Lewis said he called an old friend for advice, who summarized his
choices this way: begging for money or giving it away. He chose the
Mellon Foundation presidency, overseeing an organization that provided
grants of about $235 million in support of higher education and culture
in 2013.
The foundations mission is to strengthen, promote, and, where
necessary, defend the contributions of the humanities and the arts to
human flourishing and to the well-being of diverse and democratic
societies.
In his role with Mellon, Lewis has championed the importance of
diversifying the academy, enhancing graduate education, re-envisioning
the liberal arts, exploring the role of digital tools for learning and
connecting universities to their communities. He is the author or
co-editor of seven books and is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts
and Sciences.
Also during his visit to UD, Lewis visited Winterthur Museum, where
he toured the conservation and scientific research laboratories and met
with students in the graduate Winterthur/University of Delaware Program in Art Conservation (WUDPAC) and in preservation studies and with doctoral students in UDs art history curatorial program.
In the labs, students described their conservation and technical
study projects, including the scientific analysis and preservation of
Native American basketry, a painting from 1940 by Grandma Moses, a
Plexiglas cube by the artist Connie Fox, library materials and
hand-colored photographic postcards from the 19th century and an export
Chinese lacquer sewing cabinet
WUDPAC, a three-year program whose students earn a masters degree,
is one of only five graduate programs in art conservation in North
America and one of only two jointly sponsored between a university and a
museum.
The curatorial track for doctoral art history students was launched
in 2011 with the support of a generous grant from the Andrew W. Mellon
Foundation. The program is one of only a handful in the country to
prepare future curators for careers in specialized historical art
fields.
Dr. Lewis connection to and engagement with our graduate students
and faculty was energizing, and his visit enjoyed and appreciated by
all, said Debra Hess Norris, Unidel Henry Francis du Pont Chair in Fine
Arts and director of WUDPAC.
After the Winterthur visit, Lewis returned to the Newark campus to
attend a research seminar with faculty and staff affiliated with the
College of Arts and Sciences Center for the Study of Diversity.
Late Tuesday afternoon, he delivered a talk, titled Why Learn: In Search of Higher Educations Future, as part of UDs Thought Leader Speaker Series.