CGIS Debuts Portrait Exhibit

A portrait of renowned government professor Harvey C. Mansfield ’53 smiles benignly alongside a portrait of staff member Medardo A. Landaverde and 26 other portraits as part of an exhibit launched yesterday in CGIS South.

This collection of 30 total portraits—two more paintings will soon join the exhibit—is housed in the basement of CGIS South and is part of the building’s efforts to promote the arts.

CGIS Art Board Associate Bettina K. Burch, who painted all the portraits over the course of three years, called the exhibit a “democratic representation” of the members of the CGIS community.

“I went to the various departments and centers to find people from different backgrounds,” Burch said. “I presented them so that they’re all on the same level and without any gilt frame, so you just see the faces, in their own element.”

Burch said that she arranged the portraits in the exhibit not by the subject’s department or position within the University but by pure “aesthetic,” in order to maintain “a diverse representation near each other.”

“There’s no hierarchical representation,” she added.

Each of the portraits in the exhibit features its subject posing with a distinct expression and hand motion, gestures that Burch said embody the subject’s personality.

As an Art Board Associate at CGIS, Burch is responsible for the maintenance of the artwork in both CGIS buildings.

After working hard to fill the basement with beauty for many years, Burch “shyly but insistently” requested to have a space of her own, according to Steven B. Bloomfield ’77, executive director of the Weatherhead Center of International Affairs who spoke at the exhibit launch.

Landaverde said he thought Burch was joking when she told him that she wanted to paint a portrait of him.

“I mean, I was really touched that she took the time to make portraits of us staff guys as well,” Landaverde said.

Matthew P. Stec, the manager of facilities in the CGIS buildings, said he admired the goals of the exhibition.

“I think it’s a great way to build a community—she’s represented a great cross-section of CGIS,” he said.

“I think that she really captured people’s personalities,” said Stephen E. Coady, assistant director at the International Quantitative Social Sciences and also a subject of one of Burch’s portraits.

—Staff writer Gautam S. Kumar can be reached at gkumar@college.harvard.edu.

—Staff writer Julia L. Ryan can be reached at jryan@college.harvard.edu.