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"On First Encountering Francis Bacon’s Paintings",,"The disturbing art of Irish-born British painter Francis Bacon often violates formal boundaries of the human. Consequently, a visit to a retrospective of Bacon’s work at the Hirschhorn Museum left Robert D. Newman deeply unsettled. As a humanities moment, this encounter compelled Newman to grapple with Bacon’s art, sorting through “contradictory emotions,” ultimately growing “as a being and as a self.” ",,"Francis Bacon's paintings at the Hirshhorn Museum",,,"Robert D. Newman, President and Director, National Humanities Center",,,,,,robert-newman-francis-bacon-paintings,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,"",,,"Art,Bacon, Francis (1909-1992),Emotional Experience,Hirschhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden,Modern Painting,Museum Exhibits,Painters,Washington, D.C.",https://humanitiesmoments.org/files/original/2/4/francis-bacon-crucify2.jpg,"Moving Image","Robert D. Newman ",1,0
"“I was dragged, kicking and screaming, to a van Gogh exhibition”","I get chills thinking about it even now, because to have this extraordinary storyteller explaining to you what was going on at that point in van Gogh’s life—what this meant to him, what it should mean to us—but still leaving the whole painting open to individual interpretation, it was really something that, to me, was quite profound.","In what I believe was the latter part of the 1980s, I was dragged, kicking and screaming, to a van Gogh exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum. And for the first time in my life, I wore one of those machines around my neck, where you listen to headphones and you hear somebody describe what it is you’re going to see. It was a brand-new experience.
The narrator was the then-director of the Metropolitan Museum, Philippe de Montebello, and at the introductory part of the exhibit, I was really struck by the quality of what he was saying. It was so well written that it really bordered on being fine literature.... As we went from room to room, his storytelling, and the visual impact of my seeing these extraordinary paintings by this extraordinary, troubled person, made an impact on me that I still think about, probably, every month.
There was a new richness in what I saw, but also a level of insight into what van Gogh had done that magnified to a great degree the impact that it had on me. Looking back on it, coming at a part of my life where I had been underground for a long time, as a law student, and then as a young lawyer, it pulled me back into the knowledge that there was this greater, more interesting world out there; one to which I owed a lot more attention. From then on, I dedicated myself to making sure that I was going to live a life that was more rich.
I get chills thinking about it even now, because to have this extraordinary storyteller explaining to you what was going on at that point in van Gogh’s life—what this meant to him, what it should mean to us—but still leaving the whole painting open to individual interpretation, it was really something that, to me, was quite profound.","Vincent van Gogh","An exhibit of Vincent van Gogh's paintings ",,,"C. Allen Parker, General Counsel, Wells Fargo & Company",,,,,,allen-parker-van-gogh,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,"",,,"Art,Art Exhibitions,Art Museums,Business Leaders,de Montebello, Philippe,Metropolitan Museum of Art,Museum Curatorship,New York, New York,Paintings,Post-Impressionism (Art),Storytelling,van Gogh, Vincent",https://humanitiesmoments.org/files/original/21/Wheatfield_with_Crows.Vincent_Van_Gogh.jpg,"Moving Image",,1,0
"Finding “the Truth” in Music","Reflecting on the interview with William, I realized that he was describing the very learning experience my students were having as they created their documentary. By investigating the relationship between individuals and the music that shaped their lives, the students were in fact developing deeper understandings about the history of neighborhoods, their city, and American society—and seeing connections across time and place. Like William, their interest in music led them to think like historians. That day reaffirmed my commitment to interdisciplinary learning and, specifically, to using music and art wherever possible to help students make meaningful connections in my classroom.","In June 2017, I found myself in a cramped, sweltering apartment in New York’s East Village. I was there with three high-school students to interview William Millan, founder of the seminal 1970s Latin band, Saoco. The students were working on a documentary film about the history of musical communities in New York City. After playing several Saoco albums for us, William described how his interest in the roots of Latin music led him on an intellectual journey to understand the cultural history of the Caribbean, Europe, and Africa. Then he said something profound:
“I wasn’t a very good history and geography student when I was in school… it wasn’t until I really got into the music that I realized it’s not that I don’t like history and geography—I really love history and geography. It was the information they were giving me in school that I couldn’t relate to because it had nothing to do with what I was living. If you go into the music, and you check out the artists’ lives, that’s going to give you a truer picture of history; and in their body of work you’re going to see what the truth is.”
