ROANOKE TIMES 
                      Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times

DATE: Sunday, February 9, 1997               TAG: 9702100067
SECTION: VIRGINIA                 PAGE: B-1  EDITION: METRO 
DATELINE: CHARLOTTESVILLE 
SOURCE: Associated Press

DEBATE SURROUNDS PORTRAITS

PAINTINGS OF FORMER DEANS, displayed in a corridor at UVa's School of Law, have sparked controversy. Many students wonder why minorities or women aren't represented.

Eight portraits of former deans now being displayed in the University of Virginia's School of Law have drawn criticism from students who wonder why no minorities or women have been represented.

The oil portraits, all featuring the men seated and draped in black robes, were moved into a new corridor that joins the law school with the old graduate business school last month. They had been in the law library.

``When I first did see them, it was a shock,'' said Melissa Hart, a 23-year-old black law student from Randallstown, Md. ``I respect their decision to put up the portraits, but where are the representations of minorities and women? In light of that absence, it's offensive to me.''

Several of the men featured are living, and one still teaches at UVa, but some students have dubbed the hallway ``Dead White Male Hall.''

``Every law school has a hall like this, but not in such a prominent place where it is going to be the first thing that a visitor sees,'' said Helen Wan, a 24-year-old Asian American law student from Washington, D.C.

The controversy has been brewing since the portraits were hung in January, but Dean Robert Scott said the placement of the paintings was approved several years ago by a committee of students and faculty.

``I think it is stereotyping to suggest that these people, just because they are white and male, just like all the presidents of the United States have been, just like all the presidents of the university have been, are not people of whom we should be proud,'' Scott said.

Officials plan to incorporate the school's diversity into its new setting, Scott said, noting that portraits of Elizabeth Tompkins, who became the school's first female enrollee in 1925, and John Merchant, the first black to earn a law degree at UVa, already have been commissioned.

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