On April 14, a temporary student art installation composed of 20 strips of molding beef jerky arranged in the shape of a smiling face was removed from the dedication wall of the Black Family Visual Arts Center at the direction of studio art department chair Tricia Treacy.
The installation was created by Erik Siegel ’26 and Roan Wade ’25 for the studio art department’s ongoing termly exhibition, “Storage Room,” which was co-curated by Siegel.
The jerky installation — titled “Something Rotten: Ah man, the guy loved jerky. You didn’t know?” — intended to offer a “critique” of BVAC’s namesake Leon Black ’73, Wade told The Dartmouth. Siegel did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
The point of putting up the molding jerky was to give “no honor and respect” to the Black family, “in contrast to the way that the family has been put on a pedestal with their name on the building,” Wade said.
Over the past month, Dartmouth Student Government, the Student and Presidential Committee on Sexual Assault and the Women of Dartmouth alumni council have called for the College to rename BVAC, citing Black’s long-standing relationship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, outlined in files recently released by the Department of Justice. The Black Family Foundation donated $48 million to fund BVAC’s construction in 2012.
Wade said that they used jerky to reference mentions of beef jerky in the Epstein files released by the Department of Justice, but declined to elaborate further on their motivation.
“Jerky,” which some online communities and podcasters say they believe is a code word for human flesh, appears hundreds of times in the files. At least one such appearance relates to Black.
“Jojo is here and will walk the jerky over to Jeffrey,” the 2012 email — titled “Leon Black’s office address” — reads in part. “Please you just go on your own to Leon’s office.”
A spokesperson for Black declined to comment on the artwork and any connections between Black, beef jerky and Epstein.
In an email statement to The Dartmouth, Treacy wrote that “Something Rotten” was taken down because of its “location, not content.” Other students’ pieces were located in Nearburg Gallery, a display space adjacent to the Black family donor wall.
“On the day of the opening, I asked the student artist/curator to move the artwork into the designated gallery space,” Treacy explained.
She wrote that the studio art department “fully supports” student artwork and “encourages their creativity in whatever form it takes.”
To preserve the work in its original form, the studio art department “photographed the work in high resolution and produced a high-quality large digital print that can be displayed in the Nearburg Gallery for the student artists,” Treacy added.
Wade said they were not “aware of a photo of the piece being re-installed.”
The Dartmouth requested a copy of the photograph but has not received it, and could not independently verify that a photograph has been installed.
Wade added they also hoped to address the “pervasive culture of sexual violence and gender-based violence at Dartmouth that has existed long before Leon Black was a student here and long after” through the artwork.
Studio art major Sehwan Lim ’24, who was present for the installation and has art displayed in “Storage Room,” said it was “quite striking” that there has been no “progress” on changing the name of BVAC.
“Honestly, [the name] just has to come off,” Lim said.
Wade said renaming BVAC is “valuable” and “necessary” and that conversations on the naming of BVAC have come “far too late.”
“More than a symbolic removal of the name, we need tangible action to ensure that there are not more victims of this type of violence in the future,” Wade said.
“It’s telling that the College holds firm on the policy of institutional neutrality, but it is more than willing to take money from terrible people,” Wade added. “Institutional neutrality has no value or legitimacy when there is money involved.”
A College spokesperson declined to comment on this article.
Dartmouth has no current financial relationship with Black, The Dartmouth previously reported.
