Month: October 2011

Huguely trial back underway with unexpected hearing

The George Huguely case will be back in court at 5 p.m. in the Charlottesville Circuit Court’s main courtoom today. Huguely’s defense attorneys have unexpectedly filed another motion to gain access to Yeardley Love’s medical records, according to a report from the Charlottesville Newsplex.

The former University of Virginia lacrosse player is accused of first degree murder in the beating death of Love, his ex-girlfriend.

In an April hearing, Judge Robert Downer denied the defense’s first request for access to Love’s medical records.

“I’m not going to permit a fishing expedition,” said Downer, repeating a phrase used by Commonwealth’s Attorney Dave Chapman, who deemed a subpoenae filed by Huguely defense attorneys Rhonda Quagliana and Frances McQ. Lawrence “grossly overbroad.”

During that hearing, a private medical consultant hired by Huguely’s defense to review Love’s autopsy report testified that Love’s medical history could show whether an additional medicine, coupled with Adderall, might have given Love cardiac arrhythmia, potentially fatal.

For more information on the April hearing, click here.

For more on Huguely’s defense, click here.
 

SELC releases new analysis of Bypass plan, questions impact on traffic

PRESS RELEASE: Southern Environmental Law Center–– An analysis released today of previous traffic studies for the proposed Route 29 bypass in Albemarle County confirms that the highway will not solve traffic congestion on Route 29, and urges federal and state transportation officials to focus on alternative solutions.

The report was written by Norm Marshall, a traffic expert with Smart Mobility, Inc., a consulting firm specializing in transportation modeling, design and planning, and was released by the Southern Environmental Law Center, which is sending the report to the Federal Highway Administration, Virginia Department of Transportation, Albemarle County Board of Supervisors, Charlottesville City Council, and others.

Read the report (pdf) here: http://selc.southernenvironment.org/site/R?i=2Ja69UmF3fgjoAjXMT5l0w

While finding flaws in the studies, Marshall says that the most thorough one, done between 1988 and 1990, indicated that the bypass would not remove enough vehicles from Route 29 to improve traffic congestion significantly. That study found that only about 10% of the traffic on the most congested section of Route 29 is "through" traffic — in other words, the vast majority of vehicles are shoppers, workers and residents making local trips. The data indicated that because of this, the amount of traffic diverted onto the bypass would still leave Route 29 operating at a failing level of service during peak periods.

Marshall also finds that increased traffic from development approved north of the bypass in recent years would significantly reduce any minimal traffic relief the bypass might offer.

"The proposed bypass would be even less effective today than the limited value demonstrated by the 1988-1990 modeling because of intensive development, large traffic volumes, and the increase in the number of traffic signals north of the proposed terminus of the project," he writes.

Since 2003, in Albemarle County alone, roughly 3,000 residential units and more than 3 million square feet of other development have been approved north of where the proposed bypass would tie back into Route 29. In addition, there are nine traffic lights on the 5.7-mile stretch of Route 29 in Albemarle County north of the bypass, and at least three more are proposed.

Marshall also finds that the studies on which VDOT based its most recent traffic projections have serious flaws. As a result, VDOT’s forecasts of the number of vehicles that would use the bypass, including the estimate in its Request for Proposals (RFP) for the project, are completely off base. These forecasts appear to be
based on an unrealistic annual rate of traffic growth of 1.7%.

In fact, the actual rate over the past two decades on Route 29 between Rio and Hydraulic roads, the busiest segment of the corridor, has beenonly 0.5%, and traffic has actually dropped in this stretch in thelast ten years, according to the report. Using this 0.5% rate of growth, it would be the year 2230 before 32,300 vehicles per day traveled the bypass.

"VDOT’s sky-high projection of traffic growth results in an unjustifiable estimate of the number of vehicles that would use the bypass, and hides the truth that it is an outdated and ineffective proposal," said Morgan Butler, Director of SELC’s
Charlottesville-Albemarle Project.

The report identifies key steps FHWA and VDOT must take to develop a valid traffic forecast that presents a realistic picture of any benefits of the proposed bypass. Marshall recommends that the agencies examine a combination of improvements — including grade-separated intersections on Route 29, which have been shown to be
more effective in reducing delay on Route 29 — and enhancements to the local road network, as recommended in a recent study prepared for the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission.

"The amount of money that would be necessary to build the proposed bypass could be spent much more effectively on targeted improvements along the Route 29 corridor," Marshall concluded.

