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The second group of participants in the Rothkopf Scholars program, junior art majors Elysia Brennan (Mount Pocono, Pa.), Sara Beth Talias (Wyckoff, N.J.), Danielle Schreier (New York, N.Y.), and Daina White (Mahwah, N.J.), will study art and architecture in The Netherlands and Belgium May 23-June 4
Based in Amsterdam for six days and in Brussels for five days, they will also visit Ghent, Bruges, the Hague, Antwerp, and other locations. Along the way they will hear lectures from various experts in Flemish and Dutch art on a trip that coincides with the 400th anniversary of Rembrandt’s birth.
The participating students were selected through a competitive process on the basis of essays they submitted and their overall record within the art department and the College. The completely subsidized trip will transform their lives academically and artistically, says Diane Cole Ahl, Rothkopf Professor of Art History.
“We feel that for art students to study art they must travel and see actual works. This unique program puts that philosophy into practice. Not only do they have the benefit of learning from their group leader, who is specially chosen from outside the Lafayette faculty, but there are also guest lecturers who speak to the students,” she says.
“As juniors, the students will develop a friendship and collegiality that will carry over into the next year. They will return as seniors who can share their knowledge with other students. That contributes greatly to their classes,” Ahl continues.
The program is funded by an endowment established through gifts made to the Lafayette Leadership Campaign in honor of former Lafayette president Arthur J. Rothkopf ’55 and Barbara Sarnoff Rothkopf.
Leading the trip will be Larry Silver, Farquhar Professor of Art History at University of Pennsylvania. A specialist in painting and graphic art of Northern Europe, he has written extensively on Rembrandt. Silver will deliver the 2006 Carol P. Dorian ’79 Memorial Lecture in Art History, entitled “New Jerusalem: Rembrandt, Christians, and Jews,” 4 p.m. Tuesday, April 11, in the Williams Center for the Arts.
The study trip will begin in Amsterdam and will include a visit to Rijksmuseum, the Rembrandt House, Jan Six House, the Van Gogh Museum and a trip to The Hague and Leiden. Also on the schedule are journeys to Haarlem, the Frans Hal Museum, St. Bavo, Utrecht, and St. Catherine’s Convent
From Brussels, the group will go to the Boymans-van Beuningen Museum, the Museum of Old Masters, Ghent, Bruges, the Groeninge Museum, Antwerp and Rubens House.