Document text
Museum pursues arts' cutting edge Photo by Bob Pennell Sanford Shaman, the new director of the Schneider Museum of Art at Southern Oregon University, says he is committed to exhibits that move people and connect with the community. Schneider's new director boasts an exotic background By BILL VARBLE Sanford Shaman doesn't blink when asked if he will bring cutting-edge work to the Schneider Museum of Art. "Yep," says the new director of the museum at Southern Oregon University in Ashland. "It's important for people to see what's going on in the art world. And in a university it's important to see what's new." Shaman was hired after a search to follow Greer Markle, the Schneider's only director from its opening in 1986 until this year, when he began teaching full time. Shaman arrives after a 1997 expansion and with SOU poised to become home to a new $11 million art center now under construction. "He will lead the museum into the new century at a time when the arts at Southern are being boosted by construction of the new visual arts center," says Mary Ellen Fleeger, head of the search committee that picked Shaman. For the 53-year-old arts administrator, SOU is the latest stop in a long career. He comes from the University of Haifa in Haifa, Israel, where he'd directed the museum since 1989. He directed the Palmer Museum of Art at Pennsylvania State University from 1984 to 1989 and the Washington State University art museum in Pullman, Wash., from 1980 to 1984. He grew up in Pittsburgh, Ohio, and earned a bachelor of fine arts degree from Ohio University and a master of fine arts from the Villa Schifanoia Graduate School of Fine Arts in Florence, Italy. He is a frequent contributor to arts magazines, writing on museums and contemporary art. "I think it's a coup to get a man of his experience," says longtime Schneider board member Gary Heiter. Like Markle, Shaman will teach in addition to running the museum and its programs. This term he has an experimental workshop in museum education. "The class is designed for the students to experience an art exhibit on a personal level and get in touch with intuitive areas that usually remain untapped," he says. After a decade in Israel he confesses to moments of shock at the sound of English being spoken. Although people in the arts chronically complain about funding, Shaman says the country seems rich after Israel. "People tend to take for granted how much money we have," he says. "You always hear grant money is going up and down. After 10 years, I've come to appreciate America as an abundant country. We still have exceptional support for the arts." Shaman praises his predecessor. "Greer sort of made it easy for me to take over the administrative aspects," he says. "He did such a good job." Markle won kudos from arts buffs -- and the occasional barb from detractors -- for refusing to play it safe in booking such exhibits as a 1996 post-modernist show with American Indian artist James Luna and Cuban artist Alberto Rey, a provocative 1989 show by artist David Geise called "The Rise and Fall of Taste," a show of found objects called `Trashformations," and others. `It's a museum of contemporary art," Shaman says. "That means we have to be cutting edge." The exhibit schedule for this year is already set, and he says it's a little early to talk about artists he hopes to bring, but he says he'll seek emerging artists doing new things in new media. "I'll be looking for contemporary artists who are able to speak to the audience," he says. "And that the public can respond to. Exhibits that move the public." Nan Trout, an ex-board member involved in the search that picked Shaman, says a key issue was that he seems to be interested in developing the museum as a community resource. "Not just as an adjunct to faculty, but to engage the community with artworks that in some ways address where we are culturally and how are we are changing." Shaman says the biggest challenge facing the museum is to develop into all it can be. "It has tremendous potential," he says. "It has an impressive support group. It can be a major player in the arts of the region." He doesn't see any obstacles. Trout says the biggest challenge will be fund raising. Museum programming doesn't come out of SOU's budget and must be raised separately. "He'll have to work out strategies," she says Shaman gave a talk in June about the need for art to reconnect with another dimension, what he called its spiritual raison d'etre. "This is why we have art museums," he says. "A lot of art has lost that." Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 1999, Medford, Oregon USA