In 20 years of teaching, I have never heard a better articulation of music’s power to engage students in the study of history and culture.
Reflecting on the interview with William, I realized that he was describing the very learning experience my students were having as they created their documentary. By investigating the relationship between individuals and the music that shaped their lives, the students were in fact developing deeper understandings about the history of neighborhoods, their city, and American society—and seeing connections across time and place. Like William, their interest in music led them to think like historians. That day reaffirmed my commitment to interdisciplinary learning and, specifically, to using music and art wherever possible to help students make meaningful connections in my classroom.",,"Interview with William Millan, musician and founder of the band, Saoco",,"June 2017","Ben Wides, age 46, social studies teacher, East Side Community High School, New York City",,,,,,finding-truth-in-music,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,"Art,Cultural History,Documentary Films,Geography,History,Interdisciplinarity,Latin Music,Millan, William,Music,New York, New York,Saoco,Teachers & Teaching",https://humanitiesmoments.org/files/original/7/95/Willie_Millan.jpg,Text,#Humanitiesinclass,1,0
"Finding Meaning in Art",," My moment came at one of the least expected times for me over the past few weeks. To begin, I am not a lover of art. I generally am not a fan of art museums at all. About four years ago I married my wife who was a fine arts major at Penn State University and is currently an art teacher in Wake County, North Carolina. She has tried to convince me of the value of works of art and she has taken me to numerous art museums. I have never been one to get it, though, as I see a painting or sculpture and then move on to the next one.
On Wednesday July 25th, 2018 our NEH Summer Institute (Contested Territory) made a trip to the Ackland Art Museum at the University of North Carolina and my group went to the second floor to spend thirty minutes looking at one piece of art from Southeast Asia. This work was by Dinh Q. Le called Untitled #9 from Cambodia: Splendor and Darkness and I could not believe there was nothing else in the room beyond one piece of art. We were asked to bring our chairs up close to the piece. When we were asked to explain what we saw in the work, I was amazed that so many people could see so much and such a variety of things in the work. We switched angles and people then explained the new things they saw from a different perspective. I couldn’t believe it. One work of art could bring so much out of so many different people. The artist in this particular piece was attempting to display some of the horror and emotion associated with the violence in Cambodia in the late 1970’s.
When I spoke with my wife about it that evening she got excited. Without even seeing the piece she tried to explain what the artist may have been attempting to do with colors and what he may have sought by placing the pictures how he did. While I am in no way going to become an art expert, the emotion one work could bring from so many people was a valuable lesson for me and gives me new appreciation for the role art can play in keeping history alive.
",,"Untitled #9 from Cambodia: Splendor and Darkness by Dinh Q. Lê",,"July 25, 2018","Michael Miragliuolo, 43, Social Studies Teacher at Green Hope HS in Cary, NC",,,,,,finding-meaning-in-art,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,"At the NEH Summer Seminar Contested Territory","Ackland Museum of Art,Art,Art Museums,Cambodia,Chapel Hill, North Carolina,Le, Dinh Q.,Paintings,Teachers & Teaching,Untitled #9 from Cambodia: Splendor and Darkness",https://humanitiesmoments.org/files/original/13/202/SplendorandDarknessAcklandArtMuseum.jpg,Text,"Contested Territory: America’s Role in Southeast Asia, 1945–75",1,0
"The Brightest Star in the Night",,"My humanities moment took place over a few years. It all started one day when I was in the 4th grade. This was one of my favorite days in elementary school because we had an assembly that day. That meant that after lunch recess we got to do something fun instead of doing math or history or science or something else that was uncolorful and boring. I was really excited to find out that it was an art assemble, which meant that afterwards we would get to paint or draw for the rest of the day. Taped all over the walls of our gym were many colorful, bright, and interesting paintings. When we were all seated on the floor I was able to get a better view of the paintings on my side of the wall. It was very interesting to look back and forth between the different sides of the gym. On the far side the paintings looked just like standard paintings but on the side near to me I could see all the little details.
The art teacher went on to explain why the paintings looked different from a distance. These were some of Vincent van Gogh’s most famous paintings and that he used a very unique style and technique. She explained that he is best known for his use of pointillism. This means that he painted using thousands of dots or strokes to create a very detailed and bright picture. My favorite picture that she showed us was of a little town at night. It had blue rolling hills and a swirly starry sky.
