:: By Amy Braverman Puma

:: Illustration by Richard Thompson

In Every Issue ::

Four ways to hang a president

After announcing his pending departure for the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation (see “Measured Steps”), President Don M. Randel told the Maroon this past October that he planned to break with tradition when it came to his Hutchinson Commons portrait. Among the customary paintings of founder John D. Rockefeller, President William Rainey Harper, and other University dignitaries (including the contemporary-realist oil study of president emeritus Hanna Holborn Gray by Philip Pearlstein), Randel intends his image to hang for posterity as the first photograph to grace the room. Alumni hoping for a brush-stroked rendition, take heart: illustrator Richard Thompson has depicted Chicago’s 12th president as he might have been seen by four masters: Magritte, Picasso, Rembrandt—and Larson.