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WELLESLEY,
Mass. -- In addition to being one of the top liberal arts
colleges in the United States, Wellesley College is renowned
for the outstanding beauty and design of its campus. The
Landscape and Architecture of Wellesley College, a newly
published book by three members of Wellesley's art faculty,
details and explains the origins and planning behind this
remarkable campus.
In
eleven chapters richly illustrated with vintage and contemporary
images, the book details the 125-year development of the
park-like composition of meadows, woods, and buildings sited
on the shore of a characteristic New England glacial lake.
The
authors place this story in the wider context of landscape
and architectural studies, as well as Wellesley's own institutional
development.
"Set
in the context of the institution's history and the development
of women's education, the landscape and architecture form
a moving history of ideals enunciated first by the founders,
Henry and Pauline Durant, and continued through the generations
since to make Wellesley a place where women could make a
difference," note the authors.
"For
the non-Wellesley reader, this book should be a revelation,
for it will introduce the College's extraordinary campus
as well as provide its detailed history," states Helen Lefkowitz
Horowitz, professor of American Studies at Smith College
and a 1963 Wellesley alumna. "The book is a first. No college
in the United States has been so carefully delineated by
landscape and architectural historians. And no college more
deserves to be."
"Anyone
who has lived, studied, or worked at Wellesley College for
any period of time carries experiences of the campus that
are vivid and visceral," explains President Diana Chapman
Walsh in the book's foreword. "The story of the campus is
a lens through which we can read the story of the College's
mission, culture, and values."
Wellesley
College has published the book in commemoration of the college's
125th
anniversary. It was printed by Cantz in Stuttgart, Germany.
Peter
J. Fergusson is the Theodora L. and Stanley H. Feldberg
Professor of Art at Wellesley College. A member of the faculty
since 1966, he teaches courses in medieval art and architecture,
landscape and garden architecture. His most recent book,
Rievaulx Abbey: Community, Architecture, Memory,
which he co-authored, was published by Yale University Press
in the spring of 2000.
James
F. O'Gorman is the Grace Slack McNeil Professor of the
History of American Art. Widely acclaimed as an author,
lecturer, editor, consultant, and historian, he teaches
courses in the history of painting, sculpture, and architecture
in the United States from colonial times through World War
II and seminars in American art and architecture. The subject
of his most recent book, Accomplished in All Departments
of Art: Hammatt Billings of Boston, 1818-1874, (University
of Massachusetts Press, 1998) was the architect of the original
buildings at Wellesley.
John
Rhodes is a Senior Lecturer in Wellesley's Art Department
and Writing Program. A specialist in Western art and architecture
from the 18th through the 20th centuries, he has taught
a wide variety of courses in these and other areas, including
the history of landscape design, theories of ornament and
art-historical methodology. Rhodes has published works on
avant-garde aesthetics, American vernacular architecture
and the history of modernism.
The
color photographs were taken by Cervin Robinson of New York
City, one of the country's foremost photographers of architecture
and landscape, and form a central part of the book.
The
book will be available from the Office
for Public Information or in the Wellesley College Bookstore,
beginning in February.
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