After learning about his style and looking at more of his paintings we went back to our class and got to try out painting like him. I had so much fun learning about and painting in Van Gogh’s unique style. It was by far my most favorite assembly. In middle school I kept seeing the painting with the swirly night sky and so I decided to look more into Vincent van Gogh’s life. He was born on March 30, 1853 in Zundert, Netherlands to Theodorus van Gogh and Anna Carbentus. Van Gogh was introduced to art very early in life when he worked with his uncle as an art dealer. During his early adulthood he had trouble figuring out his purpose in life. He worked many jobs trying to figure this out; he worked as an art dealer, a bookseller, and even became a preacher at one point. On his preaching mission in Borinage, Belgium, a mining region, he would give Bible readings to the locals. While this was all happening he would write to his brother, Theo, about his journeys. In these letters he would draw little sketches and drawings of what he saw. Which caused Theo to advise him to pursue his passion for art. Van Gogh agreed and soon got art lessons from Anton Mauve. Since Van Gogh didn't have a paying job anymore, Theo would send him money. Later in his painting career, as compensation for Theo taking care of him, he would give Theo some of his paintings to sell. Vincent van Gogh’s mental health fluctuate all throughout his life. He began a relationship with a former prostitute Sien Hoornik. Together they rented a studio where they lived along with her baby and five year old daughter. The relationship broke off and Van Gogh moved to Arles, Paris to focus on his art. There he rented one of his rooms to fellow artist Paul Gauguin. Paul and him had very different art styles and would often get into heated arguments with one another. This along with the stress of his painting career being unsuccessful caused his mental health to deteriorate. At its worst, he cut off his ear then gave it to a prostitute wrapped in a newspaper. After his recovery in the hospital he went back home to paint. Then feeling his mental health declining again he admitted himself to the psychiatric hospital in Saint-Rémy. While there he experienced a period of extreme confusion and ate oil paint. It was at this asylum that Vincent van Gogh painted The Starry Night, the swirly painting that I had liked so much. With everything becoming too much, on July 27, 1890 Van Gogh shot himself in the chest. He was able to walk back to his house and was found, but it was to late for him. Vincent van Gogh died on July 29, 1890 in Auvers-sur-Oise, France. Over his lifetime he drew over 850 paintings and about 1,300 works on paper.
Sadly, it was only after his death that his paintings found any success and popularity. This has influenced me personally because it taught me to not take everything at face value. You might not know what is going on underneath the surface. With Van Gogh his paintings seemed so happy and playful but behind that he was struggling financially and with his mental health. It taught me to be aware of those around me and to remind myself that not everything is pretty. After learning more about Vincent van Gogh’s life and his struggles it made the painting have a deeper meaning. It was both sad and beautiful to learn about the man behind the paintings. I learned that even in the worst situations people can create eternal beauty.",,"The Starry Night by Vincent van Gogh",,2010/2011,"Sydnie, 18, Student",,,,,,the-brightest-star-in-the-night,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,School,"Art,Beauty,Inspiration,Painters,Paintings,Pointillism,Salt Lake City, Utah,Students,Teachers & Teaching,The Starry Night,van Gogh, Vincent",https://humanitiesmoments.org/files/original/282/4912901360_c4971a58e6_o.jpg,Text,,1,0
"A Mountain of Faith",,"It was the middle of nowhere—nothing but sand, the occasional old car or rusted out piece of machinery, a strange lake known as the Salton Sea, and in the distance a rising mound of color that glimmered in the desert sun. In 2010, with encouragement from my religion professor, my mother and I quite literally drove across the country, roughly 2600 miles to Salvation Mountain, a mound of colorful paint that displayed biblical and religious messages. Bible verses accompanied images of bluebirds, flowers and waterfalls, all molded out of a mixture of clay and straw. This visit proved well worth the journey as it helped me to jump into ethnographic fieldwork while also allowing me to experience my first prominent ‘humanities moment.’
Rising 50 feet high and spanning 150 feet wide, the Dr. Seuss-like whimsical creation was made entirely by hand and proved to be as unique as its creator, Leonard Knight, an elderly man who dedicated his life to building this mountain in an effort to proclaim God’s love. Leonard was as kind hearted and gentle spirited as I had imagined. He lived at the mountain staying primarily in an old shaded hammock. A couple people who would check on Leonard over the years explained that he spent his days scavenging the dump for old building materials that he could use to add to his mountain. Along the way, he would often pick up something to eat. Salvaging car doors, windows, ladders, and buckets, Leonard incorporated anything he could find into his masterpiece. Over time, he built it up—adding new sections like a makeshift trophy room that contained local plaques he received or the ‘yellow brick road’ that consisted of a painted yellow stairway to the top.
