Search for Beauty 2017

Lord of the Rings is one my favorite novels ever written. It is J. R. Tolkiens works that I have an immense fondness for. There are many allegorical connotations that derive from biblical accounts. The story of Christ for one as the "returning king" represented by Aarogron son of Arathorn. The one that would become king. It is truly an inspiring novel that speaks to the heart. My heart was moved by the strong friendships that journeys in life takes upon people (particularly Samwise and Frodo). The elemental plots that made the story even greater involved the characterizations of antagonist characters such as Gollum. Gollum was quintessential in the LOTR universe, for without him, the world would have plunged into darkness. The beauty in this ideology is that we need antagonist characters because they develop our own characters. They force us to grow when we do not want to. Often times opposition is what forces one to grow because it becomes the realization of the necessity to...

Boot camp... I hated it. Simply put it was probably one of the most trying trials in my entire life. It was difficult being away from family because I have never left home for that long period of time. The first 3 weeks were the most difficult. The army designs its training to strip away one's civilian identity from anything recognizable. They train soldiers, not entitled civilians. The difficulty was not the physical aspect of army training, but it was with the mental portion of it. If your mentality was not placed in the right mindset, you would fail at everything. Also emotional contentions were high. Emotional stability was just as important. To survive Basic Training, follow orders, and don't talk back. Accept one's fate whilst in the army. Granted, the army cannot take all aspects of your civilian side away, but the important part in training was not to lose oneself.

Nancy is a girl I'm seeing. She's difficult to handle at times, but underneath she has a genuine heart. The difficulty lies in the fact that she has had a trying life, but ultimately, what amazes me is the fact that she is able to persevere admits difficulties. She has resiliency. More than what Ive ever come across. The beauty in that is that no matter what happens, she is able to persevere. She is stronger than she lets on, but she still believes that she is not. She is intriguing in that she is not the type to let people trample on her. She is strong, but strong can be a defense mechanism. Granted, no one's perfect, but she's trying. The beauty lies in the fact that she is trying not to prove to people who she is, but that she is doing it for herself. Nothing else will stand in her way of success. Her resiliency inspires me, and my training that I've received from the military. She is my form of reinforcement.

I was in an escape room today. It was thrilling because there was no distinct answer to be given. Granted, we were given the option of 3 hints, but still it was difficult. The difficulty was in grouping together. The group consisted of young adults that all believed that their theories were right. It was difficult because it was a conditions based games. The riddles were confusing because they followed an anagram and numbering system that was difficult to crack. Although it was difficult we solved the riddle in the end. The concept was based on the "con-artist" who stole an original piece from the Lourve Museum in Paris. The goal was to figure out where he hid the piece. The clues themselves were difficult because they only utilized a system in which required minds to think, but also cooperate. Cooperation was the most difficult part because there were too many people thinking aloud at once, which makes concentration so difficult. But we put aside our differences and theories...

The beauty of the beautiful is that it is not confined in just one particular field. There are many fields in which beauty can be characterized as. In particular, beauty in personalities. The personality of each individual evolves through time or characterized in ways that it matures. The beauty in personalities is that it is not confined to one thing. It is a numerous conditions in which personalities drive intentions.

How do you find beauty in the mundane? The mundane is dull and not interesting at all. The difficulty lies in not the lack of beauty, but the absence of wanting beauty. The beauty in the mundane is that it is not trying. That is beauty because its not making an effort to be beautiful. It is authentic in its own right. It is not the attempt of seeking beauty because it does conform to the standard of which it makes something beautiful. Aesthetically, it is beauty in its own right.

Aristotle believed that art is imitation, and that it is a good thing. It pertains to humanity in ways that connects humanity. Imitation to Aristotle is relational in that humans learn from such as children. Even artistic values such as tragedies (mimesis) help to fosters an emotional connection to humankind. For Aristotle, a good tragedy produces Kartharis. Which is essentially, purification through pity and fear. The notion of imitation as a good thing, falls relatively short in that imitation is the reproduction or copy of something else. Whether it is a good copy or not, it derives from non original conditions.

