Living With The Graphic Arts Loan Collection

By Michele Rabkin

I came to work on the UC Berkeley campus in 1999 as the first Associate Director of the Consortium for the Arts, which later became the Arts Research Center. Since it was my job to be aware of all the arts resources on campus, naturally I learned about the Graphic Arts Loan Collection. I was thrilled to be able to check out works of art and hang them in my office for an entire semester! I borrowed quite a few different pieces over the years, including “Dark Day in the Abundant Blue Light of Paris” by Mary Lovelace O’Neal  (now a Professor Emeritus), who at the time was Chair of the Department of Art Practice. This print is beautiful, moody and mysterious. Looking at her artwork every day was a great reminder that many of the faculty with whom I worked regularly in an administrative capacity–sitting in meetings, trading emails, organizing panel discussions–were also practicing artists, anxious to escape the university bureaucracy and pursue their creative visions. Looking away from my computer screen and gazing at an imaginative work of art was a great way for me to refresh myself, gain some distance on the daily grind, and re-focus on the most important priorities.

By Evan Larson

GALC added so much to my experience at Cal. My roommate and I pick out prints at the start of the year to decorate our common room. There’s one print we like so much we’ve requested it two years running. Having these beautiful images up in our apartment pulls the apartment together and makes it feel more like a home. Thank you GALC for adding so much to our time at Cal!

By Leilanie B. Martinez

I appreciated the accessibility of this program. Having considered myself not very “artsy” in the past, it was refreshing to temporarily own an art piece for a semester. I got to see a new aspect of the art every day. Thanks for the experience!

By Barbara Wilcox

Rowlandson’s The Rivals was one of the prints I checked out as a Berkeley undergraduate in the 1970s. I am amazed to learn that it’s still circulating and in good condition 40 years later. I was a History of Art major, but living with Real Art on the wall of my crumbling Northside apartment was an entirely different experience, one of stewardship and daily changing understanding. I researched Rowlandson and years later found an 1805 hand-tinted print at a garage sale for $10. Benefits of a liberal arts education! As a career I went into journalism and later into university communications and advancement. The ability I developed at Cal to appreciate beauty and the social contribution of art enriches every day of my life. I’m on two nonprofit art-related boards and I evangelize for the arts every place I go, including that other university across the Bay.