Showing us around, Leonard emphasized the reason for building the mountain: he wanted to tell the whole world that God is Love. He explained, “people got too complicated with love. Just keep it simple.” While his mountain displayed bible verses like the Lord’s Prayer and proclamations like “Jesus loves you,” perhaps above all Salvation Mountain acted as a direct representation of one man’s personal faith and larger understanding of the world around him. The mountain embodied a lived religion that ventured beyond static scriptures into the dry heat and sun-worn desert landscape of California.
As an undergraduate, I understood religion within a sociological lens. It could help organize groups, driving and inspiring a range of outlooks and perspectives. But it was also magical, evoking a sense of wonder and awe. Like other humanities, religion helps us to explore and think critically about the human experience while deeply tugging at our emotions. Talking with Leonard a man who lived off the grid in a hammock in the desert, he whole-heartedly believed in the power of love and set out to embody such a love through the best way he could: a large colorful mountain. Of the handful of visitors I met that day, Leonard was the only person who had any strong ties to religion. Though his proclamation seemed apart from the views of those who stumbled upon the creation and an anomaly in a seemingly ‘middle of nowhere’ location, Salvation Mountain reveals the rich life and prevalence of religious thought that exists in marginalized places.
While faith is normally looked at in the grandeur of cathedrals, churches, mosques, and temples, or even the beauty and solace of redwood forests, canyon lands, and ocean horizons, Salvation Mountain’s appearance on the margins of town and society show that even in the most unlikely of places, religion can drive conversation, thought, and action. It reveals the complexity and power that religion can have, even when its just one person calling out in the desolate desert.
",,,,2010,"Victoria Machado, 30, PhD Candidate in Religion & Nature / Writing Instructor at the University of Florida ",,,,,,mountain-of-faith,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,"National Humanities Center Summer 2020 Graduate Student Residency ","Architecture,Art,Bible,Cultural Awareness,Faith,Religion,Religious Studies,Sociology",https://humanitiesmoments.org/files/original/17/402/intro.jpg,Text,"Graduate Student Residents 2020",1,0
"humanity without The Humanities ",,"My ""humanities moment"" occurred during my undergraduate studies at what was/is essentially a trade school in Pakistan (with no GenEd courses and only one course on Art or Art History offered among the subjects listed on your website. Specifically, during field trips to the Lahore Fort, where we saw 19th century frescoes brightly decorating the interior walls during our first visit and a month later they were gone (plastered over)! I had drawn those frescoes in my sketchbook, taken photographs and was planning to integrate these in my Architecture Thesis project for Punjab House in Islamabad. I can still feel the freezing of my body, the numbing of my mind, and the visual shock to see the plastered surface that hid my frescoes. Even as a 4th year undergraduate student, I pulled myself together to write a letter of inquiry to the Pakistani Minister of Antiquities. Long story short, my quest to uncover histories and safeguard monuments of the dispossessed began, WITHOUT being exposed to general education requirements or humanities curricula.
Since then, having spent more than 3 decades in American Higher Education machine, I wonder why have the humanities come under attack since the 1990s? Yes, neo-liberals may be blamed for everything these days, but there is a major disconnect between humanities scholarship and the public imagination/perception of the value of humanities (precisely why you are seeking ""humanities moments"", right?). These ""moments"" are not going to ""mind the gap"" between public comprehension of the value of The Humanities to humanity. We as humans must remove (dismantle) the colonial industrial machine of higher education, which has perfected the European division of Arts/Humanities and the Sciences, through decolonizing curricula. And please do not get me wrong, I am not calling for ""multi"" or ""trans"" disciplinary approaches, rather for taking an ANTI-DISCIPLINARY comprehension of ECOLOGY, SPACE + TIME.
Sometimes I wonder why I sought higher education in the ""land of the free"" when the toil I pursued back home placed me closest to the humanity of my ancestors!",,"19th century Frescoes on wall of the Lahore Fort in Pakistan",,1985,"Samia Rab Kirchner, 57, Associate Professor of Architecture at Morgan State University",,,,,,humanity-without-the-humanities,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,"web search","Art,Cultural Awareness,Cultural Relations,Human Beings,Humanities Education,Teachers & Teaching",https://humanitiesmoments.org/files/original/409/Stone_Fresco_HM.jpg,Text,,1,0
"Have One on Joanna Newsom",,"As I considered a range of options for my Humanities Moment, I instinctively knew it would come down to music, which is the element that moves me most often and intensely in my daily life. However, my tendency to live within particular soundscapes for hours or days on end also means that my moment is entangled with longer histories and hard to pin down in time and space. If anything, the album Have One on Me that yielded my “moment” has taught me a different, more unbounded relationship with time. But first, a little bit of background on the artist and how I discovered her.
