USD Magazine Spring 2020

$2.3 million to Burnham-Moores Center for Real Estate [ g e n e r o s i t y ] B U I L D I N G R E L AT I O N S H I P S

draft or a study of a larger commissioned piece that was either never completed or simply lost in time. Art historians date this 11- by-15-inch piece to sometime between 1521 and 1524, when Michelangelo was at the height of his career. There are several hundred drawings in the world that scholars have identified as being done by Michelangelo. Some are just scraps of paper where he was working out an idea in his mind, but The Three Crosses is rare. “There’s no finished work that relates to this piece,” says Derrick Cartwright, PhD, director of the University Galleries, who returned to the University of San Diego in 2012 following his tenure as an art professor at USD from 1992 to 1998. “Also, this drawing has very little in common with the established iconography of the time.” Typically, what’s shown is Christ’s family and his apostles who are supporting his mother, Mary, while she swoons at the sight of her son. But that’s not the case in Michelangelo’s drawing. In his version, Christ is still alive on the cross. He’s turning his head toward the thief on the cross to his left. Cartwright wonders, “Why did Michelangelo draw Christ this way? What was he saying to the thief on his left?” “I don’t know what Michel- angelo was thinking,” says Cartwright, who, once the exhibit closed, announced that it attracted a record-breaking 6,125 visitors — more than any in the history of the university. “Maybe he is making us rethink the Crucifixion. Sometimes we think we know a story or we know the artists and then they show us something new.”

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by Liz Harman

fter years of neutralizing Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) in Iraq and Afghanistan, Navy Lt. Brian Lehtinen ’22 is looking for a career that’s a little more relaxing. Since he’d acquired some prop- erties during his service, he thought an elective in the prin- ciples of real estate made sense for his bachelor’s degree. And when he heard about the USD real estate program’s No. 1 rank- ing, he realized a major in the subject was the “right choice.” The personalized attention from faculty members, industry professionals and the Burnham- Moores Center for Real Estate is something he wouldn’t get anywhere else, says Lehtinen. “I’m so fortunate.” Lehtinen also has benefited from a $5,000 scholarship facili- tated through the center. The scholarship was awarded from the San Diego-based Burnham Foundation, named on behalf of legendary real estate icon and San Diego native Malin Burn- ham (pictured). That Burnham and the foundation saw some- thing in him “is an honor,” says the humble Lehtinen, who did six combat deployments as a Navy explosive ordnance disposal technician. Now, through a generous $2.3 million gift from Burnham and his wife, Roberta, the Burnham-Moores Center, within the USD School of Business, will be able to do even more to shape the next generation of outstand- ing professionals and industry leaders in real estate. The Burn-

program No. 1 in the U.S. “We understand that a suc- cessful career in real estate is more than textbook knowledge about land use, structures, analysis and finance. It’s also about relationships,” says Stath Karras, executive director of the Burnham-Moores Center. Last fall, Lauren Classon ’20 did an internship with a mentor who’s helping to redesign Seaport Village in San Diego. Classon, who also received a scholarship from the Burnham Foundation, says she’s already thinking about how to repay what she’s been given. Whether it’s by providing jobs or mentor- ing of funds, “I want to give back to the school that’s given me so much.”

ham leadership gift will support the center’s Campaign for 2020 to raise $10 million to create new scholarship endowment funds and to attract and retain the nation’s top faculty. “The way the Burnham-Moores Center engages with the San Diego real estate community, for the benefit of both the under- graduate and graduate students at the university, made it a very easy decision to make this gift,” said Burnham when the gift was announced. Burnham’s relation- ship with the center dates back to 2004, when he and John Moores, founder of JMI Realty, made an initial $5 million gift to support the real estate program. For the past three years, College Factual has ranked the real estate

sandiego.edu/galleries

EDUARDO CONTRERAS / SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE/ ZUMA WIRE

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Spring 2020