Outdoor Sculpture Collection

Mihail Chemiakin (Russian, born 1943)
Plato Having a Dialogue with Socrates, 1999
Bronze
62 x 113.5 x 57 in.
Hofstra University Museum of Art, Gift of the Estate of Harold E. Yuker, HU99.7

The piece features Plato seated on a low column a table, having a conversation with a bust of Socrates. Across the table from Plato is an empty seat. The empty seat is a similar column, upon which any person can sit and join in the dialogue. There is room enough at the table so that persons with disabilities or those who are able-bodied may sit in on the discussion.

Plato Having a Dialogue with Socrates was funded by a bequest from the Harold E. Yuker estate for the educational and cultural benefit of Hofstra University. Dr. Harold E. Yuker, Hofstra Professor of Psychology from 1948-1997, became a provost and distinguished professor at Hofstra despite a lifelong struggle with cerebral palsy. In the early 1960s, Dr. Yuker played a major role in making Hofstra the first private university in the nation to become 100 percent barrier-free to persons with disabilities, well before legislative mandates.