I found Joanna Newsom in a Facebook post by a scholar I had met at a James Joyce summer school in Trieste, Italy. I had loved this person's academic work on literary hoaxes but as our social media afterlives showed us, our most vital point of connection was our love for women musicians with strange voices. I made it a point to check out any song he posted, and in late 2015, one of those songs turned out to be ""Sapokanikan"" from Newsom's latest release, Divers. ""Sapokanikan"" is notorious (within admittedly niche circles) for rhyming its titular word--an indigenous place name--with ""Ozymandian""--an adjective crafted from Shelley's famous poem (""Ozymandias"") about transience, infinity, and human hubris. This parallel is a neat glimpse into how the rest of the song traces the ebb and flow and layering of human histories in a single place. The audacity of it could be obnoxious, just as the music video of Newsom skipping down the streets singing straight into the camera could be precious. But none of it felt overindulgent to me.
The density of the lyrics allowed Newsom's voice to soar, at moments to hair-raising pitches that could have come straight from her harp or accompanying strings. Her earnest playfulness presented the mythic scope of her song with a disarming wink. And so my love for Joanna Newsom sprouted, easily and effortlessly. At times, I was troubled by how her love of myth led her to paint mystical pictures of ""ethnic"" cultures, or to string together different cultural references a bit too lightly and whimsically for the material histories of inequity that they grazed against. Nonetheless, I found the grand scale of her work personally liberating, and she always seemed to be aware of the fragility inherent in any overinflated image--whether in the way men saw women, or civilizations saw themselves.
But while I grew obsessed with Newsom's discography, I could never seem to get into her album Have One on Me. An over two hour-long triple album, it already posed a challenge to attention spans, almost testing the quality of her fans’ devotion. But a bigger problem for me was that the album seemed to lack her trademark energy and graspable forms that usually provided an entry point into her complex compositions. Unlike the sparkling and robust folk tunes of her debut, or the almost classical shifts in pace and melody in her later work, Have One on Me had a meandering, repetitive quality to my ears. The lyrics were devastating as usual, the singing was heartfelt, the overall sound was polished, but I failed to find that hook, that leap, that burst of vibrancy or ethereal lull that would transport me to Joanna’s universe.
At some point in the Spring semester of 2021, I was relying desperately on music to help me complete a dissertation chapter draft while my country was being ravaged by the second wave of COVID-19 and the disregard of a cold-blooded central government. My nerves were frayed--I craved a protective cocoon of music but not one so stimulating that I would be led away from my work. Have One on Me suddenly seemed like a good option. It may have been my least favourite Joanna Newsom album, but it was still Joanna Newsom. The album was expansive, elegant, and my distance from it could only help my focus. It turned out to be a great choice--the intricacy of the sound became a calming swirl around me as I plunged into the depths of my writing.
But after days of writing successfully to Have One on Me, something changed. The album was no longer a soothing but distant friend, no longer an amorphous mass of pretty and mysterious textures. I felt as though I had suddenly obtained the ability to see and hear at close range. Songs had intimately familiar outlines and phrases. The album wasn’t untethered, it was a deeply emotionally grounded narrative that left no stone unturned for the sake of the story that might lurk beneath. In a sense, Have One on Me occupies the most relatable of genres--the breakup album. But like Bjork’s Vulnicura, it is a breakup album that stretches and grasps and generates more than it fixes, fixates, or breaks down. The title track laughingly announces the singer’s separation from a hurtful ex-lover. “Baby Birch” mourns the loss of a baby, never held or seen. “California” makes an emphatic choice to protect the “border of… [the singer’s] heart” but still admits that the powerful habits of love wind her up like a cuckoo clock. It is easy to confuse something capacious for something overindulgent if we have been taught to trust bite-size pieces of wisdom and catharsis. Have on One Me was a vital corrective to those habits that I’ve acquired.
