The Mind’s Eye

Bachmann Wins Tufts Discovery Award Beth Bachmann (right), assistant professor of English, is the 2010 winner of the prestigious Kate Tufts Discovery Award, given to honor a poet’s first book. The award, presented by Claremont Graduate University, includes a $10,000 prize. Bachmann’s Temper, published last year by the University of… Read More

Gold Medal Physics: The Science of Sports (2010, The Johns Hopkins University Press) by John Eric Goff, BS’92 Using performances by elite athletes such as Greg Louganis, Bob Beamon and Lance Armstrong as starting points, Goff discusses the science behind diving, long jumping, cycling, skating, football, soccer, and a… Read More

John Guider, BE’ 72, understands fully what Emerson meant when he said, “Who looks upon a river … and is not reminded of the flux of all things?” Guider, a well-known commercial photographer, has traveled the world to produce the perfect image for clients. In August 2003 he embarked on… Read More

In September, nine VUMC nurses starred in Hey, Florence!, a musical about the day-to-day lives of nurses. Hey, Florence!, a musical reflecting the day-to-day life of nurses at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, premiered in September in Langford Auditorium. Directed by renowned Australian playwright Craig Christie, the 60-minute show starred nine… Read More

Woodstock: Three Days That Rocked the World (2009, Sterling Publishing) edited by Mike Evans and Paul Kingsbury, BA’80 Filled with photos from the event itself as well as visual exploration of the social context in which Woodstock happened, this well-researched coffee-table tome provides new information, including complete set lists… Read More

Duncan Jones (left) and actor Sam Rockwell on the set of Moon Speaking by phone from Liberty Studios in London, 38-year-old former Vanderbilt student Duncan Jones seems unaffected by the flurry of media attention he’s receiving for his directorial debut, the science-fiction film Moon. Produced for $5 million (a… Read More

Designed by the New York firm of McKim, Mead and White, Cohen Memorial on the Peabody campus has always been dedicated to the arts. Nashville art collector George Etta Brinkley Cohen gave the hall to Peabody College in 1926 and occupied an apartment on the second floor until… Read More

Born with the 20th century in the American South, jazz has been called the only music entirely original to the United States. Yet no less a figure than Duke Ellington once said, “It is becoming increasingly difficult to decide where jazz starts or where it stops, where Tin Pan Alley… Read More

Adrienne Outlaw This fall scholars from Vanderbilt debated the ethics of healthy people taking prescription drugs to enhance creativity as part of the yearlong Art Makes Place program. With a focus on contemporary artists who are making community-oriented, temporary and performance-based art for public spaces, the Vanderbilt panelists discussed… Read More

Seeing Mexico Photographed (2008, Yale University Press) by Leonard Folgarait, professor of history of art. During the years 1910–35, Mexico underwent changes brought on by the Mexican Revolution and the forging of a new nation and government. Folgarait’s book looks at the photographs of four historically engaged artists—American Walter H. Read More

Guayasamín’s sketch for the mural “Family” for the Chapel of Man (serigraph) The Vanderbilt University Fine Arts Gallery was honored recently during a celebration of the 90th birthday of the renowned, late Ecuadorian artist Oswaldo Guayasamín at the Capilla del Hombre (Chapel of Man) in Quito, Ecuador. Given in recognition… Read More

Odigie When singer-songwriter Denitia Odigie walked on stage at the POP Montreal International Music Festival, strummed her Ibanez acoustic guitar and began to sing, she became an international favorite, earning the title “Find of the Fest.” The gifted Odigie, BA’04, has impressed a growing number of fans and critics, inspiring… Read More

Music has been shown to offer distraction from pain for the seriously ill, as well as reduce stress and increase social interaction for patients and their families. Music in the Clinic (M.I.C.) is a volunteer program at Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center that connects patients with this healing power of music. At… Read More

The “Second Stringers,” the Blair School of Music’s newest student string band, debuted on the on March 28 with the Mike Snyder Band. Matt Combs, adjunct instructor of fiddle and head of the fiddle program at Blair, directs the group. Pictured here from left to right are Rachel Baiman, Eva… Read More

The Vanderbilt Dyer Observatory has been added to the National Register of Historic Places, the nation’s official list of cultural resources worthy of preservation. “Listing is recognition of a property’s importance,” says Claudette Stager with the Tennessee Historical Commission, which administers the program in Tennessee. “Properties that are listed in the National… Read More

Tichi Cecelia Tichi, the William R. Kenan Jr. Professor of English, has been named the 2009 winner of the Hubbell Medal, a lifetime achievement award presented by the American Literature Section to recognize significant advancements in the study of American literature. “The ALS executive committee is very excited about the choice… Read More

The Robert Stempfel Jr. Collection of John Updike materials is on display in Special Collections at the Jean and Alexander Heard Library through August. The exhibit includes first editions of classic Updike books and ephemeral items like small-press editions of his stories created in limited numbers and signed by the… Read More

Georgia Stitt, BMus’94, with 4-year-old America's Got Talent contestant Kaitlyn Maher. In show business, the saying goes, it’s not what you know but whom you know. In the case of Georgia Stitt, award-winning composer and vocal coach on America’s Got Talent, it’s both. A Tennessee native, Stitt received her bachelor’s… Read More

Being on tour and missing life at home is nothing new for Stokes Nielson, BS’00, and Ryder Lee, BA’00, of the fast-rising country band The Lost Trailers. But on New Year’s Eve, the day of Vanderbilt’s historic victory in the Music City Bowl, it was especially painful to be alumni… Read More

One of the most influential photographers of the last half-century, William Eggleston, ’61, has helped define the history of color photography. William Eggleston: Democratic Camera, Photographs and Video, 1961–2008, an exhibit at New York City’s Whitney Museum of American Art from November through January, was rated one of the top 10… Read More