Summer's Swan Song—Act Two

One of the things I love about late summer is the loud song of the cicadas (depending on where you are, of course), sometimes in harmony with tree frogs and other night sounds. We're lucky enough to have a little house in Tarrytown, where one cicada expired and landed on our walkway. It's an exquisite corpse—and so beautiful that I put it into a jewelry box and brought it into the office, where Brendan McInerney photographed it. Brendan, a recent college grad, is more interested in fashion and event photography, but he's certainly made this gorgeous artefact of an hemiptera look ready for her closeup.


Photos by Brendan McInerney
http://www.TheAngryPenguin.org
http://www.ideeplace.blogspot.com/

Monarch Miracle

Your friend's education blog is totally inspiring—and captures the wonder of learning and then, passing it on, by teaching. Also, what poetic writing.

I know you and Rob have already read and responded to the blog, but during these last days of August, when the Monarchs are "called to fly to Mexico," I just have to quote Marla McLean's vision of . . . well . . . having vision.

If we are to share the ancient beliefs of Mexican people, then we believe that Monarchs carry the souls of our ancestors. If you have ever raised Monarchs, and have witnessed the transformation of the tiny little egg, into a caterpillar, into a chrysalis, and then observe the metamorphosis with your own eyes, then you are a person who believes in miracles and the unimaginable.

It's that time alright

I'm working on my syllabus, too, for the upcoming Intro to Design 2050 class at Baruch. I'm totally inspired by my friend who writes an education blog about teaching art in an Emilia Reggio school in Washington, DC, who says that "Those who can teach, do more."
I'm always so impressed with how much prep and research you do for your students. It's true that the teacher learns so much.

Recently I met a colleague of a friend (they both teach at Kutztown University) who also has a blog. Dr. Martin Rayala writes a magazine about how design and art education must be expanded to cover film/video, graphic shop class, and other creative pursuits in high schools. No more English teachers teaching film—although it's based on narrative, it is a visual medium. Design is being taught by the technology and computer department. Again, it's a visual and visual thinking medium.

It's really heartening to see so many teachers and professors reaching out beyond their classrooms. You included.

Short time left

Speaking of shorts, the days are shortening. Summer's just about over. There are mere days until adjuncts leave the lazy hazy crazy days of summer for the classroom.

Semester-opening convocation took place today, along with a long meeting of the Communication Design Department, including us adjuncts. Although this coming semester I'm not teaching Visual Process—a class concerning about symbols and communication without words—I spent time this summer trying to deepen my understanding of symbols by reading Rudolf Arnheim's Visual Thinking and gobbling up
Natalia Ilyin's witty Blonde Like Me, which is also about symbols. You guessed it; a blonde is a big symbol—and even though I'm a sincere brunette, I loved Ilyin's (pronounced "Ill-een") mix of semiotics and sassy stories.

With the benefit of some experience and the afore-mentioned research, I see many many ways I could improve my Visual Process class (86-ing some of the projects, becoming a good enough actress to make anything I say more exciting, more group projects, encouraging students to do their projects as movies etc), I felt I had a better grasp of the subject matter than I did in earlier forays in the same course. So, when the department meeting ended with a perhaps-inevitable hearty discussion of Student Evaluations (including a comment from one instructor that summarized our collective dilemma and cracked me up: "Of course you hate me; you're eighteen."), I listened intently but didn't get fearful about my own evaluation. I'd been diligently applying what I'd learned about teaching. I'd been taking advantage of the seminars offered by the most excellent Center for Excellence in Teaching. I'd been improving my evaluation scores so that they were above the required median.

After the meeting, I went to check my department mail. So much for the comfort of improvement. My Student Evaluations were pretty unimpressive. I may be improving teaching skills, but the scores for my most recent class are ripe for another improvement marathon. I feel the same sort of betrayal-by-self that I felt in high school when I aced American History and won the class prize but then garnered miserable scores on the Achievement Test. The category "Respect for Students" showed high scores, but everything else puts me back in strivers row. The good thing is that I'm learning to learn as I learn to be a better teacher. I just hope my students are learning as much as I am.

BTW, the image has absolutely nothing to do with the post; it's just a gorgeous shadow.

Some seriously bad kerning

I believe it's also known as butt crack. (But only 20 bucks!)

Oh, and there's even a video.

Although I do love the song, "Cobra Style" by the Teddybears Stockholm featuring Mad Cobra.
Although I love the cover even more, done by Robyn.

Trip Detritus

There were other cool things to see and do on our NJ=PA=WV=OH=IN trip. Notably the beautifully elegant (and Brancusi-ish; thank you Dr. Martin Rayala for that apt description) windmills in a Pennsyvania windfarm. In this photo, one of the windmills is being repaired, which is the only way we got a sense of the scale of these things...huge!



Also, there was more wonderful installation art to be found at the Mattress Factory, including Renee Piechocki's "Guestroom for Lareese's Dream" (2009), which has one of the prettiest blues I've ever seen on the walls along with topographical map line drawings on the floor.


Also notable was Drew Pavelchak's "Staple Approach" (2009) that featured a kinetic chattering stapler.


And this lovely bit of business by an artist whose name escapes me (but the card is somewhere and I'll find it sometime) that had a body-size drawing (or carving) on the wall and this umbrella over the light fixture.


While in Indiana, we had an opportunity to go to the Wonderlab, which is the Museum of Science, Health, and Technology in Bloomington, IN, and just a fantastic place to take kids. One of the permanent exhibits they have is a see-through beehive that is inside the museum (but the bees can fly out to garden outside to collect pollen and go disco dancing through a see-through pipe). I have been interested in bees for awhile now, and this was a great chance to get to watch them for an extended period of time.


Lastly, in Bloomington we came across one of the nicest graffiti I've ever seen, on the side of an abandoned market.

And that's what I did on my summer vacation.

Next stop, Monroe County Fair

We arrived in Indiana in time for the County Fair.

Well, I'd been to the New Jersey State Fair which did prepare me a bit...there was 4H livestock everywhere! Miss You-Know-Who was in wonderland here. We're lucky we didn't go home with a goat!



Some amazing looking prize animals (yes, that's a rabbit),


and as expected, some great signage!

Mattress Factory

We were lucky enough to visit The Mattress Factory while we were in Pittsburgh—it's the preeminent installation art museum in the country. One whole floor is devoted entirely to James Turrell, who does site specific work with light—he plays with the interchange between created space and actual space. The light installations actually seem to extrude and then recede . . . when you walk up to them and put your hand out it's surprising to find out there's a hole there with light in it!


This one is Danaë, 2003, shot by Florian Holzherr (it's so impossible to get a good snapshot, so I had to borrow).
Here are R&N playing in the blue hole:


We also got to play in Yayoi Kusama's Repetitive Vision from 1996, and got some fun (if not predictable) shots!

Change?

Glad to be back in NYC and surrounds. We had a great trip to Pittsburgh, PA and Bloomington, IN. Let's start with the Pennsylvania part of the trip. No good road trip is complete without a stop at Bob Evans, but wow, even they have embraced Gotham. It's so darn recognizable!

Legitimized Street Art

The Keith Haring wall at Bowery and Houston has been replaced by a magical mural by two Brazilian brothers (twins) with the moniker Os Gemeos. The New York Times
reviewer overdescribed it, so I'll simply show some lovely details—along with folks on the traffic island snapping away. Can an inanimate object have a gaggle of paparazzi? As lovely as the new mural is, it doesn't have the power of the Haring.