Plato disliked the idea that art was real, rather it was imitation. It is imitation because it does not represent the reality we're in. This was because Plato, ultimately believed that the world was represented in shapes and forms. This idea referred back to Plato's Allegory of the Cave. The philosopher essentially is the one freed from the confines of the cave, and is able to free themselves from the cave thusly, seeing the bigger picture. Art serves as imitation to things that are reality. Imitation falls under copying, and Plato dislikes that notion. I disagree. Art is not imitation, it's initiation. It initiates in the form of starting something that had no beginning. Initiation drives creativity, and establishes context.

According to Van Der Leeuw, music stands closest to religion. This is because it closely relates to Catholic ideologies concerning Mass and Requiem. This ideology incorporates a form of worship. The ideology of tonal music is that it is insufficient. Music does not just seek the higher, rather it is its preconditions. The opposite of music resides in the form of silence. Silence can be argued that it perpetuates power in of itself. It grows in that silence destroys the notion of sound. It is is just as powerful as sounds because it perpetuates that absence of sound. It is therefore, powerful in its own right.

According to Van Der Leeuw, word is not just instant inspiration. It takes practice, reflection, and conscious consideration. Word comes not when it is needed to be expected, but when it is unexpected. The powers of the word derive from the primitiveness of man, but also drives home the ability to do more. A poet is the mouthpiece of inspiration. Granted, not all great things can be spoken with instant success. It does take time to think out. I agree with Van Der Leeuw in that instant success is not given all the time, rather, like most things in the world, earned. To yearn for something is to seek after it. But this is what instills passion and the desire to want that which can be attained through time. Beauty in this sense, is the ability to accept and adhere to inspiration when it strikes, not just the constant need to attain it.

On November 29th, my life basically changed. I had the privilege on seeing the infamous Mayhem, all the way from Norway, in concert in a tiny personal venue known as Shaka's at the VB oceanfront. They were supported by Black Anvil and Immolation. Let's get into it. First up were the guys from Black Anvil from New York. They were... interesting, to say the least. Their sound was a mixture of black metal with rock and roll. I'm still not sure how I feel about it. They started off with some cool, evil-sounding guitar riffs but they quickly went into clean singing and basic rock and roll beats. I'm not trying to disrespect rock and roll; I like rock quite a bit. But they, in my not so humble opinion, did not blend the two styles well. Next up was Immolation. These guys have been pumping out quality death metal albums since the early nineties, and they are fan favorites. They came onto the tiny stage, started playing, and immediately the stage started to shake due to t...

12/15 Mandalas are some of my favorite pieces of art and I have one tattooed on my shoulder. It is a symbol of your journey through life, how you start from the very beginning, small and simple, and as you grow, you have different phases and experiences and life is constantly changing. It ends up being a big beautiful masterpiece. It is also a symbol of peace. When you look at it, you almost get lost in all the beautiful chaos and it calms you. It is artwork of Hindu and Buddhist religions. Van der leeuw talks about art being representational and awe-inspiring. Mandalas do just this. They represent life and religion. They cause people to be in awe of their beauty. Life is a mess but once you step back and look at the whole thing, it is a gorgeous piece of art. That is the message the mandala is trying to send.

12/15 This is a snippet from the poem, "Story Telling" by Edgar Guest. New stories every night they ask. And that is not an easy task; I have to be so many things, The frog that croaks, the lark that sings, The cunning fox, the frightened hen; But just last night they stumped me, when They wanted me to twist and squirm And imitate an angle worm. The poem is about children wanting to hear bedtime stories. Although this part in the poem is about bedtime stories, it could be about reading a poem and this part just made me think of van der leeuws part where he talks about the poet. He says that they carry power with words they read and must portray these words. The parent in the story has to portray all these different animals to his child. He is creating "a living image." I liked this poem because it is almost a poem within a poem. To the child, the dad is moving her with these stories. The dad is the poet.