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The Southern Environmental Law Center is a regional conservation organization using the power of the law to protect the health and environment of the Southeast (Virginia, Tennessee, North and South Carolina, Georgia, and Alabama). Founded in 1986, SELC’s team of 40 legal experts represent more than 100 partner groups on issues of climate change and energy, air and water quality, forests, the coast and wetlands, transportation, and land use.
 

Categories
News

UVA's Garrett Hall, $12.2 million later

Originally a dining hall dubbed “the Commons” by students, Garrett Hall was approved by the UVA Board of Visitors on June 11, 1906. The structure’s cost was pegged at $21,000, more than the cost of the President’s home on Carr’s Hill, which was conceived the same year by renowned architecture firm McKim, Mead and White. Two weeks later, Stanford White, who redesigned the Rotunda after it burned to the ground and also blocked off the South Lawn, was shot and killed on the Madison Square Roof Garden. (The story later became central to E.L. Doctorow’s novel, Ragtime.) The building was completed in 1909. Read below for more details.

Garrett Hall, circa summer 2011, and near the end of its two-year, $12.2 million renovation.

Over a century after its construction, and after nearly two years of renovation work, Garrett Hall was officially dedicated last week as home to UVA’s Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy. The former dining hall space is now a renovated “Great Hall,” a 200-seat space that Batten Dean Harry Harding calls one of UVA’s “most spectacular” in a press release. Projected to cost $8.6 million, the Garrett Hall renovation ultimately ran an estimated $12.2 million tab.

“The Batten School is our youngest school, but it is focused on one of the oldest goals of the University and draws on a rich tradition that extends back to the founding ideals expressed by Jefferson 200 years ago,” said UVA President Teresa Sullivan in a press release. “He believed that the University should teach ‘useful knowledge’ to its students to equip them for the leadership of our democracy.”

For a history of UVA architecture told through 16 buildings, click here.

Categories
News

Morgan Harrington's mom on lawsuit: "We did not do this lightly"

Two years since Morgan Harrington disappeared from the grounds around John Paul Jones Arena, her parents’ mourning looks more like a call to preventative action. Last week, Dan and Gil Harrington filed a $3.5 million lawsuit in a Roanoke court against contracted arena security group RMC Events, employees of which denied their daughter reentry to a Metallica concert the night she disappeared in 2009. The lawsuit arrived days before Virginia’s statute of limitations would have rendered such a suit void.

“The statute of limitations was up as of Monday,” Gil Harrington told C-VILLE in an interview. “We’re not clear on how to proceed from here, but we wanted to preserve the option.” The lawsuit “extends our investigation options for the next year.” UVA told C-VILLE last year that all staff would be "on a higher alert for patrons in distress."

They’ve also launched an online campaign, Help Save the Next Girl, which links information about their daughter’s death to state and national websites for missing people. Morgan’s body was found on Anchorage Farm in Albemarle County in January 2010, three months after she was reported missing. While DNA evidence linked her death with an assault in Fairfax, no suspect has been named—only sketched by state police. [FOR C-VILLE’S COVERAGE, CLICK HERE]

Gil Harrington says police also have taken a familial DNA sample from Morgan, and will evaluate new samples as they are received from other crimes. “The DNA information that I will hate to hear is that we find our perpetrator through a DNA hit from another homicide,” said Harrington. “We are working really hard to make that not be so.”

Morgan’s mother still blogs regularly at her family’s website, FindMorgan.com—long letters addressed to her dead daughter. Asked about the state of her family, Gil Harrington said, “I think we’ve been extraordinarily functional. Perhaps to our detriment, because we’re so pesky. We’re worker bees.”

Should they receive $3.5 million in damages from RMC Events, Gil Harrington said her family would endow the Morgan Dana Harrington Memorial Scholarship at Virginia Tech’s Carillion School of Medicine, as well as support costs for keeping up HelpSaveTheNextGirl.com and a medical orphanage in Zambia.

“We did not do this lightly,” said Gil Harrington about the lawsuit. “We did it with great trepidation. But I think we can make changes in the world with that funding, and that made it worthwhile.”

While Gil Harrington said she understands that some families deal with tragedy in a more private manner, she added that she feels a responsibility for keeping a public presence.

"We’ve really felt great urgency and determination to be part of shaking the tree and trying to make a murderer fall out," she said.

 

Categories
Living

What wine pros would drink (and eat) on their deathbeds

 I don’t often contemplate death, yet the thought of asking food and wine people what they would eat and drink as a final meal is irresistible. It’s a passionate question for a passionate bunch, and while coffee-table books have been dedicated to last meals, the wine is often overlooked. I say that’s the meat of the question; after all, I want to go down full and drunk.

