Arts & Entertainment
Watergate
to time over the years, including an exhibit in San Francisco for the 30th anniversary. Even after decades as a full-time artist, Reagan is still happy with her handiwork from long ago. “I was pleasantly surprised when I got these out,” she says. If there’s a leading man here, it’s Sam Ervin, the Democratic senator from North Carolina who chaired the investigating committee. Reagan was so taken with his face that he’s the only one she drew twice. In one of the portraits, Senator Sam is set against a regal purple background, his nose and chin prominent, his eyebrows perpetually in motion. Ervin, Reagan wrote in her exhibit card, “was a crusty grandfather figure, drawing on immense knowledge. His outrage was also immense.” Still, the artist’s favorite is the portrait of fallen attorney general and Nixon pal John Mitchell, who would serve prison time for his Watergate role. Here he is tight-lipped and small-eyed. “It has a kind of subtlety to it,” she said of the drawing. Other players on the long yellow hall include White House counsel John Dean, head bowed, his eyes invisible behind his glasses; and the old heartthrob Jeb McGruder, with pursed lips and deep-set eyes. The CREEP deputy director, Reagan said, “came across as a guy who would do anything for Nixon.” Reagan is still disappointed that she didn’t get to draw Alexander Butterfield, whose testimony re-
Veronica Weber
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Artist Trudy Reagan, now also known as Myrrh, stands with her drawings. (John Mitchell is on the left.) vealed the secret taping system in from Stanford University. In 1980, the Oval Office. He was on the stand when Ronald Reagan was elected for only 10 minutes. president, she decided to give herself In a way, the portrait project was a different art name. Since then she therapeutic for Reagan after years has signed her works “Myrrh.” of the Vietnam War. “I’m a Quaker Many of the artist’s works have and involved in anti-war activities. I been inspired by science, not polijust got royally depressed during that tics. While she has very little trainperiod,” she says. ing herself, she comes from a scienReagan ended up sending one of tific family, with a geologist father her works to the Senate as a politi- and a physicist husband. “He was cal protest. Different from the drawn really my tutor,” she says of her husportraits, it was a block print made band, Daryl. “He would read to me from an image she carved into a books like ‘Are Quanta Real?’” styrofoam meat tray. Pictured was Reagan is drawn to patterns in Nixon, waving not the victory sign nature, views of the cosmos, rock but the finger. A copy of the print is formations, visual mathematics. in the exhibit. She’s explored them in painting, The Watergate works were part of printmaking, paper marbling and a long art career that extends to this batik. One favorite series is “Essenday. A resident of Palo Alto since tial Mysteries,” in which she looks at 1963, Reagan has a fine-arts degree large questions of science and math
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through large paintings on glowing Plexiglas circles. She also started an organization called YLEM: Artists Using Science and Technology in 1981, bringing together artists and scientists to publish journals and put on forums. These days, Reagan is writing her memoirs and poetry, and is part of the Palo Alto group Waverley Writers. Artwise, she has a newer series called “Artful Recycling,” in which she makes sculptures from old electronic equipment and maps. It pays to have a physicist husband and a son who works in electronics who can supply parts. Reagan has remained interested in politics and social issues. She has done portraits of Central American refugees, donating proceeds to Quaker projects in El Salvador. Other works have explored civil rights and advocated for compassion in the Middle East. In 1987, Reagan was again rapt in front of the television, watching the Iran-Contra hearings. She pulls out a sketchbook and displays some of the portraits she drew then. Elliott Abrams, assistant secretary of state, looks extremely hawkish. And here’s Fawn Hall, former secretary to Lt. Col. Oliver North. Oh, Fawn. That hair. Anyone looking at the sketchbook would be waiting for Ollie North, and Reagan does not disappoint. Here he is in all his boyish, gaptoothed glory, and yet Reagan found something enigmatic about him. She flips through one portrait after another. “It took me about three draw-
ings to realize that he had busted his nose at some point.” N What: “Watergate Villains and Heroes,” portraits by Trudy Reagan, also known as Myrrh Where: Midpeninsula Community Media Center, 900 San Antonio Road, Palo Alto When: Through June 29, weekdays from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. (by appointment on weekday evenings). Cost: Free. Info: For more about the artist’s work, go to myrrh-art.com.
A&E DIGEST THEATREWORKS CASTS NEW ROLES ... TheatreWorks now has two new directors: new associate artistic director and director of advancement, that is. Leslie Martinson, longtime casting and stage director at TheatreWorks, will fill the first of these two staff positions. She’s been with the Peninsula company since 1984, and has helmed shows including “Time Stands Still” and “The Pitmen Painters.” Filling the development position is Jodye Friedman, who previously worked as director of advancement for Brandeis Hillel Day School in San Francisco. She has also worked with One World Theatre in Texas and with the Florida Philharmonic Orchestra.
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