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The Orozco Room is located in the reserve corridor of Baker Library at Dartmouth College. The lights progressively dim as one descends the stairs and into the long, spacious mural room. Arguably Jose Clemente Orozco’s greatest mural, The Epic of American Civilization covers the walls of the corridor. Composed of 24 individual panels and spanning approximately 3,200 square feet, the Orozco murals depict the development of American civilization from prehistoric times through the arrival of Quetzalcoatl, a prominent Meso-American god, into the age of conquistadors and modernity. Raw and vibrant, the frescoes simply demand attention. Most who use the room today however, do not realize the rich history behind the vibrant frescoes. During the 1930s, Dartmouth art faculty heavily lobbied for Orozco to demonstrate his mastery of fresco painting at the College to undergraduates. Following the construction of Baker Library, Carpenter Hall, and the Sanborn House in the late 1920s (which formed the cultural center of a “new” Dartmouth), the arrival of Orozco in 1932 was part of a greater push to modernize the campus by increasing its artistic and aesthetic sensitivities. Undergraduate students, faculty, and community members alike were given the opportunity to observe a master at work. The room has been keep in fine condition due to restoration efforts and so Orozco’s masterpiece is still very much intact nearly a century later for students to enjoy. Though it primarily serves as an alternative study space today, the Orozco Room was a bold experiment in self-expression and cultural sophistication, heralding the emergence of a new, modern Dartmouth.

Category:History Beginning in the 1920s, President Hopkins’ experimental policies marked a departure from previous administrations. He worked to change the College from being known as a “stronghold of conservatism.” A budget surplus allowed Hopkins to spearhead a campaign to build a new Dartmouth. In a short span of time, the administration built three buildings that would form the “cultural complex” at the heart of a “new” Dartmouth: Baker Library, Carpenter Hall (Art department), and Sanborn House (English department).

In a speech inaugurating the beginning of the 1931 school year, President Hopkins acknowledged that while Dartmouth needed to remain a bastion of liberal arts education, it must also adapt with the times. In response to the cynicism and criticism expressed in national editorials and journals, Hopkins asserted that college was a place of learning and culture, not intellectual elitism. He also reaffirmed his faith in the liberal arts education, noting that “no man can even fortell what things it will in the immediate future be most important to know.” Therefore it is important to learn how to learn and develop intellectual curiosity. Hopkins also acknowledged the forces of urbanization and change in America. He explained that while there was much to be appreciated in Dartmouth’s rural landscape, one should not be blind to the modern beauty of bridges and urban skyline. Hopkins implied that if Dartmouth continued to hold onto outdated traditions at the expense of innovation and adaption, it would be left behind. As the president of a premier American institution of higher learning, it was up to Hopkins to make sure that this wouldn’t happen. He was confident in the agency of the student body, reminding the men of Dartmouth that they would play an important role in shaping the College and the world. It with this spirit of intellectual revivalism that members of the art faculty broached Hopkins about the possibility of inviting world-renowned muralist, J.C. Orozco, to showcase his abilities on campus.

Professor Churchill P. Lathrop played a key role in lobbying for Orozco to come to campus. Lathrop saw Orozco as a master of technique and someone who would be most receptive to the mission of culturally enriching the school. It also made great sense to employ a muralist because, as Orozco once explained, the mural is the most public form of painting and would be most educational.

In 1932, Dartmouth hired Orozco to come to the school as a “lecturer” to paint a small mural titled “Release,” a panel showing “man free from the bondage of destructive mechanisms.” The Art department hoped this would attract more attention to the arts at the College and inspire students. During his stay, Orozco spotted the walls of the reserve corridor, located in the lower level of Baker Library, as the perfect spot for what he then called the “Epic of America,” his masterpiece mural.

This announcement sparked a flurry of positive response from staff and the student body. Nathaniel Lewis Goodrich, Librarian of the College, noted that Orozco’s work would make a bold statement, striking a stark contrast with the traditional, quiet décor of Baker. Professor Stacy May, a highly regarded economics professor, strongly encouraged the administration to allow Orozco to work at Dartmouth, believing the commission would be “one of the most hopeful educational experiments ever attempted in an American college.” The student body was equally excited. An article in The Dartmouth noted that Orozco’s presence at Dartmouth marked a return to true liberal arts values. It would encourage development of an aesthetic sense rather than a focus on immediately practical skills, in essence balancing out the recent addition of the Tuck School of Business. Shortly after the completion of “Release,” Orozco began work on The Epic of American Civilization in the reserve corridor of Baker Library, slowly but surely transforming the modest décor of the room into an exciting expression of raw emotion and philosophy that was (and arguably still is to this day) unlike anything else at Dartmouth. During his brief stay as a resident artist at Dartmouth, Orozco befriended students and faculty alike with his intelligence, integrity and gentle personality. The murals were finally completed on February 13, 1934. Days later, faculty and College administrators held a formal dinner event at The Hanover Inn to honor Orozco and the incredible work he accomplished in the short span of two years: the completion of what was then the largest fresco cycle in all of North America.