And I could not have been more wrong about the album’s pacing--I realized that everything about it was dynamic. Some songs, like the title track, are a richly embroidered tapestry, with subtle incremental shifts in the musical pattern. “Baby Birch” starts as a slow, pained crooning and swells into a tumultuous but triumphant section with strong percussion. “Go Long,” a bewilderingly compassionate indictment of toxic masculinity, switches between a regular and a high register with an unearthly ease while the shimmering harp in the background takes over in a wordless concluding meditation. The final song, “Does Not Suffice,” imagines the ex-lover’s home slowly returning to a masculine starkness as the singer removes all her items of clothing before her departure. It is once contemptuous and empathetic, self-aggrandizing and vulnerable. The gentle, ambling melody is almost identical to an earlier song, “In California,” with a whiff of added melancholy and fewer variations this time round. The ending however, is a dark and thunderous banging on a cluster of musical instruments all at once.
In the height of my newfound obsession with this album, I listened to it all the time--with headphones on, through my portable speakers, on my laptop speakers, and even directly through my phone. When “Does Not Suffice” drew to a close, my phone surprised me by the sheer contained violence that exploded from its inadequate sound system. As the instruments pounded away, it felt as though there was a ghost trapped in my device. I remember that visceral quality straining past technological barriers as a reminder of much energy there is in Joanna Newsom’s music, and particularly in the album that I had underestimated.","Joanna Newsom","Have One on Me (2010) by Joanna Newsom",,"Spring 2021","Anushka Sen, 30, Ph.D. Candidate, teacher, emerging translator",,,,,,have-one-on-joanna-newsom,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,"NHC Summer Residency","Aesthetics,Art,Graduate Students,Music Appreciation,Newsom, Joanna,Poetry,Self-Realization",https://humanitiesmoments.org/files/original/18/453/HM_Harp_Image.jpg,Text,"Graduate Student Residents 2021",1,0
"A Painting, A Baby, and Jacques Lacan Walk into a Syllabus...",,"This summer, I am working with the Syracuse University Art Museum to create English-specific teaching resources. The goal is to make the museum's collections more accessible to instructors for both teaching and research purposes. The job came with the underlying assumption that artwork is a valuable tool for all kinds of academic or humanistic endeavors: close reading, interpretation, question-asking, theory application, etc.
As I dug around in the collection, I came across a piece by Louisa Chase, ""Baby, Baby"" (1991) and had a breakthrough moment. The abstract work, and Chase generally, uses geometric shapes to shadow or mimic forms--in this case, rectangles and squares to mimic a baby--and chaotic, heavy lines to disrupt the image. The work is striking in itself, but I was inspired by the way in which it perfectly represents the Lacanian idea of the ""Mirror Stage.""
A professor I work closely with describes pre-Mirror Stage identity as the formless, wild, confusing, cloudy, and chaotic experiences of an infant's sense of ""self."" And Chase's work shows that exactly, without the use of so-called ""high theory."" I was excited to show my professor, who was equally excited, and I went on to develop an entire module on the ""Mirror Stage"" and Identity out of paintings, photographs, cartoons, and other artworks of diverse mediums.
This module, once completed, will hopefully help to illuminate Lacan's theory by showing how humans find (or construct) their identity via images, representations, objects, and other things on the outside. I'm excited to continue to research the collection this summer to identify other artworks that can help students and scholars achieve understanding, find inspiration, and communicate ideas.","Louisa Chase","""Baby, Baby"" by Louisa Chase (1991). Etching on aquatint. ",,"June 2021","Madeline Krumel, 24, Ph.D. Student ",,,,,,painting-baby-jacques-lacan-walk-syllabus,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,"NHC GSSR","Art,Chase, Louisa,Identity,Lacan, Jacques,Museum Curatorship,Museums,Psychoanalysis,Teachers & Teaching",https://humanitiesmoments.org/files/original/18/455/cubes-447703_640.jpg,Text,"Graduate Student Residents 2021",1,0
"The Original Starry Night",,"""Starlight Over the Rhone"" is a precursor to the much more famous ""Starry, Starry Night"" by Vincent van Gogh. It features a boundless black sky that merges into the murky waters of the Rhone below. Stars shine brightly above and are reflected in the river.
The sky, of course, is the most impressive piece of the work, but what I love most about this piece, is the couple walking along the river. The two appear in the bottom right of the painting, and are dwarfed by the landscape. Their faces are indecipherable, and they drift through the space. I think about them often, mostly I think about the idea of relationships and humanity. There are two people, together, compact, wandering, amidst this vast emptiness. They are together.
