2016 Annual Newsletter of the Signet Society

Sic

vos non vobis mellificatis ape

— So

d o yo u b e es m a k e h o n e y , n o t f o r yo u r se lv e s .

Virgil

2016 Newsletter of the Signet Society of Harvard College 4 6 D u n s t e r S t r e e t , C a m b r i d g e , M a ss a c h u s e t t s 0 2 1 3 8 • 6 1 7 - 5 4 7 - 0 5 2 6 • S i g n e t S o c i e t y . o r g

Science!

John Singer Sargent gave two of his palettes to his fr ie n d W illia m J a m e s .

James’ son William, Class of 1903, was a Signet member and gave us one of the palettes. He gave the other to the Tavern Club, where it is on display in a secure case, intact.

Ours, however, was available for examination by students, and sometime in the mid-2000s it broke in two. Nobody knows how! The digital record shows a f lurry of emails between members and staff, and then silence. Wrapped in paper, put on a high shelf, it vanished for a decade.

When we finally found it, we made an archival case for the two pieces and the various chips of paint that were assiduously collected after its unfortunate breakage.

a chance to look at the crosssection with their new microscope, and the chips would be invaluable for testing.

Sargent’s El Jaleo, painted in 1882

Part of the Signet’s Sargent palette being examined at the Harvard Art Museum

The Harvard Art Museum knew we had it. They’re surveying all of Sargent’s palettes (there are eight available) to determine what paints he used and how he used them. Researchers of the great Edwardian artist want to know how Sargent created his magical effects.

They regretted our breakage, but pointed out a silver lining—it allowed them

Cross-sections of paint chips from our palette

They’re working on it now.

So far, they’ve surmised that Sargent worked with wet oil pigments over an extended period of time, intermixing older paints with new, and that sometimes he let old paint dry completely and then started over with fresh oils. That might be what one would expect, but science now confirms it.

They can analyze the paint quite specifically, and hope to assign the various palettes to specific paintings. We might someday know that our palette was used to create the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum’s dramatic El Jaleo, but we’d settle for The Daughters of Edward Darley Boit, or Lady Agnew of Lochnaw.

Our palette is old-growth, dense mahogany. On its backside, there are smoothed-off lead weights, designed to balance the palette on Sargent’s arm. A tin flange has been customized to keep paint off the artist’s sleeve. Harvard will advise us on how to display both pieces of the palette at the Hive in a way to show both the rich oil hues on the front and the utilitarian form-follows-function backside.

Every Hundred years, Whether It Needs It Or Not

Harvard’s senior piano shop technician Paul Rattigan adjusts the new hammers of the Signet’s Steinway piano.

Our venerable Steinway piano has endured a lot of collegiate love in its long life, and was finally not suitable for performances. The Harvard Piano Shop is restoring it by replacing the maple pin block, installing a new Steinway action, and restringing the harp. They’re doing this at cost ($7,000) since we are a Harvard affiliate.

They have also tapped into a Harvard fund to do some restoration of the finish. It won’t be a mirror stage finish, but it will meet “collegiate standards.”

They don’t need to replace the Sitka spruce sounding board, which is in a “sweet spot” of excellent sound, which it should enjoy for another fifty years. (Sounding boards are built with a slightly domed shape called a crown. Over time, the crown settles. When it’s horizontal, the sound is richest. Eventually, it continues to drop and become slightly concave—then it’s time for a new one, but not yet for ours!)

Our instrument started life in 1911 as a player piano. With the advent of phonographs and radio, ours, like many other player pianos, was converted to a regular piano. The sound and the action weren’t affected, but every technician points it out.

The Signet Associates’ board has raised over $4,000 for the project. If you’re a pianist or ever just noodled around on the ivories then consider helping future generations of college students enjoy our piano as you once did.

Two Marshalls and a Rhodes The Signet currently has three recent graduates enrolled in prominent scholarship programs. Former Signet undergraduate president Anna Hagen ’15 is in her second year as a Marshall Scholar, and Rebecca Panovka ’15 is starting her first, both of them at Cambridge. As a Harvard undergraduate, Rebecca undertook a joint concentration in philosophy and English. Her senior thesis interrogated both Dostoevsky and Rousseau. And, unsurprisingly, her current Marshall scholarship will make a whole of two disparate disciplines: intellectual history and documentary filmmaking. As she completes her current Masters of Philosophy at Cambridge University, she is already preparing to continue developing her talents behind the camera at Westminster University.

For Panovka, whose credits include an editorial internship at the Paris Review and research for Pulitzer laureate Louis Menand, filmmaking is only made richer by the study of philosophers like Foucault and Heidegger. Such intellectual social inquiry has anchored two of her most ambitious projects: a documentary about a group of New Yorkers who devote their lives to the city’s pigeons through legal (and often illegal) means, and another investigating a game reserve’s vexed relationship to a local village near South Africa’s Kruger National Park.

Yen Pham ’15-’16 is a Rhodes Scholar under the auspices of the Rhodes program of Australia, her native country. About her Rhodes/Oxford experience, Yen writes: “Contrary to my original ideas but fully in the spirit of exploration, I’m now pursuing an MSt in Women’s Studies, which is a one-year interdisciplinary degree program. I’m actually very excited to be joining a field that conducts its research on such obviously shifting grounds. I’m housed at St Peter’s College, a smaller college on the western side of central Oxford.

I have very much enjoyed meeting my fellow Rhodes cohort, who are pursuing studies ranging from politi-

cal theory to zoology to condensed matter physics. Their competence and earnestness about tackling the world’s problems, no matter how specific or varied their fields, is spurring me to consider anew how my creative aspirations can align with my social justice goals. I am waiting to see what activities present themselves to me, but for the moment I’m looking forward to going walking in the English countryside, and participating in theatre or the Oxford Union. After this first MSt, I’m likely to pursue another in English.

