by THE STANFORD ARTS REVIEW STAFF
At Wednesday’s meeting in Synergy, members of the Arts Review wrote for ten minutes about some object in the room. Here is what they came up with.
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Among the artifacts to survive the Synergy remodel are a series of plaster reliefs above the fireplaces on the first floor. They are white, neoclassical, and dirty; I know from experience that they aren’t part of the weekly house-clean. In two of them, a group of male figures sing or chant around a common choirbook. In another, a group of women and two simian-looking children strum lyres against their chests. The men have curly hair; everyone is wearing robes.
Over the summer, Housing took down the front and back fire-escapes, and dismantled the second-floor porch. They rearranged the parking lot. They added a barbecue. I can remember nights when travelling musicians would stay at Synergy and pay their way by playing. We would sit out on the fire escape and listen to music and drink from a common bottle as the sun set over campus and the stars came out over the bay.
I wonder, now, why Stanford found the silent reliefs worth keeping, and why they felt that the fire escapes had to go.
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