do a private internship or don’t get a security clearance or don’t get accepted,” Jansich said. He also said that the number of applications submitted for Rockefeller Center funds have decreased over the past year.

In most cases, though, centers are more selective in determining which applications will get funded.

While students can usually indicate on their applications if they will be unable to pursue their internship without funding, decisions about funding are usually made based on

CORRECTIONS We welcome corrections. If you believe there is a factual error in a story, please email editor@thedartmouth.com.

holistic considerations, rather than empirical need.

“We don’t pick students because we think they can or cannot afford the particular internship,” DustinEichler said. “It’s not based on financial aid, but it’s really, ‘Is this the right learning opportunity for that student at that time?’”

While this decision-making mechanism may allow centers to fund certain student opportunities, it can disproportionately affect students who need funding in order to pursue internships.

Mackenzie Stumpf ’21 applied

for a $5,000 grant — the maximum amount possible — from the Center for Social Impact because she and her parents were unable to cover the cost of her off term. After several meetings, Stumpf was told by a Center for Social Impact staff member that the funding application process is “inherently comparative” and was not awarded the funds that she applied for.

Although Stumpf applied for a $5,000 grant, she said that even $1,500 would have made it more possible for her to fund her off term.

Stumpf believes that if the funding

centers gave smaller amounts of money to more students, they would make a greater impact on the community than by giving fewer students the full amount they request.

“The funding process was difficult and frustrating for me because the whole ‘Do something with your off term’ is so pushed by Dartmouth that you feel like you waste your degree and experience if you don’t do something productive — so why isn’t funding more common or more evenly spread?” Stumpf wrote in an email to The Dartmouth. “[I] was let down, sadly.”

D-H seeks to boost health professionals the next 10 years. DartmouthHitchcock’s investment begins with an bachelor of science nursing degree. initial installment of $750,000, which Colby-Sawyer students have since will fund renovations to accommodate benefited from clinical rotations and larger classes and hiring additional internships within the Dartmouth- faculty. Subsequent funding will be Hitchcock Health system. provided once Colby-Sawyer meets According to a Colby-Sawyer certain milestones regarding their press release, there are currently nursing and health science degrees.

30 to 40 students receiving their With the investment, Colbyundergraduate degrees each year Sawyer will also be offering five new in nursing from bachelor’s degree Colby-Sawyer, and programs in the fall 80 percent of these “By year five, we of 2020: addiction undergraduates go expect to be able studies, healthcare on to work at D-H. a d m i n i s t r at i o n , Still, there are more to wean ourselves health science, than 1,000 job from the Dartmouth medical laboratory vacancies at D-H science and social investment and be — the state’s largest work. and only academic self-sufficient.”

“These areas are health system. known to have “It ended up a shortage of being a marriage -SUE STUEBNER ’93, workers in them o f n e e d s t h a t COLBY-SAWYER and also, within we both have,” our region, limited S t u e b n e r s a i d . COLLEGE PRESIDENT opportunities to “The [Dartmouthobtain bachelor Hitchcock] health system is looking degrees in,” D-H chief human to recruit and retain the best resource officer Aimee Giglio said. professionals they can across all the Other new programs include an different areas of needs that they have, associate’s degree in health sciences and we saw that this was really a way providing further education for where Colby-Sawyer could build on current D-H employees, as well as the strength in our nursing program.” two new tracks for Colby-Sawyer’s According to Stuebner, Colby- Master of Science in Nursing: Sawyer hopes to triple the number nursing leadership and nursing of nursing undergraduates within education.

FROM COLBY-SAWYER PAGE 1

“Because the programs are local, it provides existing employees an opportunity to get the advancement of professional development needed to advance their careers,” Giglio said.

With the revenue generated from the new associate’s and master’s programs along with additional fundraising, Colby-Sawyer expects to be more financially independent in the upcoming years.

“By year five, we expect to be able to wean ourselves from the Dartmouth investment and be selfsufficient,” Stuebner said.