Thinking fondly of the Hive! Best, Yen.”

2016 Senior Thesis Topics Of the 17 theses written by last spring’s seniors, nine received Hoopes Prizes, indicated here with an asterisk.

Emma Adler The Revivalists Creative thesis for the English Department * Alona Bach Lights Up: Performing Science and the Electrical Association for Women, 1925-1927 History of Science Department * Josh Bean The Myth of Madame Mao and Her World: Reexamining Jiang Qing’s Gendered Legacy in Nixon in China and Beyond Joint thesis in Music and East Asian Studies Joshuah Campbell ‘Paris Tout Entier’: Musical Histories of Improvisation and Blackness from African-American Musicians in Paris, 1920 to now Joint thesis in French and Music* Daniel Citron As I wake: A virtual reality narrative Visual and Environmental Studies* Alistair Debling War Room A multi-media installation in Visual & Environmental Studies Sumire Hirotsuru Music of the 20th Century: from Eastern Europe to the New World Performance thesis for the Music Department Zoe Hitzig The Evolutionary Dynamics of Distributive Justice Joint thesis in Mathematics & Philosophy*

Ema Horvath Right After This Feature-Length Screenplay submitted as a Creative Thesis to the English Department Max McGillivray Dulles A creative film for the Visual & Environmental Studies Department Moira McCavana 86 Ways of Becoming José Manuel Elosegi A collection of short stories for the English Department* Olivia Munk What the Director Said: The Creative Collaborations of T.S. Eliot and E. Martin Browne English Department Molly Roberts The Authorial Use of the Footnote (Or: A Supposedly Fun Thesis I’ll Never Write Again) English Department Laura Trosser Refolding the Folds of the Antigone Myth: the frustration of withness, catharsis and time in Anne Carson’s Antigonick Literature Department Mindy Yi Modernism with a Human Face: Asterios Polyp’s Visual Language Visual and Environmental Studies* Renee Zhan Hold Me (Ca Caw Ca Caw) Creative thesis in Visual & Environmental Studies* Maggie Zier Staging the Wake: Black Women Playwrights and the Fight Against Lynching, 1916-1940 History and Literature*

The Signet’s Role at Harvard The Signet’s move to open applications last year went more smoothly than anyone expected, thanks to the efforts of our undergraduate officers and membership. Perhaps a third of those who joined last year would have been overlooked under our previous method of “putting up” candidates who were known by current members.

We have a much stronger representation of the visual arts, including many graphic artists who aren’t affiliated with a campus publication.

The membership takes seriously the process of reviewing portfolios and examples of work. In a nod to the Oscars, members in the applicant’s field and outside of it do a first review. To vote on a candidate, members must have seen the portfolio, which is easier to ensure in this digital age. We truly are a home for those who excel in the arts and letters.

The restrictions on single-sex organizations that Harvard has enacted do not affect the Signet, with our forty-five year tradition of not considering gender as a basis for admission. We continue to focus on our purpose: to provide a home for students in a broad spectrum of artistic fields.

Lunches & Access We serve lunch at 1 p.m. each Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday during the school year. If you plan to join us or would like to bring a guest, please sign up at SignetLuncheon.org . If you live locally, we’d be happy to add you to our weekly emailing of upcoming tasty menus.

We’ve simplified the system for payment by graduates, associates, and your guests—meals are $20 a head. We’ve brought back the very popular “5 tickets for $75” deal if you’re regularly around.

And remember, you’re a member for life. If you would like an access card to come by when we’re open, please email the office at <sigsoc@fas.harvard.edu> and we’ll send you one.

We have migrated our database! If the postal address we have for you is not where you’d like us to reach you, please let us know.

S A V E T H E D A T E !

S AT U R D A Y A P R I L 2 2 2 0 1 7 SIGNET ANNUAL DINNER K I R K L A N D H O U S E

Executive Committee Prof. Thomas Forrest Kelly, President Patrick O’Donnell ’67, Vice-President Winthrop G. Minot ’71, Treasurer John H. Finley IV ’92, Clerk Matthew C. Lee ’91, At Large Finance Committee Winthrop G. Minot ’71, Chair Christopher Laconi Thomas F. Moore ’98 Geoffrey H. Movius ’62 House Committee Patrick O’Donnell ’67, Chair Prof. Amanda Claybaugh Mark S. Hruby ’78 Auguste “Gussie” Roc ’17 Sally Scopa ’13 Bryan Simmons ’83 Prof. John Stilgoe Capital A Associates Rucker Alex ’99 Susan Stevenson Borowitz ’81 Mimi Brown ’97 Prof. Amanda Claybaugh Stephen Coit ’71 Prof. Diana Eck Prof. James Engell John H. Finley IV ’92 Stephen Gauster ’92 John W. Gillespie, Jr. ’76 Margaret H. Gleason ’94 Joel Henning ’61 Prof. Thomas Forrest Kelly Daniel Kim ’97 Walter B. Klyce, III ’10 Christopher Laconi Matthew C. Lee ’91 Winthrop G. Minot ’71 Thomas F. Moore ’98 Geoffrey H. Movius ’62 Philip Munger ’95 Patrick O’Donnell ’67 Bryan Eric Simmons ’83 Nancy Sinsabaugh ’76 Prof. John Stilgoe James M. Storey ’53 Simon Williams ’09 Artist-in-Residence Jesse Nee-Vogelman ’13