Rio Hill Wine & Gourmet owner Doug Hotz had no trouble choosing a last meal, which he’d pair with Château d’Yquem, a sweet French wine. 

Bartholomew Broadbent, owner of Broadbent Selections: “I’d probably decide on leg of lamb with a bottle of well-aged Château Musar. For me, it has to be Château Musar. It is simply the most delicious wine I know.”

Jake Busching, winemaker at Grace Estates at Mount Juliet: “My grill, a rare filet from my neighbor’s herd, scavenged asparagus from an orchard or fence row, fresh-pulled garden salad, and a little orzo with blue cheese. Five friends, a picnic table at dusk, comfortable chairs, a breeze with a fire of some kind, and cigars, with which to finish the 2007 Flora Springs Cab Franc, a moon-sized onion of evolving aromatics and layers of flavor that carry the experience through its entirety. Down to the dregs and then hand me the blindfold…”

Bill Curtis, chef/owner of Tastings of Charlottesville: “With the hope of recovery, I would drink a medium-aged Bern-kasteler Doctor Spätlese. It was just such a recovery act that earned the vineyard its name when the Archbishop of Trier was cured of a life-threatening illness after consuming wine from here. With it, a gloriously roasted chicken accompanied by fresh garden peas with lightly sautéed chanterelles. Always good to have a backup, so same glorious roasting on a guinea hen, same peas, same chanterelles, but substitute a top flight Savennières, say Le Clos du Papillon or La Roche Aux Moines. And then, in the words of Winston Churchill, I would be prepared to meet my Maker, (with the further paraphrase) whether or not he is prepared to meet me.”

Matthieu Finot, winemaker at King Family Vineyards: “I would go back to my roots with a bottle of Hermitage (where I’m from) and a plate of my uncle’s charcuterie, a brouillade made with natural free-range egg and northern Drôme black truffle and bread. A last meal without bread would be ruined.”

Richard Hewitt, sommelier at Keswick Hall: “I would slowly caramelize every veggie I could get my hands on, then eat that with either Esporao Bianco Reserva or Tinto Reserva.”

Doug Hotz, owner of Rio Hill Wine & Gourmet: “That’s easy…a 2001 Château d’Yquem with pan-seared foie gras with a red currant jelly, balsamic reduction on buttered toast points. Heavenly.”

Garry Moore, sales representative for Siema Wines: “My last wine on earth would actually be the first wine I tasted in my early 20s that gave me a lasting sensation of the pleasure of wine—Domaine de la Romanée-Conti ‘La Tache’ in any vintage—to close the circle of my wine life. With it? Simple, classic food—foie gras, filet of beef, fresh goat cheese and crusty French bread.”

Christine Iezzi, area manager of The Country Vintner: “It would have to be champagne—Moncuit-Delos NV or Krug —with sushi. If it’s my last wine on earth, I’d want to be drinking the stars…”

Tara Koenig, regional brand manager of Monsieur Touton Selections: “I’d want a 1994 Château Pontet-Canet with the Ricotta Gnudi and sticky toffee pudding from Spotted Pig in New York.”

Dave McIntyre, wine columnist for The Washington Post: “My impulse is to say Champagne, from a grower/récoltant, by itself. Champagne, ultimately, is the ultimate food group.”

Andy Reagan, winemaker at Jefferson Vineyards: “I’d have an old and dirty red, like a Châteauneuf-du-Pape, with a massive porterhouse, potatoes broiled with garlic and EVOO, broccoli, and my mom’s angel food cake.”

Eric Ripert, chef/co-owner of Le Bernadin: “I’d drink a bottle of Bordeaux with a slice of country bread topped with shaved black truffle and olive oil.”

Gabriele Rausse, winemaker at Gabriele Rausse Winery: “I’d want Grüner Veltliner and risi e bisi (rice with peas).”

Categories
Living

 Anthony Bourdain and Eric Ripert at The Paramount

The good chef
You probably know Chef Eric Ripert as a judge on Bravo’s “Top Chef” or from “No Reservations,” where he’s traveled and eaten with best buddy and fellow silver fox, Anthony Bourdain. But, this soft-spoken chef from Andorra, France, is a star in his own right, with four cookbooks, a show called “Avec Eric” on PBS and a four-star restaurant in New York (among others) under his apron strings.