The numerous health science programs hope to alleviate the shortage of health professionals in New Hampshire. According to a Colby-Sawyer press release, health care is predicted to account for 21 percent of all job growth between now and 2026, with the need for specific professions such as family nurse practitioners growing by 34.7 percent. There are also more than 6,500 unfilled healthcare jobs in the state, which is only expected to increase.

“A lot of hospitals are relying on visiting professionals for a variety of roles,” Stuebner said. “The more that we can help with some of those different health science majors and graduates, it’ll be a real opportunity for [those students] in terms of having a choice about where they want to work.”

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 4, 2020

PAGE 3

THE DARTMOUTH NEWS

Some students seeking pre-law advice reach out to professors FROM PRE-LAW PAGE 1

and promote law-related internships and paralegal opportunities [and] provide a law school guide in the resource library of our DartBoard system.”

This past fall, the CPD also held a law school fair, a law school panel with the University of Chicago, the University of Michigan and the University of Texas, as well as information sessions with Harvard Law School and Yale Law School.

Mickenberg said that he participated in a graduate schools fair organized by the CPD and spoke to Harvard Law representatives, calling it a “good opportunity.”

In lieu of a dedicated pre-law adviser and other resources, students have used the CPD’s events to obtain more information about future career choices.

“For a time, I was worried about the major I was picking,” Mickenberg said.

“It took me going to a career fair and talking to a Harvard Law representative for them to tell me to relax. It would be much easier if I could shoot a Dartmouth representative an email.”

Former CPD assistant director for advising and programming Zachary Vigliani, who was familiar in pre-law legal resources and organized pre-law events for students, declined to comment for the story. He left Dartmouth in fall 2019.

Lovelace said that although the CPD has been supportive, it does not have a dedicated law program like other colleges.

The kinds of resources available at other institutions include designated advisers and LSAT preparation programs. Brown University, like Dartmouth, does not have a law school.

However, Brown has three designated pre-law advisers and a website that details available resources, including events and opportunities, LSAT preparation material and readily available statistics on Brown alumni who attended law school.

“There is no guidance for anyone, but especially if you are a minority and you don’t have the social capital to understand how to navigate the application process, among other

things,” said DMPLA member Attiya Khan ’22. “I think there are many people who are being neglected when it comes to this career, [which is of] interest to many people who come from that sort of background.”

Some students have also turned to professors with training in the legal field, such as Ethics Institute director and government professor Sonu Bedi, who has a law degree in addition to a variety of other degrees — including a Ph.D. “The kind of advice I give is not so much the nuts and bolts [of applying to law school],” Bedi said. “If students consider law school, I will just informally talk to them about my experience going to law school, being a lawyer for a very short period of time and why it wasn’t for me.”

Without a centralized system to assist pre-law students, finding opportunities and even reaching the right professors may be a matter of “getting lucky,” according to Mickenberg. For example, he noted that were it not for having a class with a professor with legal experience, he would lack an important resource.

Bedi said that he encourages students to reach out to people with legal expertise through the alumni database and to partake in existing student-run organizations like the Dartmouth Law Journal — which he advises — the DMPLA and the Mock Trial Society.

The Dartmouth Law Journal is an undergraduate journal that publishes articles from law professors, law students and practicing lawyers from around the country. According to co-editor-in-chief Michael Nachman ’21, the Dartmouth Law Journal publishes two issues a year and is comprised of around 80 editors.

“We try to be a resource for students as much as we can,” Nachman said. “I would say the biggest way we act as a resource for people interested in law is that our editors get to engage with the academic side of law.”

The DMPLA organizes school tours, conference trips, keynote speeches, dinners and collaborations with the CPD to offer presentations about preparing for law school, according to Lovelace.

“We try to provide pre-law resources

and opportunities because there [aren’t] a ton at Dartmouth,” Lovelace said. “We don’t have a law school, so we don’t have a lot of people who have law degrees around. There aren’t a lot of people who can help us.”

The third student-run, law-oriented club at Dartmouth is the Mock Trial Society. The group’s members simulate trials and compete against other universities from the East Coast, according to Mickenberg.

