UC Davis art professor Seymour Howard's Remember?:! — a meditation on the meaning and nature of democracy — is on exhibit at the Buehler Alumni and Visitors Center.

The university's Nelson Gallery organized the exhibit as a tribute to Howard, with a gallery news release noting that Howard "has given a lifetime's effort into shaping the art and art history department at UC Davis."

"As an emeritus faculty member, he is a walking treasure trove of both the history of ideas and UC Davis history; we are graced by his presence among us as he approaches the 50th anniversary of his arrival at Davis in 1958," said Renny Pritikin, Nelson director.

The Remember?:! exhibit is scheduled to run through Sept. 13.

A news release from the Nelson Gallery states that Remember?:! is "an inherent part of Howard's ongoing research into the philosophy of art."

Remember?:! comprises prose, painting and poetry created during the Clinton impeachment of the 1990s, when the House of Representatives approved articles of impeachment against Clinton, who subsequently survived a Senate trial.

According to the Nelson Gallery: "The written work bristles with resentment and righteous anger about distortions and manipulations of the nation's founding principles by politicians.

"The paintings parallel those distortions by showing visual manipulations of the flag.

"In the accompanying poetry, Jeffersonian rhetoric is held up for scrutiny in recognition of the rights of those not included in the founder's thinking.

"Finally, however, the birth of the nation is celebrated as well as critiqued, for its astounding breakthroughs and continuing potential."

Howard taught at UC Davis from the early 1960s until the early '90s. He had a variety of pivotal roles, including leading the initial years of the ceramics program and the art history department.

He is the author of some 300 publications, including 20 books, and many magazine articles, reviews, catalogs and anthology inclusions. He has lectured in more than 150 venues, including the Louvre, British Museum, Victoria and Albert Museum, the Hermitage, the National Gallery, and the J. Paul Getty Museum, as well as major universities in the United States and abroad.

Since going on emeritus status, he has continued to write, teach, lecture and consult.