When we spoke to Ripert on the telephone last month in anticipation of his and Bourdain’s October 30 show at the Paramount Theater, he was minutes from re-opening his shrine to seafood, Le Bernadin, after a month-long renovation.—Megan Headley

 

Eric Ripert, of “Top Chef” fame, is looking forward to trying Virginia wine for the first time during his October 30 visit.

All You Can Eat: Le Bernadin is the ultimate dining out experience, whereas “Avec Eric” is geared more towards travel and home-cooking. Where does your current passion lie?
Ripert: I still love both, but I’m not 20 anymore. I love leading my team at the restaurant, but “Avec Eric” has been a great opportunity to travel and connect with people. It’s like the difference between haute couture and ready-to-wear—both still involve quality ingredients and techniques.

What do you find to be the most exciting trend in dining?
People are passionate about food everywhere now. It has been a part of European culture for much longer than in America, but the recent backlash against processed food here is good. All of a sudden people are aware of how their chicken was raised and what has trans fats in it. Everyone wants to be cooking with and eating the best ingredients possible.

You worked in the D.C. area in 1989 and have traveled extensively through Virginia for “Avec Eric,” including a visit to Joel Salatin’s Polyface Farms. What did you think?
I was so happy to return to Virginia—I knew it was beautiful, but had forgotten just how beautiful. What Joel does makes sense and proves that you can have sustainability. It is the ideal model for the land, for the animals and for our diet—he’s an inspiration and the solution for the future.

Do you think the locavore movement is here to stay?
It’s certainly interesting and an inspiration, but I prefer not to get obsessive over it and eat nothing but apples all winter. I think preserving food is great and have childhood memories of parties when we’d all help boiling and peeling tomatoes to prepare for the winter.

What can we expect from you and Chef Bourdain? A food fight?
He likes to roast me first, then it is my turn. We both love food—Anthony is less fine dining, but he likes good food and he knows good ingredients.

I know you are partial to Bordeaux (and tequila), but have you tasted Virginia wine?
I love scotch now too! I haven’t tried Virginia wine, but will have a good opportunity to when I come to Charlottesville.

“No Reservations” chef Anthony Bourdain will bring his foodie smarts and sharp tongue to the Paramount stage this weekend.

The bad chef
Anthony Bourdain is crass, offensive and grumpy—but we can’t seem to get enough of him. The foul-mouthed, omnivorous chef became a household name in 2000 with his best-selling book, Kitchen Confidential, in which he exposed the good, the bad and the downright unappetizing subculture of the restaurant world. He became a television star in 2005 when his book A Cook’s Tour inspired a Travel Channel show called “No Reservations,” with Bourdain serving as our intrepid, chain-smoking (though he recently kicked that habit), heavily imbibing host.

After nine seasons of putting anything and everything into his mouth (he once swallowed a still-beating cobra heart in Vietnam) and letting anything and everything spew out of it (he once called the butter-slathering Food Network star Paula Dean the worst, most dangerous person to America), he debuts a new series called “The Layover” on November 21, where he eats and drinks his way through a city—“from dive bars to five stars”—in 24 to 48 hours. His latest book, Medium Raw: A Bloody Valentine to the World of Food and the People Who Cook, returns to the underbelly of the culinary world through interviews with other controversial foodie figures. Keep feeding us, Tony—we’re always hungry for more.

The chefs’ chef
Pei Chang, Ten’s executive chef who’s cooked for the Grammys and Oscars at the Kodak Theater in Los Angeles, wasn’t nervous about cooking for Chefs Eric Ripert and Anthony Bourdain—that is, until people started asking him if he was. Of course, he has no reason for nerves. Chang’s cooked at the second floor sushi mecca on-and-off since it opened in 2006 (with stints at Keswick in between, where his brother-in-law, Dean Maupin, is executive chef) and has been at the kitchen’s helm for a year and a half now.

After Bourdain and Ripert entertain a sold-out audience at the Paramount, they’ll head to Ten with 150 VIP ticket holders to sign books and chat over drinks and passed hors d’oeuvres. Although Chang’s never met the chefs, he knows from their books and television shows that they love the clean and simple flavors of Asian food and plans to do what he does best—sushi and a few grilled items—just gussied up a bit. “What do you serve people who’ve eaten everything in the world?” said Chang. He’s especially excited about the o-toro sushi with white truffle paste he has planned for the evening.