The last resource available to undergraduate students interested in law is the alumni network, largely represented by the Dartmouth Lawyers Association.

DLA sponsors student internships through the Rockefeller Center for Public Policy for students interested in pursuing a legal career, as well as an annual Law Day event in which they bring in a speaker.

“For any student interested in possibly pursuing a legal career, those organizations are fantastic opportunities,” said DLA president Thomas Skilton ’89.

Noor is a member of The Dartmouth staff.

PAGE 4

THE DARTMOUTH OPINION

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 4, 2020

CONTRIBUTING COLUMNIST OSMAN KHAN ’21

We’re the Worst

It’s time to do what’s best for our community.

DEBORA HYEMIN HAN, Editor-in-Chief

AIDAN SHEINBERG, Publisher

ALEX FREDMAN, Executive Editor PETER CHARALAMBOUS, Managing Editor

PRODUCTION EDITORS TEDDY HILL-WELD & MATTHEW MAGANN, Opinion Editors KYLEE SIBILIA & NOVI ZHUKOVSKY, Mirror Editors ADDISON DICK & JUSTIN KRAMER & LILI STERN, Sports Editors LEX KANG & LUCY TURNIPSEED, Arts Editors NAINA BHALLA & LORRAINE LIU, Photo Editors SAMANTHA BURACK & BELLA JACOBY, Design Editors GRANT PINKSTON, Templating Editor JESS CAMPANILE, Multimedia Editor

ANTHONY ROBLES, Managing Editor

BUSINESS DIRECTORS JONNY FRIED & JASMINE FU Advertising & Finance Directors HIMADRI NARASIMHAMURTHY & KAI SHERWIN Business Development Directors ALBERT CHEN & ELEANOR NIEDERMAYER Strategy Directors VINAY REDDY & ERIC ZHANG Marketing, Analytics and Technology Directors

ELIZA JANE SCHAEFFER, Social Media Editor WILLIAM CHEN & AARON LEE, Data Visualization Editors

SUBMISSIONS: We welcome letters and guest columns. All submissions must include the author’s name and affiliation with Dartmouth College and

should not exceed 250 words for letters or 700 words for columns. The Dartmouth reserves the right to edit all material before publication. All material submitted becomes property of The Dartmouth. Please email submissions to editor@thedartmouth.com.

Ask people at Dartmouth how they spend Carnival, gone are the thousands of visitors their time out of class. Specifically, ask and feature-length films, and gone is the sense them how they feel about the non-academic of community that old alumni will tell you the aspects of Dartmouth. You’ll hear a lot of Winter Carnival fostered in bygone years. At responses. Some will tell you this school is no the risk of sounding like a worn-out “Lest the good anymore compared to its fabled glory old traditions fail” article in the Dartmouth days. Others might complain that the House Review, I’m begging you to help change that. system is ineffective and completely fails to Let’s do something more than complaining compete with the Greek system. Then there for a change and actually promote the kind are those who believe the of community we want for administration hates the the College. Building the “Let’s do something Greek system, coupled sculpture is a great more than complaining snow with the students who way to do that. for a chance and feel the administration’s It’s fun to help p o l i c y t ow a rd G re e k build something massive actually promote the organizations is far too for your school with your lenient. The particular kind of community we own two hands. It’s exciting gripes might differ, but want for the College.” to actually be invested in the general sense of Winter Carnival, rather dissatisfaction remains. than write it off as another If you have a problem with social life night of drinking, studying or hanging out. at Dartmouth, you’re in good company: It It’s also a great chance, whether you think seems like everyone around here does. So, Dartmouth students have gotten soft or you given all these problems, what do all of us desperately want some sort of alternative opinionated crusaders that comprise the social space at this school, to work together vaunted student body actually do about it? on a tradition that also carries us into the Based on the amount of change — or lack future. thereof — this school experiences, the answer I don’t know about you, but I’m tired of is not a lot. my own cynicism. I’m exhausted by endless Don’t believe me? Let’s talk about the snow conversations about how we don’t like it at the sculpture. It’s an overschool we spent 18 years 95-year-old Dartmouth trying to get into. Is it too “I dont know about tradition that’s perfect much to ask that we put you, but I’m tired of f o d d e r f o r t h e “ my our thoughts into action great-grandfather-wentand try to do something my own cynicism ... here” people who spit great together?

