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Our thanks to all volunteers and sponsors who helped make Artists & Models: STIMULUS such a successful and fun event. Visit our page to see some images and videos and read some reviews.

March 3, 1924—May 9, 2010

Myles Slatin, Ph.D., of Buffalo, retired UB English professor and long-time member and supporter of Hallwalls, died on May 9, 2010, after a long illness. He was 86.

Born in Queens, Myles attended Flushing High and Queens College and served in the Army Signal Corps during World War II, learning Japanese as part of a team that cracked enemy codes. After the War he earned his doctorate at Yale University with a study on Ezra Pound, then moved to Buffalo in 1952 when he became an associate professor in the University of Buffalo English Department, where he taught Romantic and modern poetry and was an early proponent of women writers and feminist activists. He also explored contemporary authors and popular fiction in his classes, which are fondly remembered by generations of students. As an associate dean in the 1960s, Myles was active in the University of Buffalo's transition into the SUNY system, recruiting numerous faculty members and participating in the recruitment of then UC Berkeley Chancellor Martin Meyerson as UB's new President. Myles was director of Lockwood Library from 1969 to 1973, during a period of student protests when the library experienced vandalism, including numerous small bombings. He retired from the UB faculty in 1994 after 42 years.

Long an avid art collector, tireless gallerygoer, and patron of local artists, Myles focused almost entirely on visual art after he retired from teaching literature, taking drawing and painting classes at UB and renting a studio on Buffalo's West Side to pursue his own art. He and his wife of 57 years, Diana Bluestein Slatin, a distinguished fine artist and fashion illustrator, were deeply involved with Hallwalls on both its Visual Artists Committee and Board of Directors. When Diana died in 2003, Myles generously invited friends who were so inclined to make donations in Diana's memory to Hallwalls, as many did. In the same spirit, Myles's surviving son Peter and other family members have indicated that memorial gifts in Myles's name may be made to either Hallwalls or Jewish Family Services of Buffalo.

Gifts to Hallwalls in Memory of our admired friend Myles Slatin will be acknowledged individually as well as publicly here, and we thank his family for their thoughtfulness in making this suggestion. As of June 9th, generous gifts in Myles's memory have been gratefully received from Nancy A. Hamilton, John M. Jablonski, and Harvey J. & Deborah Breverman.