About the commencement speaker

Raymond D. Nasher, an international business leader and recognized philanthropic patron of the arts, is a longtime and continuing supporter of UNT and its visual arts programs. He has shared work from his collection for exhibitions and opened his private sculpture gardens to faculty, students and groups of university supporters. And, as founding chair of the advisory board for the School of Visual Arts, he has significantly affected the quality of education in the visual arts at UNT.

In more than three decades of collecting art, he and his late wife, Patsy, assembled one of the finest collections of modern sculpture in the world today. In 1998, he announced a commitment to build and create the Nasher Sculpture Center in downtown Dallas. When it opens in 2003, the center will be a fitting home for future generations to study and enjoy his unique collection. This and other acts inspired Fortune magazine to name him among the top 10 "Most Generous Americans" in recent years.

As founder and chair of the board of the Nasher Company, he has played an important role in the planning, development and management of shopping centers, office parks, industrial sites, new towns and planned residential communities. In developing the highly acclaimed NorthPark Center in Dallas, he gave the nation one of its very first retail complexes that incorporated art as an integral part of its design.

In addition, Nasher has a distinguished record of public service. He has served on the boards of many educational institutions including Boston University, Duke University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and UNT. As a U.S. delegate to the United Nations General Assembly and an appointee of three US presidents to the President's Committee on the Arts and Humanities, he has served government for more than 30 years. He also established the Dallas Business Committee for the Arts and is currently chair of the National Business Committee for the Arts. He has served as a director of the Dallas Museum of Art, the Dallas Opera, the Dallas Symphony, the Dallas Theatre Center, Ballet Dallas and the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth and has served on committees and councils of numerous national and international museums.

A native of Boston, Nasher received a bachelor of arts degree at Duke University and a master of arts in economics from Boston University.

BY ELIZABETH DEL TORO paiswri1@unt.edu

Other featured articles in this issue

• UNT regents approve property purchases
• Mean Green returning to New Orleans Bowl Dec. 17
• Art patron, philanthropist to speak at fall commencement
• Weather closing information
• SECC at UNT brings in more than $140,000
• Faculty Senate hears academic budget report, forecast for 2003 legislative session
• Staff Council chair encourages teamwork, spirit of cooperation
• Hobbits returning to theaters this holiday season
• Honors Day nomination forms due Dec. 14
• Think Green, It's Friday spirit contest winners

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