Is it too much to righteous flames about There are only ask that we put Homecoming’s current three days left until Winter impotence. And what’s Carnival. There’s an email our thoughts into more, it also happens to in your inbox asking for action and try to be completely alternative help with the sculpture. to the Greek system, Open it. Answer the call. do something great alcohol-free and safe — Bring your friends, bring together?” it’s also perfect for the your family, bring your “everything-mainstreamclub, bring your Greek at-this-school-is-frattyhouse, bring your crush and-horrible” types. Despite the sculpture’s from Anthro class. You know, you can bring wide-ranging appeal, its deep historical your professor, too. roots and the bevy of incredible sculptures But what matters is that you show up. produced by Dartmouth students — Show up so that you can have some easy including a fire-breathing dragon in 1969 and fun at a what’s otherwise hard school. Show a Guinness World Record tallest snowman up so that you can tell people you helped in 1987 — student interest in helping build build a colossal snow sculpture. Show up the sculpture, at least from what I’ve seen, just because it’s fun. Show up for tradition, remains minimal. show up for progress, show up for whatever Gone is the excitement around Winter it is that motivates you. But please, show up.

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 4, 2020

PAGE 5

THE DARTMOUTH NEWS

Irving Oil criticized for relationship to natural gas compressor FROM WEYMOUTH PAGE 1

legal and regulatory efforts to stop the project failed, the activists turn to the College’s connection with Irving. The group specifically refers to Irving Oil’s $80-million donation to the College to create the Irving Institute, cautioning against “unnecessary reputational damage” by its association with Enbridge.

Enbridge, an energy company that moves nearly two-thirds of Canada’s crude oil exports to the United States and 20 percent of the natural gas burned in the U.S., began considering the compressor as a part of its Atlantic Bridge Project that links two major pipelines in the U.S. and Canada. The $450-million compression station in Weymouth would allow the flow of natural gas to regain pressure as it continues flowing through the pipeline.

The activists’ letter alleges that the compression station “would enable carbon emissions greater than all the motor vehicles in New Hampshire and Vermont combined,” and potentially

endanger the community with an explosion. The letter also notes that because Enbridge and Irving Oil are the only backers of project, the Irving’s withdrawal from the project could play a major role in stopping the project.

“Irving has every reason — financial, ethical, contractual, reputational — to [cancel its contract] regarding an expensive, financially shaky partnership that faces [unrelenting] and [broad opposition] committed to using all necessary measures to stop the Compressor,” the letter states.

The letter comes after local activists failed to successfully prevent the construction of the compression station despite a lawsuit, efforts during regulatory comment periods and grassroots organizing.

Irving Institute director Elizabeth Wilson said the Institute will not take a stance on the issue.

“We are an institute at Dartmouth that does not take political positions,” Wilson said. “We are not in any position to have any influence on this topic at all … We’re focused on engaging our efforts

on places where we think we have the most impact.”

Wilson responded to the letter by noting that both those at the Irving Institute and the activists opposing the project both share similar long-term goals.

“We all share the same end goal of having a sustainable, affordable, and reliable energy system,” she said. “There may be very different pathways that people we engage with believe in.”

Wilson also touched on the importance of receiving money from Irving, describing it as a legacy system to invest in the future.

“I think it’s incredible that the legacy energy system is willing to give us, at Dartmouth, the resources to invest and create the energy systems of the future,” Wilson said. She described the “legacy system” investing in Dartmouth as “a gift.”

Boston University earth and environment professor Nathan Phillips, an advocate against the compressor, was a contributor in the open letter to the College. He is currently on hunger

strike to protest the compression station.

Phillips said he understands that Irving Oil is not directly affiliated with the Irving Institute. However, he drew attention to the fact that the energy company’s CEO, Sarah Irving ’10 Tu’14 and Sandra Irving serve as part of the Institute’s advisory board.

