Major Players to Talk Policy at Guild Hall
The Hamptons Institute, a weekend-long symposium on national and global issues, will bring a number of heavy hitters from both sides of the political spectrum to Guild Hall on Saturday and Sunday to discuss politics, art, global women’s rights, urban development, and the economy.
The participants include a 2011 Nobel Peace laureate, Leymah Gbowee, a Liberian activist and women’s rights leader; Emil Henry, who served as assistant secretary for financial institutions under President George W. Bush, and Cyrus Amir-Mokri, who holds that post now.
The symposium, which is co-sponsored by the Roosevelt Institute, begins on Saturday with a panel discussion from 2:30 to 4 p.m., “Perspectives on New York as a 21st-Century City,” moderated by the architecture critic Paul Goldberger. Joining him will be Robert Hammond, co-founder and executive director of Friends of the High Line, Joe Rose, former chairman of the New York City Planning Commission and director of the Department of City Planning under Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, and Leslie Koch, president of the Trust for Governors Island.
A garden cocktail reception follows at 4 p.m., and at 5, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, a Democrat, will review the “2012 Politics and Policy Scorecard” as part of what is billed as a bipartisan conversation.
Sunday’s sessions begin at 11 a.m. with “Women Rising in the World: Implications for Global Peace and Prosperity,” featuring three women who know firsthand what those implications are. In this session, Ms. Gbowee will talk with Dina Powell, president of the Goldman Sachs Foundation and global head of corporate engagement, and Kati Marton, a former NPR and ABC News correspondent and author.
Ms. Gbowee is credited with leading a women’s peace movement that brought an end to the Liberian Civil War in 2003. Ms. Powell served as President George W. Bush’s chief of personnel and was assistant secretary of state for educational and cultural affairs and deputy undersecretary for public diplomacy in that administration. Ms. Marton, who is also a human rights activist, was married to the late Richard Holbrooke, the U.S. envoy to Afghanistan.
Lunch will be available in Guild Hall’s lobby following the talk, and at 1 p.m. attention will turn to “America’s Economic Future,” during a bipartisan discussion among Joe Nocera, an Op-Ed columnist for The New York Times, Mr. Henry, Mr. Amir-Mokri, and Sallie Krawchek, a former president of Bank of America’s global wealth and investment management division.
Authenticating Pollock
Francis V. O’Connor, Ph.D., considered the foremost expert on the work of Jackson Pollock, will offer the final talk of the weekend, a look at the “fine art of authenticating art,” from 4 to 5:30 p.m. Also, the Pollock-Krasner House and Study Center’s annual lecture, “Forensic Connoisseurship, Jackson Pollock, and the Authentic Eye,” will explore the inner workings of the art authentication process, which often takes place in the midst of multimillion-dollar lawsuits with reputations hanging in the balance. Mr. O’Connor was a member of the now-defunct Pollock-Krasner Authentication Board.
Tickets to the Pollock-Krasner lecture cost $15, or $13 for members of Guild Hall or the Pollock-Krasner House. Tickets for the other sessions cost $20, or $18 for Guild Hall members. Students 21 and under can attend for free with ID.
A $250 “cum laude” package includes a donation to Guild Hall and admission to all programs. Tickets starting at $500 include V.I.P. seating, a dinner on Saturday, and a lunch in the Minikes Garden at Guild Hall on Sunday.