12/15 The first snow is always so magical. They talk about the calm before the storm but I don't think there's anything more calm than the way it feels outside when it's about it snow or starts to snow. Everyone goes home and bundles up. It has that power to make almost everyone stop their crazy lives and just relax with their friends and families. Each snowflake is unique and beautiful in its own way. The snowflakes move and dance as they fall from the sky. "Movement reaches out and overpowers all things, until the stars, the clouds, and the flowers join the dance and become a roundelay which includes the entire world." Van der leeuw says this about dancing and movement which perfectly signifies the movement of snow. The movement of the spiritual world extends to our environment and causes it to move and dance also. The snow is just a dance and floating rhythm. I think this is why it is so calming and has the power to bring about peace to people.

12/15 I went and saw my friends one act she had to put on for her senior year thesis. The play was about these 2 mayflies that had come home from a party, trying to hook up with each other. While they are watching animal planet on tv, they accidentally learn that mayflies only live for a day. They begin to panic and wonder how they are going to spend the rest of the time they have left. Although the play is lighthearted and funny, it makes you think about your own life and what you are going to do with your time here on earth. Drama is a very important composition of art. Van der leeuw talks about drama being a representation of the cycle of life: birth, death, and everything in between. This play shows the struggle of coping with death and how we always have it at the back of our minds. In the play, they attempt to distract themselves by talking or watching more tv. This made me think about how Buber says we avoid silence because when we are silent we start to think and ...

12/14 Bassnectar is a dj that produces bass music. A lot of his songs are melodic and transport you to another place. It feels like you are no longer in your body and it can be seen almost as a spiritual experience. Everyone has one artist or song that does this to them and Bassnectar does this for me. I truly believe that it is art in the most pure form. Music has been there from the beginning of time and it vital to life and happiness. Van Der Leeuw talks about rhythm being the most important part of music and how the drum is the original instrument and how it holds power and meaning from war, love, dance, and sacrifice. Bassnectar's music is bass which stems from the drums. His songs have powerful meanings behind them, especially his song "Empathy," where one line in the song says, "To a higher zone, you are not alone." It just shows that there are unexplainable things out there like a higher deity and we do not have to fear that we are alone in this wor...

Last night I went outside and laid on the roof of the parking garage waiting to see "shooting stars." It was midnight and my roommate and her study buddy started layering up in warm clothes and asked me if I wanted to go out and watch a meteor shower with them. I was tired, but I didn't want to miss the show. As soon as I got outside, I knew I was going to be too cold. I didn't bother to layer up, but it was worth it. I got to see two shooting stars clearly. They were gorgeous. When the one big meteor shot across the sky, it felt like the whole world stopped for a moment. Everything was peaceful for that one moment.

For me, driving is one of my favorite things to do. I find peace, relaxation and almost a sort of therapy that comes with it. Some don't like to drive and that is okay for me, for it allows me to do it even more ;). Being as obsessed with music as I am, I attribute a lot of my love for driving because of my speakers. There is something truly amazing about plugging your phone in, jamming out (max volume always) to a variety of music as you drive. As the scenery changes, so does the music and a lot of times for me this is when I get a chance to truly think and self-reflect about anything and everything that is going on in my mind.  Driving allows me to escape my worries in life, freeing me of my problems for the time I am driving and hopefully, I arrive to my destination safely. Driving is not loved by everyone but, I am surely a proponent of its beauty. 

The world has so much natural beauty. In the fall, the earth changes not just in color but also in weather and movement. I remember at the beginning of the semester when we watched a movie clip where the man found so much beauty in piece of trash at the mercy of the wind. It danced so freely and it had so much beauty. Recently, I have felt the same awe for the leaves dancing as the man felt for the bag dancing. Beauty that people see is often that which stands out as something aesthetically pleasing or something magnificent. But often, the beauty that is unseen can be the most calming. Watching the leaves move is something so simple, yet also so magnificent because it is done independent of human action.

One of my favorite songs is called The Ends of The Earth  who is by Michigan based band, Lord Huron. The song begins with  a rustled guitar strum and a pile of flyaway harmonies; a minute in, the song pivots, exploding into a towering vocal line that'd catch even the most passionate  Fleet Foxes fan wondering if they missed a demo. The chiming hollow body guitar tone, the backing percussions; to me this is a song of adventure and love.  I believe the song in its entirety is about being young and in love, excited about exploring the world and wanting desperately to do it with that person. You ask them if they would follow you to the ends of the earth, but deep down you know the answer will be no. They are stuck living in the "life [they] were given", not ready to face the unknown and embark on this adventurous journey with you, leaving you to try it alone.  Heartbreaking and truly inspirational at the same time, this song for me shows that there are...