Charlottesville Police search for wanted man

Press Release from Charlottesville Police Department – October 25th, 2011

Contact: Lt. Ronnie Roberts – Public Information Officer
Cell: 434-566-1446
Office: 434-970-3578

Malicious Wounding

Officers responded to the 800 block of Forrest Street on Sunday, October 23rd at 8:53 pm for a shots fired call. While officers were on the scene of the call, we were notified by Uva’s E.R. that a male victim in his early 20’s was brought to the Emergency Room. The victim of a gunshot wound to the abdominal area.

Investigators have been working diligently to develop and locate the suspect. Warrants have been issued for;

BOWLES, Shannon Christopher a 34 year old African American male for Malicious Wounding, Use of a Firearm in the Commission of a Felony and Possession of a Firearm by a Convicted Felon. I have attached the Wanted Poster with a photograph. Anyone with any information in this case is asked to call Crime Stoppers (434) 977-4000. 

 

 

Categories
Living

Small Bites: Word on the street food

Kids of all ages can make and decorate their own caramel apples at the Crozet Mudhouse on Sunday, October 30, from 1-3pm with pastry chef Margot Diaz. Call 823-2240 to reserve your apple ($6 per apple).

Word on the street food
The Downtown Mall’s Fifth Street has been busy this season. Joining the newly opened Downtown Deli, Tempo, and Commonwealth Restaurant & Skybar will be a Northern Chinese-influenced street food spot located between Wilson Investments and the Downtown Deli. The kitchen hood’s been installed and owner Song Song is shooting for a November opening. That’s music to our ears.

Spicing up the Market
The little hut off the Main Street Market that used to house Mountain Lumber Company’s local showroom (it’s moved to the corner of West Main and Ridge streets) will soon be home to The Spice Diva. And who, exactly, is that diva? Her real name is Phyllis Hunter and she’s already lent some of her spicy mixtures, like basil salt and peppercorn, to Caromont Farm’s fresh goat cheese balls at Meet Yer Eats in September.

Recently closed
Ragazzi’s Italian Restaurant in the Shoppers World Court on 29N has closed after more than 10 years of business. Toliver House in Gordonsville, which reopened under new ownership last October, has closed as well.

Categories
News

CIC tries to grow Charlottesville's small businesses

According to 2008 census figures, 97 percent of the Thomas Jefferson Planing District’s 27,528 businesses qualify as micro or small enterprises. Microbusinesses—those with five or fewer employees—make up more than 75 percent of that number. Through discussions with area banks as well as interviews with more than a dozen local small business owners, the Community Investment Corporation (CIC)—a Charlottesville-based microfinancing group currently under development—says those small businesses can have a hard time getting loans through traditional means.

“We want to become the nexus for everything small business,” said Toan Nguyen, co-founder of C’ville Coffee and a member of the CIC Leadership Team.

While the effort is in its early stages, both Nguyen and Bennett met with C-VILLE to discuss CIC’s organization and hopes. The pair describe CIC as an opportunity for small business owners to find critical, early-stage loans outside of banking systems that might not extend funding. However, said Bennett, funding is “a small part of the puzzle.” CIC plans to offer funding opportunities alongside educational opportunities and a mentoring program for its members.The group’s list of volunteers numbers more than 50. The leadership team includes directors and founders from the Piedmont Housing Alliance (PHA), Center for Nonprofit Excellent, Virginia Workforce Enterprise, entrepreneur instructors at UVA’s Batten Institute and Charlottesville Albemarle Technical Education Center, former Congressman Tom Perriello’s district director, and Gordon Bennett, CEO of Gordonsville-based software company Web Data Corporation. Bennett and PHA’s Stuart Armstrong have contributed funding to support one paid staff member, Hebah Fisher, who studied microfinance at UVA.

Currently, CIC can nearly cover its first year of administrative and web development costs, which it pegs at an estimated $80,000. It received $12,000 in seed money from four pledges, and Piedmont Housing Alliance plans to contribute roughly $60,000. After finalizing its business plan and receiving its nonprofit status, CIC hopes to grow its loan funds from $84,000 to $180,000, and finance small businesses in increments up to $35,000.

Those loans carry commitments to CIC’s educational components: a 12-week education program for new businesses, and a mentor-matching program. According to an executive summary, borrowers would “undergo relevant training and business-planning, continue with their mentors, and submit monthly financial statements during the term of their loan.” CIC hopes to be self-sustaining after three years, and plans to earn revenue through paid memberships, educational events, and fees for its clients. The organization can also accept pledges now, and donations once it receives its nonprofit status.

