A non-list friend wrote in response to my thoughts about weirdness that in her locale a motorcycle had just bumped into a cow, with tragic consequences for one of the folk on board, but little damage to the bovine. I expressed regrets and my thoughts eventually circled to bovines, but I began with the more immediate present, which was a college catalog fresh-opened from the mail.
"Women of voice and vision." This is the slogan of Scripps College, a college that Laura thinks Julia will like and fit into and so one about which I am invited to bite my tongue. You have heard me before on the subject of "of." Translate the slogan and what do you get, "People who can talk and see." Imagine the tour, with person walking backwards, "Welcome to our college. The thing that should jump out at you right away is we have students who can talk and see."
"Ah no," you, dear reader, object, "you simplify matters. Women of vision are women who not only perceive within the normal visible spectrum, they can see further, into the future. They are people who imagine things."
O.K., let's get back to the tour, "In addition to being able to talk and see, our students sometimes imagine things."
"And are their voices individual?" "They are indeed. All of them are very unique."My two cow paintings are close to being finished and I am happy with them, so don't come crying to me with tales of bovine destructive rampage. As far as I am concerned, highland cows at least are inspirational. And very orange.
I woke this morning still considering the counter-argument to my first reaction to a few angry student evaluations. Most were great; a few were unhappy. My first reaction was probably right, that the fault was with the students and that evaluations tend to be mirrors held up to the evaluator. But we are trained to consider counter- arguments and to probe for weaknesses, so I woke at an earlier hour than I would have wished, wondering if those who argue our college's thesis process doesn't work as well as it should may have a point. I considered my summer's paintings as a "body of work," (this is the term we use) and asked how they would have been improved by the kind of research we require thesis students to do. The argument is that research improves understanding and understanding improves art; the thesis is not an exercise in art making, it's an exercise in coming to a deeper understanding of a chosen subject through art making, writing and research. So the first answer to my question is, "I wasn't embarked on a thesis exercise; I was just making paintings." But, I pressed, what if you were; what then could you write about? Do the paintings mean anything? Have you discovered anything while painting? What is your understanding of their place in the contemporary art world?
I haven't learned much about cows, but I was pleased to learn "from the inside" as it were, that our thesis is not an easy exercise. It's an exercise of mind.
David Ritchie, Portland, Oregon ------------------------------------------------------------------ To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off, digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html