“It’s not like there are super separate things — They’re very closely connected,” Philips said. “At my university, I would not be comfortable, personally, being part of a faculty that’s funded by a fossil fuel company.”

Alice Arena, the president and executive director of FRRACS, has family near the proposed site in Weymouth and also expressed skepticism.

“It’s really difficult to say they’re going to bite the hand that feeds them,” Arena said.

Arena also characterized the Irving Institute’s renewable energy research and programs as “greenwashing.”

A representative from Irving Oil declined to comment for this story.

According to Phillips, many members of the Dartmouth community are unaware of these connections. He hopes the letter will bring attention to the issue and that “anyone affiliated with the Irving Institute or even Dartmouth in general would ask that Irving do the right thing and cancel the contract.”

“It’s not a big ask that would generate enormous goodwill,” he said.

Both Phillips and Arena pointed out the large-scale impact of the project.

Phillips claimed that the project is part of “a massive build out that has New England wide and even international implications” by sustaining the natural gas industry in that region in the long term. He expanded on his concerns that the compression could lock the gas industry in for the next 40 to 50 years.

Arena claimed that Dartmouth’s image is tarnished regarding its association with Irving Oil. “[Irving] gains the legitimacy of being associated with Dartmouth …

But at the same time Irving is killing my neighborhood,” she said.

PAGE 6

DARTMOUTHEVENTS

THE DARTMOUTH EVENTS

FULL OF LOVE

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 4, 2020

UUGANZUL TUMURBAATAR ’21

TODAY

8:00 p.m. – 6:00 p.m.

Exhibit: “The Ties that Bind: Slavery and Dartmouth.” Sponsored by the Dartmouth Library, Rauner Special Collections Library.

2:00 p.m. – 3:00 p.m.

Talk: “The Math of Physically Based Rendering,” with Professor Wojciech Jarosz. Sponsored by the Computer Science Department, Neukom Conference Room, Haldeman 252.

7:30 p.m. – 9:30 p.m.

Film: “Parasite.” Sponsored by the Hopkins Center, Loew Auditorium.

TOMORROW 4:30 p.m. – 6:00 p.m.

Talk: “The Afghanistan Quandary: Should We Leave? Can We Leave?” with Barnett Rubin, associate director of NYU’s Center on International Cooperation. Sponsored by the Dickey Center, Dartmouth Hall 105.

5:00 p.m. – 6:00 p.m.

Talk: “A Policy Conversation with Republican Presidential Candidate Joe Walsh.” Sponsored by the Rockefeller Center, Rocky 003.

5:00 p.m. – 7:00 p.m.

Talk: “An Evening with Isabella Hammad, author of ‘The Parisian.’”

Sponsored by the Leslie Center for the Humanities, Haldeman 41.

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TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 4, 2020

THE DARTMOUTH ARTS

PAGE 7

New Hood Museum exhibit excites imaginations of viewers

B y Mounisha Anumolu The Dartmouth

Visitors to the Hood Museum can now see studio art professor Colleen Randall’s work featured in a new, two-room exhibit. “In the Midst of Something Splendid” will be on display until May 31.

This body of work, which can be found up the stairs of the Hood and on the right-hand side, is titled based on a line of a Russell Edson prose poem called “The Taxi.”

Randall, who has been teaching at Dartmouth for over 30 years now, said she chose to use this particular quote as the title of her exhibit in order to reflect some of the central themes she hopes to convey. “[Edson] takes this imaginative journey, and at some point he says, ‘I realize I was in the midst of something splendid,’” Randall said.

“Even though he is doing a different thing in his work than I am doing in mine, it’s celebrating the sacred space of the imagination and how important that is for all of us to respect and practice in our lives in order to stay human.”

The importance of artistic creativity and its applications to everyday life is something Randall emphasizes in this exhibit. Randall said she hopes that visitors to the Hood Museum will sit or stand with her paintings for some time, in order to truly uncover what sentiments the works specifically invoke for them.

Rather than looking for something particular in each painting, Randall encourages viewers to try to find an experience that’s personally transformative for them.

