This all-day, multidisciplinary symposium explored themes in art, poetry, music and drama in conjunction with the collaborative exhibition "Lyric Truth: Paintings, Drawings and Embroideries by Rosemarie Beck."
Rosemarie Beck (1923-2003), the daughter of Hungarian Jewish immigrants, was a New York painter, needleworker, musician and journal writer. "Lyric Truth" includes Beck's joyous figure drawings, dense and colorful embroideries and large, rigorously organized paintings inspired by themes from classical mythology and literature.
The symposium explored Beck’s many creative interests—art, drama, poetry and music. Participants from collaborating institutions and from the Rosemarie Beck Foundation in New York and discussed topics such as the artist's friendship with poet Marcia Nardi and her fascination with the figure of Antigone as woman caught between filial and civic duty.
A keynote lecture by Samantha Baskind, professor of art history at Cleveland State University, places Beck in the broader context of American art in the late 20th century. The lecture is this year's Sara Glasgow Cogan Endowed Lecture in Judaic Studies.