A number of works by Martin Benjamin, professor of visual arts, are

included in “The Great Rock ‘n’ Roll Picture Show,” an exhibition at Clement Gallery in Troy, which opens Friday with a reception from 6-9 p.m. Featured are 16x20 inch black and white vintage prints that showcase rock and roll from the late 1970s through the 1990s. Some more recent digital color pigment prints of musicians and performances are also included. Some of the musicians depicted include Tina Turner, Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen (seen at right) and James Brown (photographed at Union).

Deidre Hill Butler, associate professor of sociology and director of the Africana Studies program, was recently interviewed on WNYT (the Capital Region’s NBC affiliate) as part of a discussion about African-American colorism.

Nicholas Webb, visiting assistant professor of computer science, received a $10,000 grant through the Microsoft Research National Center for Women and Information Technology’s Academic Alliance Seed Fund Award program. Webb will lead a social robotics outreach workshop at Union that pairs female computing undergraduates with middle and high school girls. The project builds upon an existing outreach program at the University at Albany.

Brenda Johnson, professor of mathematics, was awarded a $30,000 grant from the National Science Foundation for her project, “The Fourth Arolla Conference on Algebraic Topology.” The funds will be used to support participants to attend a conference in Switzerland in August. The goal of the meeting is to bring together experts from a variety of fields with homotopy theory and K-theory to learn about current work in these disciplines.