School Notes: School of Art
July/August 2018

Norfolk Summer School of Art marks 70 years

This summer, Yale School of Art celebrates the 70th anniversary of the art division of the Yale Norfolk Summer School of Music and Art. Yale Norfolk Summer School of Art was founded in 1948 as part of the bequest of the Ellen Battell Stoeckel estate, and followed the same pedagogy, beliefs, and enthusiasm of Black Mountain College, an experimental art school based in North Carolina. During the inaugural summer of the art program, the visiting artists included Buckminster Fuller, John Cage, Ben Shahn, and Josef Albers.

The Yale Norfolk School of Art was established as the only credit-granting undergraduate summer residency art program in the country, bringing together 26 rising seniors of promise, juried from nominations by over 200 institutions across the United States and abroad. Of these 26 attendees, up to three each year are Yale undergraduate art majors. Through the generosity of the Ellen Battell Stoeckel Estate Trust, all admitted students receive full scholarships for this intensive six-week program located at the bucolic Ellen Battell Stoeckel Estate in Norfolk, Connecticut.

Student creates portrait for Davenport College

Kenturah Davis ’18MFA (painting and printmaking) was commissioned by Davenport College to create a portrait of Otelia Cromwell ’26PhD. Cromwell earned a PhD in English at Yale University, becoming the university’s first African American woman graduate. Davis created the portrait using Cromwell’s own words—choosing a letter Cromwell wrote to her father about her experience at Yale, her bond with her family, and her endeavors as a scholar. The portrait was unveiled in the spring semester; it is now on view in Davenport and can also be seen on the college’s blog.