The Faculty of Arts and Sciences yesterday elected Associate Professor Leonard Opdycke '17 to head the Fine Arts department. Opdycke succeeds Frederick B. Deknatel, who will continue as William Dorr Boardman Professor of Fine Arts.

At the same time it was announced that two outstanding fine arts scholars, Millard Meiss of Columbia and Sydney J. Freedberg '36 of Wellesley, will join the faculty next year. Meiss, an expert on Italian Renaissance art, will serve as a full professor. He expects to teach during the first semester, and will devote the second half-year to museum work. Freedberg will become an associate professor, and will study on a Guggenheim fellowship next year.

The new chairman has served on the faculty here since 1920. Opdycke's special field is 17th and 18th century fine art, and he currently teaches three University courses, Fine Arts 150, 153, and 160.

Deknatel, the retiring chairman, served from 1945 through 1950, and again this past year after Charles L. Kuhn, associate professor of Fine Arts, retired from the position because of illness. The department has in recent years changed heads every fifth year.