We don't know who they are, but their comfort is palpable. It almost doesn't matter who they were, it is simply the idea they present: an idea of comfort, of belonging, of compassion, of love that exists amongst all the black. I look at this painting whenever I feel sad, and think about all the love in the world. I think about how in a universe full of emptiness, of vastness, we still have each other here.","Vincent Van Gogh","Van Gogh's painting ""Starlight Over the Rhone""",,"2011 ","Katie Ligmond, 27, Ph.D. Candidate in Visual Studies",,,,,,original-starry-night,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,NHC,"Art,Art History,Humanity,van Gogh, Vincent",https://humanitiesmoments.org/files/original/18/460/HM_Musee_Image.jpg,Text,"Graduate Student Residents 2021",1,0
"Human Grace",,"In 2009, when I was a freshman in college, I went to France and Germany at the end of a year-long seminar exploring the emergence of European nationalism after 1848. As I majored in History and Art History & Archaeology, this class was right up my alley, so to speak. And not to mention, we traveled to Paris and Berlin!
Naturally, we spent one day exploring the Louvre museum. I was ecstatic to see some of the world's most revered works of the art. I now had the opportunity to see with my own eyes the very pieces that I had spent hours studying and analyzing. One of the first pieces I sought out was a work by Sandro Botticelli--I believe it was Venus and the Three Graces. I stood there mesmerized and soon realized I was crying.
Something clicked for me that day. Perhaps it was the fact that this fresco had survived centuries and, despite its cracks, continued to inspire awe and contemplation. These figures still conveyed such beauty and grace. For me, it was the realization that these works, whose reproductions in textbooks seemed so two-dimensional, were tangible items created by human hands and genius. I carry that understanding and respect with me today, especially as I handle artifacts in museums and archives or read original primary source documents.","Sandro Botticelli","Venus and the Three Graces Presenting Gifts to a Young Woman",,2009,"Lindsey Waldenberg, 31, Public History Ph.D. Student",,,,,,human-grace,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,"Art,Art History,Art Museums,Botticelli, Sandro,Emotional Experience,Europe,Louvre Museum,Material Culture,Travel",https://humanitiesmoments.org/files/original/18/472/HM_Louvre_Image.jpg,Text,"Graduate Student Residents 2021",1,0
"Quotidian moments",,"A note I wrote from April 16, 2020
From my dining room table: My two children, ages four and six, have now been at home for 35 days. Aside from waving to neighbors from our driveway and driving by a friend’s house to shout “Happy Birthday!” from the car window, they have not seen or spent time with family members, teachers, or friends.
As I write this reflection, thinking about the intersections of parenting, research, and what I would write about for this first humanities moment, I look back through photos of all of the art work my children and I made together this past year. Photos of drawings, yard signs, letters, and baby chickens in the skirts we made and decorated for them using cupcake holders (yes, that’s a thing). I have been thinking for a long time about how parenting and research are integrated together, long before the COVID-19 pandemic, and now sitting here looking at these photos of fairy houses, sun prints, and posters we made for neighbors, it seems more relevant and prescient than ever.
Madeleine Grumet (1988) posits, “Theory grows where it is planted, soaking up the nutrients in the local soil, turning to the local light” (p. 14). For myself, theory and research are planted in the intersections of motherhood, teaching, artistry, and care. They overlap and intertwine until one cannot be understood without the other. My research can not help but turn towards my children, as well as young learners in my community, especially during this uncertain time in which we’ve found ourselves. As a researcher and parent, my biggest fear is that in this wait for the return to “normalcy” we will miss the quotidian happenings that are packed with nutrients for growth and light.
In my mind, the quotidian moments of this past year, specifically the sharpened memories of making art with my kids at home, is one great, big humanities moment- a pause to refocus on what matters. I do not wish to glorify any parts of this horrible pandemic, which has affected so many and changed lives forever. However the pause, quite literally from my dining room table, and the experience of making intentional art with my kids on a daily basis was something that had been missing for quite some time. Grumet explains, “The dining room table became the locus of this research not because its design was conducive to meditations on eidetic form but because of its proximity to the lifeworld being carried on in the adjoining kitchen” (p. 5). During my time as a doctoral student, I felt that success in my academic career came with the price of failing as a mother. Although I’ve been writing and teaching about the importance of art education for many years, it was quite often neglected at home. Before the pandemic, there were many days my dining room table was (hypothetically) empty, our lives too busy to come together in this space to sit, talk, learn. But, during the days of shelter-in-place, my table truly became the locus of my life, my heart, my research. It was covered in books, art supplies, worksheets, Play-Doh, lunch: the materials of our lives. I found myself trying to be fully present to these lifeworlds, to both the human and non-human things we are surrounded by. What lessons were learned from our time making art together around our table, and how are we changed from these experiences?
