Niki de Saint Phalle, the contemporary artist who created the Sun God sculpture, died Tuesday in San Diego at the age of 71 after a long illness.
Phalle created the Sun God in 1983. It was her first large outdoor work in the United States and is a prominent landmark on campus. The Sun God is a colored sculpture of a 14-foot bird located on the lawn between the Faculty Club and Mandeville Auditorium and is one of UCSD’s most recognized icons.
It was the first piece of artwork commissioned for the Stuart Collection.
Phalle is known for her enlarged works, which recall contradictory traits such as good and evil, modern and primitive, sacred and profane, and play and terror.
In 1981 she wrote “”AIDS: You Can’t Catch It Holding Hands,”” which was later made into film by the same name in 1989.
Phalle was born in 1930 in the Paris suburb of Neuilly-sur-Seine as Catherine Marie-Agnes Fal de Saint Phalle. She moved to New York in 1937 with her parents where she spent time visiting the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
UCSD awarded for contributions to clean air in San Diego
San Diego EarthWorks has awarded UCSD with a Very Important Planet Clean Air Award for its voluntary installation of a cogeneration plant.
The 12th annual VIP awards banquet was recently held by San Diego EarthWorks to celebrate San Diego businesses and institutions that contribute to a cleaner environment. San Diego County Supervisor Pam Slater presented UCSD’s award, which was accepted by Larry Oberti, a UCSD environmental issues manager.
The award comes from last year’s completion of a 25-megawatt cogeneration plant that provides electrical and steam power to campus. The SCONOx emissions system used by the UCSD cogeneration plant is one of the first commercial installations of the new technology.
According to UCSD Cogeneration Plant Manager John Dilliott, UCSD is saving about $250,000 per month by producing its own energy instead of buying it.
UCSD names new chair for department of radiology
William G. Bradley Jr. has been named the new chair of the radiology department at the UCSD School of Medicine. He starts May 27.
Bradley, widely regarded as one of the world’s leading experts in magnetic resonance imaging, comes to UCSD from Long Beach Memorial Medical Center where he was director of MRI and Radiology Research. He also served as a professor of radiological sciences at the University of California at Irvine.
Bradley has authored more than 160 articles and 17 books, including Magnetic Resonance Imaging, a major textbook in the MRI field that is now in its third addition. He received the “”Best New Book in Bio and Medical Sciences”” Award from the Association of American Publishers for the first edition of the book in 1988.
Regents nominate Berkeley sophomore as student regent
The UC Board of Regents recently nominated UC Berkeley sophomore Mathew J. Murray as a student member of its 2003-2004 board.
Murray will succeed UC Berkeley economy major Dexter Ligot-Gordon, who takes over for current student regent and UCLA graduate Tracy M. Davis in July of this year.
If approved, Murray will become the 29th student regent to sit on the board since the position’s creation in 1975.
Murray, an architecture major at UC Berkeley, will be considered for confirmation by the full board at its September 18-19 meeting. If approved, Murray will immediately become the student regent-designate and will be able to participate in all deliberations. However, he would not be eligible to vote until July 2003.
An active member of the UC Berkeley community, Murray is the co-founder of the Berkeley American Civil Liberties Union and serves on the Academic Freedom Committee of the Academic Senate.
Murray is a 20-year old California native who has earned the UC Berkeley Alumni Scholarship and the UC Berkeley Chancellor’s Scholarship.