“In the space and time of working with something, you experience all kinds of psychic and emotional realites,” Randall said. “Sometimes you feel turbulence, and sometimes you feel calm, and I realize that’s what is intriguing about a personality and a person — that they have many dimensions. So, I was trying to reconcile all these and unify in some way all these different attributes or experiences.”

The exhibit was co-curated by Katherine Hart, the Hood’s senior

curator of collection and a curator of academic programming. Both long-standing members of the Dartmouth community, Hart has known Randall for over 30 years, and she said she finds strong emotion within Randall’s work.

“I often think of Colleen’s work as sort of an expression of states of being through the visual, through paint,” Hart said. “They’re not necessarily descriptive, but they are more evocative and associative.

They stimulate memory, emotion, thought and sensory experience.”

Like Randall, Hart also encourages viewers to spend time with each of the works. The exhibit was designed in collaboration between Randall and curators at the Hood, including Hart, and was specifically set up in a way that all parties felt best displayed Randall’s message.

“Colleen is our partner in this, and she is, in a way, also a curator,” Hart said. “It was a matter of talking through what particular paintings, paintings on paper or canvas, that she would like to show and thinking about how they fit into the space.

It was an ongoing discussion. We talk about wall color. We talk about interpretation.”

Each aspect of the exhibit was constructed in such a way that allowed for the paintings and the experience of looking at the paintings to be the sole focus of the viewer’s attention. This includes features such as spacing, wall color, light levels and more.

“I wanted to leave a lot of space between the paintings so you can see them without being visually interrupted, from afar or with a different expression,” Randall said. “They feel at the boundaries of vision. They all have an expansive energy, so they are not just contained. I wanted them to have the space for the color to resonate.”

Studio art professor Enrico Riley said he found that the message of creativity and imagination was conveyed powerfully by Randall’s work.

“There is a temperament to the

whole show and subpersonalities to each painting,” Riley said. “They all fall under this idea of the ‘splendid’ in the sense that they’re enjoyable and give an energy to the viewer. It is a positive energy that is transmitted through the color and light of the painting.”

Part of the effectiveness for Riley is the interaction between the physical space of the Hood Museum and Randall’s body of work.

“The paintings activate the architecture and the space,” Riley said. “It’s really a testament to having institutions like museums that are dedicated to interacting and observing work in a controlled way.

It’s also a testament to the strength of Colleen’s paintings that they can push back against the architecture and actually affect it.”

Another important choice that was made in the design of this exhibit was the decision to exclude captions for each painting. Although a few explanatory sentences usually accompany each work in the Hood

Museum, Randall’s paintings are captioned with only their titles.

Similar to the title of the whole exhibit, the titles of individual works are also related to lines of poetry.

Randall named specific paintings with some help from her husband Jeff Friedman, drawing inspiration from lines in his own poetry.

The introduction panel of the exhibit also features a line written

by Friedman, taken from a poem entitled “Nothing.” Randall chose to feature this poem in order to help viewers begin to engage with some of the deeper aspects of her work.

“I think the title ‘Nothing’ opens the discussion right away because the paintings are really about space, consciousness, movement, density and experiences that are less tangible than things and objects,” Randall said. “His poem reinforces that and opens up those doors.”

For Hart, the lack of captions for each painting and intentional use of poetry adds an important element to the exhibit as a whole.

“The visual arts and poetry are not something that are empirically descriptive in their use of language,” Randall said. “It is more a sense of using language to be evocative. It’s not using everyday structures of senses to be descriptive but more having experiences that are outside of words, in many ways.”

Ran d al l h as u s e d l i t e r ar y references for past painting titles, including some that reference Emily Dickinson. In this exhibit, Randall also has a collection of paintings whose titles include the ter m “Syncope.” These works draw their title from Catherine Clément’s book “Syncope: The Philosophy of Rapture,” a novel that inspired Randall to think deeply about creativity as an imaginative process that allows for new spaces of consciousness and transformation.

It is a similar sort of introspection regarding imagination, creativity, experience and emotion that Randall hopes to invoke in viewers of her work.

