March, 2000
H. Randolph Swearer
Dean, Parson's School of Design
66 5Ih Avenue, 6th Floor
New York, NY 10011
Dear Dean Swearer:
I write to protest the recent announcement of the closing of the Parson's/New School Printshop. This decision must be reversed; the Printshop must remain.
Parson's School of Design is a world-renowned art university, and as such is obligated to provide to its students the highest caliber of teaching tools available. Integral to learning how to create art is understanding process, and there is no better model of process than printmaking. Between the working and reworking of the lithography stone or the etching plate, the multiple-screen layering of the silkscreen, and the limitless ways in which these techniques can be combined with one another and with photography, graphic design and every other artmaking process, printmaking is vital to any art school's course of study. However, it is especially so at a university in a location such as New York and with the reputation that Parson's has thus far merited.
In addition, the Parson's/New School Printshop is unique in that it affords under one ceiling all three major printmaking techniques, taught by some of the most dedicated and experienced professors and technicians at Parson's. The Printshop is a home for Parson's and New School undergrads, for AAS and Continuing Education students and for a large handful of alumni, many of them well past forty; there are few studios at Parson's with as diverse and devoted a population of students. They, and all of Parson's/New School would be devastated by its loss, however temporary, or its reduction, however minute. It is for all of these reasons that the Printshop cannot be closed, and must remain the cornerstone of teaching that it is at Parson's/New School.
Very truly yours,
6
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