monday, december 1,2003
news
the university daily kansar
3A
Foreign policy discussion to provide perspectives
By Meghan Brune
mbrune@kansan.com
Kansas staff writer
Political groups on campus are preparing for the busy campaign season.
With the U.S. presidential election less than a year away, candidates have already begun their races for office.
Student political organizations are doing their part by providing information about the issues and a place to discuss them.
The student organization KU Greens is sponsoring a U.S. foreign policy forum tonight as one way to prepare voters for next year's presidential election.
"It is important for people to be thinking about the issues and learning more about what is going on," said Sara Zafar, co-president for the KU Greens and Kansan columnist. "We want informed voters."
The forum, a panel of five professors, students and members of the community, will begin at 7
Each panelist will present a different perspective on the topic and the audience can ask questions of them, said Zafar, Wichita junior.
Zafar said the purpose of the panel was to cover all the views across the political spectrum — from conservative to liberal.
"We tried to get a diverse perspective in order to give people a sense of what everyone thinks about foreign policy," Zafar said.
tonight at the Big 12 Room in the Kansas Union.
Keating, the president of the KU Young Democrats and Marysville junior, said he thought it was important for everyone to learn more about the issues facing the government before voting.
One of the panelists, Tom
Keating, will speak from a Democratic viewpoint.
"Foreign policy is hard to understand," he said. "When working with a country sometimes we don't even know where they are on a map."
Dave Best, co-president of KU Greens, said one motivation for
the forum was to help people understand why U.S. troops were fighting in Iraq. Best said that he was interested in learning about other perspectives on the war and helping expose students to diverse ways to approach foreign policy.
"More and more soldiers are being killed and I think people are wondering why we are there," said Best, Dallas senior.
Best said his other goal was to register more voters. He said traditionally the turnout for college
age voters was low and that there would be voter registration cards at the forum.
"We want them to get excited and realize how important these things are."Best said.
The other panelists include Philip Schrodt, a political science professor, Brian DeToy, an adjunct professor of the Army ROTC, and Dave Strano, a peace activist in Lawrence, and a member of the College Republicans.
Edited by Abby Sidesinger
MURALIST: Class brings art form to Lawrence area
CONTINUED FROM 1A
Ireland, Loewenstein said he has stayed in Lawrence because its size gave him the opportunity to work more.
"There isn't a mural tradition in Lawrence like in bigger areas," he said.
In Lawrence, Loewenstein has begun his own tradition with approximately 10 murals throughout the city.
One of these is the 20-foot painting, "A Thousand Miles," on the side of Cordley Elementary. The mural, painted in 1996, depicts the story of Reverend Richard Cordley and his wife, who hid a runaway slave as part of the Underground Railroad.
Loewenstein said.
The idea to create the piece of art came from Cordley's PTA, who contacted Loewenstein, said Kim Bodensteiner, Cordley principal.
David Loewenstein, Lawrence muralist, watched over Rebecca Bruce, Leawood senior, Karl Janssen, graphic designer at the University Press of Kansas, and Janet Reeves, Spring, Texas, junior, his first class of mural painters last month. The students said they were trying to expand their artistic talents." I wanted to learn more about making murals," Janssen said. Loewenstein's class is held Sunday nights at his studio in Lawrence.
"It is a good way for our students to learn the story of their school," she said.
Every year, Bodensteiner said, the school talks about the mural and the part of history their school represents.
"I wanted it to have some vitality and energy now,"
"Some thought that it would be an invitation to draw all over the building, but I think it is the opposite," she said. "People take extra care of it."
Bodensteiner said at first the school district was worried about adding the mural to the school.
With the help of students' ideas, Loewenstein created a design that brought the history of the school's namesake into the present by incorporating students studying at computers in the bottom right of the mural.
Loewenstein's inclusion of the school and the community in creation of his art and its beauty has kept it safe. Bodensteiner said.
Sean Smith/Kansan
Loewenstein said it was important to him to get to know the community and work with it so that they would be happy with the result.
"Murals beautifully and enhance any area for not much money, and they bring people together," he said. "Eventually they become part of the landscape of the place."
Another of Loewenstein's murals resides on the side of the Cork and Barrel at Ninth and Mississippi streets.
Teaching his craft
In September, Loewenstein began a mural workshop for six students. The class gives anyone, from artists to art enthusiasts, the opportunity to learn the process of creating a "community-based" piece of art.
Loewenstein is now at work on his latest project - a mural for a restaurant in Great Bend. He said that he didn't usually work with restaurants, but that the owner seemed happy.
Wall-size men and women work together planting and cultivating bright green rows of crops. Images of Kansas wildlife mingle with the vibrantly colored people. The words on either side of the mural read, "We cannot sow seeds with clenched fists. To sow we must open our fists."
During about a six-week period, Loewenstein's class visited Kansas murals, studied the process of picking a location, experimented with different media for murals and designed their own collaborative mural. The cost of the class was $100, which included all supplies.
Last week, the class began painting its portable mural for Lawrence Habitat for Humanity.
Loewenstein said that Habitat wanted a portable mural so it could roll it up and carry it to different sites.
The design — images of building materials, working people and houses — is a blending of 20 designs the students had made throughout the classes.
The group was nervous to begin sharing ideas, but was excited to have one final design, class member and graphic designer at the University Press of
"I transferred directly from their drawings," Loewenstein said. "I didn't try to interpret."
In the design, hands hold up hammers, a home, its deed and the key to the home. The figures represent the collaborative nature of Habitat as well as the art process.
Kansas Kari Janssen said.
"Murals take art out of the gallery and put them in people's lives and forces them to look and form an opinion," Janssen, a KU employee said.
Janet Reeves, a painting major at the University, said she had always had an interest in the art form.
"I like working this big," Reeves, Spring, Texas junior said. "You can be more expressive."
Documenting a Kansas tradition
Loewenstein not only creates
art, but he also writes about it.
Loewenstein and fellow Lawrence artist, Lora Jost, traveled more than 5,000 miles around Kansas to record the hundreds of murals in its towns.
The product, Kansas Murals: A Travelers Guide, will be released in the fall or winter of 2004.
Loewenstein and Jost received grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Kansas Art Commission to create a Web site and book as part of the Kansas Mural Project.
Jost said the book had three purposes: To celebrate murals, help travelers find the murals and draw attention to the art form.
Loewenstein said he didn't know how long he planned to stay in Lawrence, but he said it was a good home base. He will continue to build his own tradition of art, to teach classes and to work closely with the community to create his murals.
- Edited by Shane Mettlen
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The elections commission of the University of Kansas Student Senate is seeking a grad student to apply to be the spring elections commissioner. This person will be in charge of overseeing the Student Senate elections of the spring semester. This is a paid position. All potential applicants can pick up their application at the Dean of Students office in Room 113 of Strong Hall. Applications are due December 6.