Harvey Breverman, professor of art, heads the Printmaking Program and is co-director of ePIC, the Experimental Print Imaging Center. A frequent international exhibitor, he has been at UB since 1961.

When did you first realize that you wanted to pursue art professionally?

Growing up poor in the multi-ethnic Hill District of Pittsburgh, a world both mysterious and magical, I filled scraps of paper with invented dreams and imaginings in pencil and crayons. Even then it was an obsession! Special art classes were out of the question. I did not visit an art museum until my sophomore year at Carnegie Tech (Carnegie-Mellon U.) Slowly and imperceptibly, the world opened up.

Did you think, when you started out, that you could make a living as an artist?

Making art makes living worthwhile, so I never gave it much thought-still don't. But, after 75 solo shows and hundreds of group venues here and abroad, involvement with dealers, collectors and institutional curators, I've found ways to navigate within the constraints of a difficult, seemingly glamorous, occasionally unsavory, often unpredictable and magnificent profession. Parenthetically, from the privileged position of teaching, one can maintain a lofty, ethical stance vis-à-vis the marketplace.

What is your favorite medium to work in, and why?

Drawing, unquestionably, informed by painting and print-making strategies. To coax a variety of marks deftly and swiftly from humble materials and coalesce these into an image and idea is indeed extraordinary. The possibilities are limitless-the sketch or notation, a plan or diagram, an elaborately finished statement.

What's the greatest change in the art field since you started teaching?

In the last four decades, the visual arts have found an academically respectable place within the university context, both for faculty and the serious art major, and appear to be on a par with other fields of scholarship. In the art world, there is a genuinely greater tolerance for a much wider spectrum of artistic expression.

What kind of art do students today show the most interest in?

If a dedicated and caring teacher lights a spark and instills in students a sense of wonderment and an insatiable curiosity for serious, investigative inquiry, helps nurture and requisite skills to mediate and begin to find one's "own voice," then figure drawing to computer-art imaging become rewarding experiences.

How many people from UB have been the subjects of your work?

About three dozen. Among these have been Creeley, Fiedler, Rayner-Banham, Federman, Barth, Coetzee, Chisolm, Bunn, Bernal, Kennedy, Dennis, Hammond, Elkin, Guitart, Jacobs, Sussman, Berlyn, Somit, Fradin, Serres, Peradotto, George Levine, et. al. After flipping a coin to see who would go first, Bruce Jackson and Diane Christian became subjects in a five-hour drawing marathon, leaving us all exhausted. It's a formidable challenge to fix a "significant moment," a gesture, a stance, a personality with a series of accumulated glances from model to paper. Three weeks ago, at a UB press conference with Elie Wiesel preceding a reception and public lecture, I was seated with sketching materials about two feet from the Nobel laureate. During the 15-minute Q&A, I drew like mad, while a television camera behind me recorded the event. With a series of moves by a disciplined hand, a conjunction of features came together and, I hope, revealed the penetrating mystery of this human face.

Who have you not yet drawn or painted that you would like to?

Chance and circumstance dictate who I will draw and paint, instead of by premeditated plan or design.

How does Buffalo compare with other similar-sized cities in terms of venues for and commitment to art?

Organization mavens here can offer a definitive, statistical answer. I'd say with alternative-space opportunities, we're way ahead of comparable cities.

Who is your favorite artist, and why?

Velazquez, Rembrandt, Goya, Giacometti, Sutherland, Bacon, Balthus and Freud have infused a certain timeless and enduring content into their images. Among artists of my generation I know-R.B. Kitaj and Irving Petlin have a potency that breathes excitement larger than modest provincialism.

What's something people don't know about you and should?

It's the artwork, not the personality.

What question do you wish I had asked, and how would you have answered it?

Your most memorable exhibition-the formal reception at the 1963 Corcoran Gallery of Art Biennial under the patronage of President and Mrs. Kennedy; my 8-1/2-foot vertical painting hung between Edward Hopper and Rico Lebrun. For a young artist entering the profession, being part of an ongoing artistic continuum was deep and long-lasting.

Your most memorable year-1997 was daunting, with eight solo exhibits and 20 group shows, including international venues in Spain, Poland, Italy, Bulgaria and Japan.