Over half a decade later in 1989, Dartmouth contracted a conservation laboratory to restore the murals. Continuing efforts to maintain the murals and the room’s furnishings point to the importance the College continues to place on the room. Orozco would eventually campus but not without leaving behind a grand series of fresco panels that continue to attract community visitors and enthrall discerning college students.

C. Brief Visual Analysis of Orozco Frescoes

The Orozco Room frescoes can be split into two main parts: the west and east wing, “first representing the aboriginal culture and the second symbolizing the elements introduced by the white man.” Conflict, sacrifice, and the cyclical nature of human history are central themes in the mural.

Starting from the west wing and moving east, the panels begin with a depiction of a barbaric, militaristic civilization with primitive gods. Then Quetzalcoatl, “luminous, white-robed, blue-eyed” arrives and brings about the golden age of the Americas, as indicated by the panels depicting the development of agriculture, art, and science. The interference of priests and magicians drove out Quetzalcoatl, presumably ushering in a dark age of civilization. The god vows to return centuries later to establish a new civilization. The concluding panel of this “pre-Colombian” section depicts the Spanish conquest of the indigenous people, presuming the fulfillment of Quetzalcoatl’s prophecy.

In the following panels is it clear that the conquistadors were not the prophesized harbingers of a new, glorious civilization. Cortez and his band bring about death and mayhem (as shown by the piles of bodies). Industrialization, modernity and Westernization follow. While some progress is certainly made, revolution and war wrack the Americas. Citizens are roped into conflict and turmoil by dead ideologies like nationalism. The panels conclude with a depiction of the modern industrial man and intellectualism as a leisurely pursuit, potentially signaling the return of Quetzalcoatl and the coming of a true golden age. Ultimately, the mural ends with a sense of cautious optimism, or tempered cynicism depending on your perspective, about the direction of the American people going forward.

D. Cost and Maintenance

The question remains of how Dartmouth, a relatively small, rural college at the time with no significant endowment, was able to afford to commission a world-class artist during a time of such great economic difficulty?

Professor Packard, a member of the art faculty at the time, reveals that Orozco’s price under ordinary circumstance would be $50,000 (in 1934 dollars of course) but the contract he signed only paid $5,200 to cover travelling expenses, board, and compensation. He wished only to have a canvas on and a receptive audience; Dartmouth served as both.

The school at first struggled to find an adequate means of funding this project. Following the recent construction of several significant campus buildings, such as Baker Library and the Tuck School of Business, the College’s funds surely must have been depleted. The art department then proposed using the teaching budget to fund Orozco’s work. Thus in addition to the relatively meager compensation he received, Orozco also earned a salary comparable to other professors, in line with his status at Dartmouth as a resident artist and teacher of painting in true fresco.

E. Critical Response to Orozco: At Time of Commissioning

J.C. Orozco was a strong proponent of the belief that art shouldn’t be obvious insofar as it should provoke further thought rather than explicitly tell people the artist’s insights. He once said: In every painting, as in any other work of art, there is always an IDEA, never a STORY. The idea is the point of departure, the first cause of the plastic construction, and it is present all the time as energy creating matter. The stories and other literary associations exist only in the mind of the spectator, the painting acting as the stimulus.

It is no wonder then that people did not easily understand Orozco’s work. In fact, some members of the Dartmouth community took offense at the Epic of American Civilization. The majority of the criticism, much of it completely unfounded, can be placed into three main categories. Detractors either believed his work to be communist propaganda, visually displeasing because of the vibrant Mexican color scheme, or anathema to Dartmouth’s (and by extension, America’s) values.

In a letter addressed to the treasurer of Dartmouth College, President Hopkins expressed some reservations over Orozco. He called Orozco a “flaming red communist.” Apparently, Orozco also believed that faculty at the College should be “annihilated” due to their “profiteering” from their students’ education and was believed to have said that he hoped a “Mrs. Bliss” be assassinated. This letter certainly paints Orozco in a different light, as most people knew him for his gentle nature and he seemed to be well loved. While it is unclear whether Hopkins himself believed these things, what is clear is that there was certainly an aura of intrigue about the muralist and his political tendencies.