ALISON PALIZZOLO/COURTESY OF THE HOOD MUSEUM

“In the Midst of Something Splendid” will be on display until May 31.

PAGE 8

THE DARTMOUTH ARTS

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 4, 2020

Historic woodworking shop is an artistic escape for students B y MiA RUSSO

particular quality to your work. I feel like learning in the workshop takes The Dartmouth on a different valence. I feel like it’s In the basement of the Hopkins a lot more freeing to work in there; Center lies a commonly undervalued you don’t really need to focus on resource — the woodworking conventional ideas of what success workshop. A bright, open space filled looks like. I think I’ve messed up a with large work tables topped with lot of times, and I think I’ve learned a myriad of projects in a variety of to enjoy messing up.”

Though intended to offer an stages of completion, the woodshop outlet for is inviting yet students to work i n t i m i d a t i n g. “I think I’ve learned a their hands There are power lot of patience working with and escape the tools lining the stresses of daily walls, cabinets in the woodshop. life, the mere idea l o a d e d w i t h I think I came into of woodworking joining materials is scary for and walls filled Dartmouth being a m a ny p e o p l e. with dif ferent very impatient person; The woodshop types of wood.

I would really just makes it clear An impressive that ever yone s p a c e i n a n d want to get thngs is welcome and o f i t s e l f, t h e done.” no experience is woodshop has needed to begin been part of w o o d w o rk i n g.

Dartmouth since -JANICE CHEN ’19 Yet just as with the 1940s, yet most things, relatively few current students have ever been starting is the hardest part.

While describing how she became inside.

Lila Rickenbaugh ’20 started comfortable within the woodshop, using the woodshop for her senior Rickenbaugh compares it to a dance seminar project last fall. She said — at first, frightening, but with a that, like many other students on little initiative, quickly welcoming.

“Everyone’s kind of in their campus, she did not know how great of a resource the workshop could own world working on whatever it is,” Rickenbaugh said. “It can be be.

Once discovered, students quickly intimidating. But once you talk to realize the unique environment that someone, they’re so nice and really characterizes the shop. Janice Chen helpful. I think whatever project ’19, the Hopkins Fellow for the you’re working on, they get really woodshop, finds the culture to be excited and get on board to help one of the most appealing parts of you get it done.”

Greg Elder, woodshop director, woodworking.

“I think it kind of follows a has been working at the Dartmouth different rhythm on campus,” Chen workship for over 30 years. He said said. “I think when you’re doing he loves working with students of all school work, it’s very high intensity skill levels as he is able to see them and you’re constantly striving for a discover, learn and grow throughout

their time in the shop.

“All projects — no matter how simple — can be an exciting and transformative experience,” Elder said. “People can come in and drill a hole and they’re very excited. That’s wonderful; [all projects] start with nothing more than an idea which gets sketched out and then the next thing you know, there it is.”

Some students enjoy that process of turning their ideas into a tangible object.

“I’ve just learned that I really love to work with my hands. [The woodshop is] a really good thing, at least for my personality, to insert

into my normal Dartmouth schedule where I do a lot more academic work,” Rickenbaugh said.

In addition to offering a balance to the traditional demanding academic schedules of Dartmouth students, Chen said that the woodshop also teaches skills such as dedication, persistence and patience.

“I think I’ve learned a lot of patience working in the workshop,” Chen said. “I think I came into Dartmouth being a very impatient person; I would really just want to get things done. I think that’s still important when you’re trying to finish projects and it’s important

to have that drive and push ideas forward.”

Most students enter the workshop with a project in mind, but they leave with more than just their homemade wooden bowl, table or guitar.

“I think it is a very welcoming community and it’s just very wholesome and charming. I hope that other students can find that as well,” Chen said.

The woodshop welcomes students of all experience levels. All beginners mu s t at t e n d a wo o d wo rk i n g orientation session before they can begin working during open shop hours.

LORRAINE LIU/THE DARTMOUTH SENIOR STAFF

The Woodworking Shop, located in the basement of the Hopkins Center, is a creative space for students.