ROCHESTER, N.Y.-The Memorial Art Gallery of the University of Rochester presents For the Sake of a Single Verse: Lithographs by Ben Shahn, on view through November 27, 2005 in the Lockhart Gallery. For the Sake of a Single Verse presents a portfolio of lithographs by American painter and printmaker Ben Shahn.

Shahn was a young man in Paris when he first read The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge by German poet Rainer Maria Rilke. Rilke said that art must come from within a person and that person’s life experiences. For more than 40 years, his words remained a touchstone for Shahn. In 1968, at the end of his life, Shahn finally illustrated the verses that had affected him so deeply, explaining in a New York Times article, “I wouldn’t have attempted to do it if I hadn’t had myself every one of the experiences he described.” Presented in honor of Joel Seligman, president of the University of Rochester.