Cultivating Silence is an important exhibit to me, for many reasons. The story of Nikolai Vavilov, while tragic, is also the story of a person who would not compromise in the face of authoritarianism. If you, the visitor, take only one thing with you from this exhibit I hope it would be this: Despite all of these issues that they deal with, despite all the manners of suppression and destruction Vavilov and others like him face, there are still people working to better the world through science. I believe that so long as they do, we may have hope yet.

I could, of course, never do this alone. My colleagues Michael Cook and Eveline Ferretti provided invaluable assistance through the entire process; I cannot thank them enough.

-Karl Rozyn