According to business anthropologist Daisy Rojas, Charlottesville has a significant number of aspiring small business owners. The challenge is knowing how to find and patronize them. Rojas, a facilitator for the Dialogue on Race’s economic work group, said many small business owners struggle to find relatively small loans. (Charlene Green, program coordinator for the city’s Dialogue on Race, held many of her economic work group meetings at C’ville Coffee, and Nguyen attended.) Those loans—from roughly $5,000 to $25,000, according to a survey conducted by the economic work group—might require the same administrative oversight as larger loans, but might not cover the expenses as easily as larger loans do.

Rojas previously assisted Gregory Fairchild, a professor at UVA’s Darden School of Business who teaches a course called “Entrepreneurial Thinking,” for a study of unbanked Latino communities. Among other things, Fairchild’s study documented declines in robberies following the launch of Latino credit unions, and suggested that Virginia currently loses $900 million in unbanked money annually from its Latino communities.

She also worked with Piedmont Housing Alliance (PHA), a Community Development Finance Institution, which is certified to apply for federal funds for the purpose of making loans to small business owners and others. Rojas helped conduct a feasibility study for a Community Development Credit Union [CDCU]—different from a financial institution in that, if designated “low income,” it can often accept non-member deposits.

“A CDCU is really devoted to serving the underserved,” said Rojas. “We’d already identified through the Darden report that there is a large Latino population underserved. But they’re not the only one.” A Community Development Credit Union, then, could keep more money in the local community and, conceivably, work in tandem with programs like the Community Investment Corporation to create a more vibrant, eclectic small business scene.

“If that money isn’t going into local banks, then we can’t make loans among the local population,” said Rojas. But—and it’s a big hypothetical—that could change.

Categories
News

UVA Arts & Sciences anticipates 200 new faculty

UVA’s College of Arts & Sciences is preparing for its next incarnation. Last week, UVA announced that a five-year, $2.9 million grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation would fund 10 faculty hires in interdisciplinary fields. Those hires will be part of the Institute of Humanities and Global Cultures, a new collaborative arts and sciences framework at UVA.

However, those hires represent only 5 percent of the new faculty that the college expects to make in the next six to eight years. According to Meredith Woo, Dean of the College and Graduate School of Arts & Sciences, UVA will hire an estimated 200 new faculty for the largest of its 12 schools—a number that represents more than one-third of its 559 current faculty members.

UVA English professor Michael Levenson, who recently published Modernism, will head the Institute of Humanities and Global Cultures.

“In the next five to seven years, we have an unprecedented opportunity to take the college to a new place,” said Woo. During that time frame, more than 100 Arts & Sciences faculty will reach age 70 or higher and choose to retire. More will disembark for other teaching gigs. And Woo anticipates that the college will absorb more than half of the 1,500-plus students President Teresa Sullivan hopes to add to the current student body by 2018. Woo added that a third of Arts & Science students are currently studying STEM disciplines—the science, technology, engineering and mathematics majors identified as growth areas by Governor Bob McDonnell’s Commission on Higher Education Reform, Innovation and Investment.

In short, the College of Arts & Sciences is poised for an eruption —new faculty teaching more students about interconnected disciplines. That eruption begins with the Institute of Humanities and Global Cultures, which will start searches for faculty in the next academic year. UVA English professor Michael Levenson, who recently published Modernism after two decades of modern literature analysis and field-leading research, will lead the institute, which has roots in the sort of interdisciplinary work that Woo has encouraged at UVA.

Levenson said the idea for the institute was developed in discussions between him, Spanish professor David Gies, English professor Rita Felski and late philosopher and professor Richard Rorty. “We formed ourselves into a committee and started to advocate for a humanities center,” said Levenson. “We got excited, disenchanted, excited and disenchanted. And through the great work of [former Arts & Sciences associate dean] Bruce Holsinger and Meredith Woo, it suddenly came to pass last year.”

“In the next five to seven years, we have an unprecedented opportunity to take the college to a new place,” said Meredith Woo, Dean of the College of Arts & Sciences.

Levenson’s modernism studies overlap, time-wise, with UVA’s inception. If modernism is restless change, the constant proliferation of new ideas and creative schematics, then the “acceleration of change,” as Levenson calls it, begins in the early 19th century. And while there is reverence throughout the school for its academic stars, from Thomas Jefferson through figures like Richard Rorty, Woo said her college is interested in “creating new scholarly constellations.”

“Sometimes, we say ‘interdisciplinary’ and the word seems overused,” said Woo. “But it’s really critical to create new knowledge that transcends disciplinary boundaries created in the last 150 years. I’m very confident, and I believe both UVA and the college are really taking the lead in this regard.”