Category: October 10 (Page 2 of 3)

Aaron Hanlon began his origins talk on buildings – architecture, layout, categorization, and compartmentalization. From displaying pictures of Miller, to breaking down many of the individual buildings surrounding campus and their functions, Hanlon focused on the physical divide that separates the various majors and disciplines of study at Colby. Though seemingly merely physical spaces in which we learn and study, this divide is one that extends beyond merely creating physical barriers between innovation, but rather creative barriers preventing intersectional growth and progression. Last semester, in the Revolutions seminar, we discussed the value in monuments, and their relevance in establishing value and meaning. Monuments, like the buildings in which we learn and teach, are reflective of our unique approaches, perspective, histories, and even beliefs. If claiming this to be true, it is impossible to look at Mudd (Physics building), Davis (CS/Psych Building), Olin (Bio/Chem Building), and note the inherent limitations we have placed on ourselves through mere physical establishments.

These limitations exist not only in the classes that we are enrolled in throughout the various spaces, but those we are surrounded by and learn with, the teachers we are learning from, the events we are experiencing, and the overarching room for possibility that may (or may not) exist. Having had many of the same classes with a large number of the same students, I have felt limited in the peers with whom I’ve worked collaboratively with over the last several years. While it has been great to develop deeper relationships with a more intimate group, I also feel great hesitation in this as a liberal arts student, and even more specifically as an STS major. As a major so heavily ingrained in intersectionality and unexpected collaboration, STS embraces the intention of liberal arts. However when confined by solely the physical spaces that we learn in, we are effectively countering the value in a liberal arts education, reducing the number of minds, ideas, and innovations that can be produced together. While there is no clear solution to this problem, as placing a science classroom next to a humanities classroom doesn’t solve the issue, it is certainly a point to note as being vital to the liberal arts experience.  

Museum originating from Greek form, mouseion, which meant “seat of the muses” was designated as a place of contemplation. When I go to a museum, I wonder what kind of interpretation people give to different piece of art. I would wish there was a way to collect interpretation of specific art and probably origins of their interpretation due to their diverse nature because of cultures, norms and practices.

This week’s museum visit made me think of our vegetation as piece of art that we, human being, have been recreating. From the picture by Gary Green of Prairie fire near Missouri, we see smoke covering the sky in the background and dry grass in the foreground. Fire restructures vegetation we have and I would think this as origin of another type of vegetation that we get after a “fire”. This makes me think human’s role is restructuring of this planet through “fire”, which can be through various human activities. Human beings have played a big role in restructuring our surrounding to suit most of human needs leading to origins of many things surrounding our landscape. From intensification of agriculture, natural vegetation fields are cleared for crop cultivations.  This extensive cultivation is related to an increasing population of people on earth and the limited cultivation lands which do not supply enough food. Therefore, more fields are cleared and the type of vegetation covering that piece of land changes. Slash and burn agricultural practices as well leads to clearing of vegetation which not only change the landscape vegetation but also leads to some of vegetation species completely removed from that place and other type of vegetation growing after the land has lost its fertility.

Scientific revolution as well as created origin of various types of plants and crops leading to restructuring of the type of vegetation cover we have. Going back to food shortage solution of increasing the fields to produce enough crops for the increasing population, science have led to modification of crops to grow faster than usual and increase production capacity. Gregor Mendel, 1800s, an Australian scientist is considered to be the founder of modern genetics due to plant hybridization. His work can be considered as the origin of our present GMO that is increasing used in the world due to it’s father growth, high yield and also due to resistance it ha to drought or to pest and diseases.

Nature as well can respond to human action. Increase in temperatures, for example, can lead to floods due to melting of polar ice and higher evaporations which increases rain fall. From these floods, the coastal areas, or any other water body, changes geography due to depositions by flooded water which creates different physical features, destroy existing vegetation and growing of other type of vegetation there.

Therefore, I think human being has played a big role in creating and reshaping its environment making human a big player in the origin of some vegetation cover on earth by changing its structure or introducing new ones in different places. Human activities as well have lead to response by nature on its activities leading to change some landscapes or vegetation but these activities can be argued to originate from human activities apart from nature controlling itself.

On October 10^th the origins lecture took place in the museum. We first learned about the origins of the museum. In the 1950s/60s Colby was gifted American + Maine based art. A lot of the art is hung in the museum and also around campus. The philosophy behind hanging art around campus is that good citizens come from looking at American art.

We looked at specific pieces of art that spoke to the theme of origins. I looked specifically at the “Study on the origin of species (after Darwin) 2012” created with ink and watercolor on book page. The book pages had information about the differences in offspring, the origins of the species and differences in animals from different places. There are marks that overlay the book pages. The figures appear to be tree branches. Perhaps the branches signify branches and threads and connections.

Another piece that we looked at was a collection of foreign money. Perhaps this piece represents money as the source of evil. Most of the money was from territories that did not treat their people well. We also brought up the interesting relationship between art and business. For this piece the artist obviously received money for his work, which can be constituted as part of the ugly side of art.

Gary Green’s “Prairies in the south” were also on display. Gary took pictures of a controlled burn. His work addresses mans involvement in resetting the origins of the landscape. His work makes the viewer think about human intervention and question if mans involvement actually helps the ecosystem.

Terry Winter’s “ORA” was also very interesting. One could interpret this piece of art in many different ways. Some may see the federalization of an egg. Some may see flowers and pollen. Regardless, one can conclude that the piece speaks to the origins of plants and the origins of people.

One of the most controversial pieces that we looked at was the “Colored Vases” 2006-08. Ai Weiwei created this work by buying ancient vases dating all the way back to 5000 BC. He then pained the ancient vases very bright colors including pink, blue and yellow. This piece makes the viewer question the origins of these vases and question whether or not it is offensive to take something so old and just paint over it. One may argue that the artist is reusing these objects and is creating new art. One may argue that the artist is covering up the authenticities of the object so that people are unable to track the vases origins. One interesting point of the conversation we had was about the value we place on these old objects. We wondered why seem more concerned with these ancient objects and their destiny then we do with human lives.

Overall the museum was very fascinating. I liked hearing about the origins of the museum and learning about pieces in the museum that represent the theme, origins. I think people can gain a lot when thinking about origins by looking art.