Shortly after the completion of the mural in 1934, an article was published in the Dartmouth Alumni Magazine that found a panel in the reserve corridor, titled “Still-Born Education,” to be a direct attack on Dartmouth. This portion of the mural depicts several ghastly figures surrounding a bare-boned skeleton in labor, in the process of giving birth to books. As the title and the provocative imagery suggests, the panel highlights what Orozco saw to be a fundamental flaw in society: the persistence and perpetuation of dead ideas, ones that have long since lost their relevance and even authenticity. It would seem that Orozco was insulting the College’s ability to provide the dynamic, liberal arts education that it’s supposedly known for. It is understandable then that the College’s alumni, a diverse group of people united by their devotion to Dartmouth, took offense at a painting that effectively declared the death of education at their beloved school (and ironically decorated the walls of a library).

However, none of this is to say that Orozco was a communist, anti-education, anti-American or, for that matter, belonging to any particular ideology or creed. He believed that political ideologies were artificial constructs that were ultimately hurtful to humanity. The ethos of the panel, “Still-Born Education,” is a strong contempt for these rigid, dogmas (“dead ideas”) that only serve to pit fellow men against each other. This theme is reiterated in several following panels. What his detractors did not understand, especially those who were of a similar mindset to Alumni Magazine, was that the very presence of Orozco on campus was a reaffirmation of Dartmouth’s strong liberal arts tradition. He was a highly skilled muralist, given free reign to execute his masterpiece here on campus. It would’ve been rather disappointing if Orozco, a man with interesting ideas and strong beliefs, weren’t allowed to voice himself at a school that touted itself as a liberal arts institution. His ideas may have been controversial, perhaps even radical. However, it would be narrow-minded and reactionary to say that he undermined the integrity of Dartmouth.

F. Critical Response to Orozco: Years Later

At the Montgomery Endowment Symposium during the fall of 1980 at Dartmouth, Clemente Orozco remarked that his father intended to leave America “a monument.” He noted that Dartmouth exhibited incredible courage in allowing Orozco to do as he wished with the allotted space in the Baker Library Reserve Corridor. Such a strong and well-articulated statement of peace and understanding not only acted as a beautiful piece of art, but also doubled as an articulation of values central to the liberal arts and Dartmouth’s mission as a school.

Some questioned at the time of his commissioning whether the issues and themes Orozco raised would endure the test of time. It is safe to say that it has. Nearly half a century after his commissioning, Orozco’s admirers at Dartmouth far outnumbered his critics. The fundamental idea of his mural is the idea that humans should seek to transform the world into a place of peace and understanding is something that was relevant to Dartmouth then and will continue to be. When Clemente asked what people at the symposium thought about the “monument to America” that his father had left, he was received with long applause.

G. Conclusion: The Orozco Room Today

The Orozco Room continues to be a common place for students to study. Long, spacious tables and the consistent availability of seats are the main draws of this space. The room is rarely ever occupied to full capacity. Indeed, the Orozco Room lacks the popularity of other study spaces within the same building such as the various floors of Berry, the Stacks or the Periodical Room. There are several root causes of this.

First, the location of the Orozco Room makes it out of the way and altogether hidden from many students. The entrance to the west wing from outside of Baker is under the main staircase and off to the side. The entrance lacks grandeur and a sense of centrality. Given the function of the room as a reserve corridor when the library was built, it was presumably never meant to be a main study space for students.

Many students simply find the murals to be distracting. Instead of stimulating intellectual thought and discussion, Orozco’s wild colors and stark caricatures of historical characters just seem to detract from studying. These students prefer more modestly decorated locations, many of which are located just upstairs. Students who frequent the room learn to block out the flood of visual data from all the frescoes. They get used to the skeletal priest, to the lightning heralding the coming of Quetzalcoatl, and the continuous human conflict depicted in The Epic of American Civilization. For them, it’s simply a backdrop for the routine work of doing readings and writing papers.

It really is a shame that students don’t realize the rich history behind the room. It is, however, to be expected. The mural has been a part of campus for nearly eighty years and, like many historical significant structures here, has had its history archived, occasionally celebrated, but ultimately neglected by Dartmouth students at large. The statement the mural made many years ago to the American academic community and perhaps even to the world however, is still one that is echoed today: Dartmouth is a school that welcomes self-expression and embodies the American ideal of a liberal arts education. It is certain that his commissioning was one of those key moments in Dartmouth’s long history that shaped it into the school it is today.

Category:Critical Response Category:History