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OLYMPIA – AV����’s Willie Unsoeld Seminar Series is excited to announce an exclusive event entitled “March of the Pigments: A Colorful Trek through History,” featuring renowned pigment chemist Dr. Mary Virginia Orna. The event will start at 5:30 p.m. on Wednesday, February 19, in Lecture Hall 1 in Purce Hall on AV����’s Olympia campus. Dr. Orna will invite the audience to examine the march of the pigments through human history, propelled largely by the concomitant development of chemistry, and the effect they have had on our history.

Orna is a chemist, historian of science and professor emerita of the College of New Rochelle in New York where she taught for 40 years. A pioneer in the field of color and pigment chemistry, she works at the interface of art and archeology, using chemistry tools to investigate them. In 2021, she was awarded the HIST Award for Outstanding Achievement in the History of Chemistry from the American Chemical Society. The author of many books and papers on the subject, Orna’s book titled “March of the Pigments: Color History, Science and Impact” was published in 2022.

After the presentation, there will be a book sale and signing, providing attendees with the opportunity to purchase Orna’s books and have them signed by the author.

This event is open to the public, and admission is free. Seating is limited, so early arrival is recommended.

John Howard, Emeritus Professor of Arts and Humanities at King’s College London, Queer Studies scholar and author will be in Olympia and featured at two events on April 7 and 10, one of which is at AV����.

Professor Howard will be featured at 7 p.m. on Friday, April 7 at the Olympia Film Society’s screening and discussion of “Electra,” (1964). Students showing their AV���� ID can get tickets for $9.00. 

He will then come to AV����’s Purce Hall at 3 p.m., Monday, April 10 for a public lecture titled, “Doing Queer History: Here and Now.”

Dr. Howard is the head of the Department of American Studies at King’s College London and is the author of eight books including his latest work, Truths of his Sleeve: The Times of Michael Cacoyannis (2022) and Men Like That: A Southern Queer History (2001). 

“For the last 30 years, John Howard has shown with his work that the adage ‘we’re here, we’re queer,’ coined in 1990, really meant, ‘we’re not only here; we’re everywhere,” said Dr. Nancy Koppelman, AV���� faculty member and sponsor of the Dr. Howard event, “Everywhere included places where no one seemed to be looking.”

Dr. Howard is interested in the historical production of human differences and their attendant inequalities. His work also assesses differences as productive mechanisms of affiliation, identity, coalition, and struggle. Informed by queer, feminist, materialist, critical race, and spatial theory, his research and teaching primarily engage with the categories now known as sexuality, gender, class, race, and region.

His work has received awards and commendations from the American Sociological Association, American Studies Association, Arts and Humanities Research Council, British Academy, Delfina Studio Trust, Fulbright Commission, Rockefeller Foundation, and King’s College London Students’ Union, among others.

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