Nel Noddings (2013) argues that “It is important for the young, in addition to being cared for, to see and assist in the genuine caring done by adults” (p. xiv). The more practice we all have in caregiving, the more likely it is for us to not only develop a method of caring and empathy but to also transfer this care to others. I found that intentional art-making, together, can be an act of care and empathy. I understand more fully how art-making can give young learners a language to express themselves during uncertain times, and how making art together opens up space for relationships to grow and conversations to be had.
Navigating the intersections of parenting and doctoral research is hard work and not without its share of failure. However, I feel challenged to continue to centralize myself to the lifeworlds carrying on around me, even as we move towards a return to “normal”. My hope for myself, and the reader, is that we take note of and show care for these quotidian moments we may have been overlooking for so long, even if it is something as simple as making a portrait out of leaves and flowers. These opportunities can be rich with opportunities for building relationships and finding beauty in the everyday.
References:
Grumet, M. (1988). Bitter milk: Women and teaching. Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts Press.
Noddings, N. (2013). Caring: A relational approach to ethics and moral education. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
",,,,2020,"Amber Pitt, 35, Ph.D. Candidate in Art Education, University of Georgia",,,,,,quotidian-moments,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,Residency,"Art,Children,COVID,Family,Parenting,Quarantine,Research",https://humanitiesmoments.org/files/original/18/492/IMG_0038.jpeg,Text,"Graduate Student Residents 2021",1,0
"Van Gogh and Me",,"Last November my grandmother was visiting and wanted to do something fun. Instead of fun, my mother dragged us to the traveling “Beyond Van Gogh” exhibit that was in Salt Lake City at the time. As we entered this big warehouse where the exhibit was located, my fears seemed to be confirmed. I walked along a winding path with backlit, large-canvas reproductions of Van Gogh’s paintings with excerpts of letters written between Vincent Van Gogh and his brother Theo written over top of the paintings. For me, because I have a visual field cut and other sensory processing issues, it was painful and overwhelming to look at. The backlighting of the artwork made every detail pop and screamed for my attention. So everything smeared together and my brain could not process anything. I did everything I could to avert my eyes as I felt myself slowly becoming overwhelmed and on the verge of melting down.
I did notice that not everything in this room was yelling at me. In between these paintings, there were various empty picture frames invisibly suspended from the ceiling. As people, including myself, walked by, we all became the subjects. I became part of the artwork for a fleeting moment as I was framed within the borders. Then, once I turned the last corner, I entered a dark room with projections of moving color on the wall and floor. I went from being the one who moved around stationary pieces of art into a stationary person watching as the brushstrokes of color and light moved around me and swallowed me whole. As my mind and senses adjusted to this new reality, I entered a huge warehouse-sized room, projections of Van Gogh's work enveloped me on all sides. I was completely immersed in all the colors and details. Music written about Van Gogh or his works was gently playing in the background. For me, it was like a reverse fishbowl effect. Instead of feeling alone and exposed while something stared at me, I was a natural being that was happily swimming amidst the wonder around me. As I watched colors and paint strokes slowly morphing one painting turned into another, for the first time, art moved me in ways I never experienced before. By magnifying details that I would never normally see, I finally understood why art is so powerful. I watched his artistic process from start to finish as sketches were recreated and deconstructed before my eyes. I did not know about his work as a portrait painter, but seeing his side-by-side gallery of his many subjects, including himself, showed such an incredible imagination. This was the first time that I felt art really move me. Van Gogh’s artwork is so powerful and now I understand why his work lives on today. Visiting the “Beyond Van Gogh” exhibit has made me rethink what is possible. Please do not tell my mom that she was right and that I had so much more than fun.
Works Cited: “The Immersive Experience .” Beyond Van Gogh Salt Lake City, 2 Dec. 2021, vangoghsaltlake.com/.",,"""Beyond Van Gogh"" traveling art exhibit",,"November 2021","Julia Reardon, Mountain Heights Academy, Utah",,,,,,van-gogh-and-me,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,"Aesthetics,Art,Art Exhibitions,Cultural Awareness,Emotional Experience,Family,Museum,Painters,Paintings,van Gogh, Vincent",https://humanitiesmoments.org/files/original/543/Van_Gogh_HM.jpg,,,1,1