Aesthetics of Surfing: As one of my earliest sports, I remember being atop my first surfboard at the age of 5. My Father and Uncle were both big time surfers from my hometown of Virginia Beach. My uncle became a professional at the age of 17 and even went on to become the first ECSC champion. Even with surfing being in my blood, it took lots of practice to conquer my first wave by myself. When I did, it was truly the most amazing experience and still is. As my passion grew, surfing became such an influence on my life and I will argue with anyone that surfing is the sport of the soul. Connecting with the ocean is truly one of the most liberating feelings anyone can ever have. Surfing is in a sense a spiritual connection with the Earth. As you paddle you feel the ocean's strength against you. As you catch the wave, you feel weightless as the sea begins to take hold on you, gliding across the water without even feeling your board beneath your feet. Time seems to go by in slow motion...

I read the chapters in Sacred and Profane Beauty about Architecture since that has always been an admiration of mine. Especially after traveling around Spain this past summer and seeing some of the oldest and most beautiful churches I was interested to see what the author and other philosophers thought about them. It was surprising the majority of the chapter talked poorly about architecture. They argued that what made God holy was his humility and grandiose buildings did not represent that. I understood the argument, but I think of churches of some of the most beautiful buildings that demonstrate a person's love and respect for God that they would build something in his honor. Most of the churches I've visited also have a lot of artwork inside the building and music which are 2 of areas of art that we've discussed this year. I thought the 3 types of art would work together to create something extremely beautiful that many philosophers would appreciate. However, one of ...

Nietzsche was another philosopher I had never heard of before reading the chapter about his beliefs about art as redemption in the nature of art book. He was known as dark and pessimistic, which I can relate to. He thought life was depressing which is more pessimistic than I agree with but he thought art was a way to make life bearable. I've read about art being a portrayal of reality and it was interesting to read about a man who thought of it as a positive thing. He seemed to think that the purpose of art was to bring joy to people in their depressive lives. It seems a little dramatic to me but it's interesting to see how people value art so highly. Art has never been a significant part of my life that has brought me extreme joy. Although I can appreciate good art, it has rarely made me feel powerful. Tolstoy was a big advocate of art being important since it communicates the artist's feelings to the audience. I can usually distinguish emotions in art based on colors or...

I had never heard of Schopenhauer before I read his chapter in the Nature of Art book. Because I'm not a philosophy major, I rarely hear about philosophy besides the big 3: Plato, Aristotle, and Socrates. However, while I was reading his chapter, I found a lot of what he was saying to be very interesting. Because I wrote my research paper focusing on Plato's perception of art being dangerous and a manipulation of the truth, I did not know how other philosopher's beliefs compared. Schopenhauer agreed that art represented appearance. However, he thought it was distinguished from reality. I agree more with Schopenhauer since I think I look at art as a biased perspective of reality. I don't think that makes it any less significant or influential. In other blogs, I've mentioned I'm a neuroscience major and so reading about how Schopenhauer compared art and science was interesting to me since I'm slightly biased to favoring science since to me it is factual an...

Writing this as I lay in my hammock, engulfed in the blue ridge mountains, I stop and see the true beauty this world has. I find that today, people (especially my age) take this world's beauty for granted. We live in a world that truly has the most beautiful sights if we would just open our eyes to see them. The grass, the leaves, the sun, the rivers, the snow, the huge mountains around; our world is a masterpiece. I find that my favorite place in the world is where I am currently; sitting in the middle of the woods behind my mountain house (skyline drive), truly LOOKING at all the beauty around me. I listen to the bird's songs, the whistle of the wind through the trees, the distant knocks of a woodpecker; I see all the beauty of this world that many overlook and it is truly saddening. This is our one and only life to live, and it hurts me to see people going by without (as cliché as it sounds) stopping to smell the flowers. Our world holds more beauty than we will ever truly...

Being an athlete my entire life, I have always held sports to be one of the most, if not the most important parts of my life. Growing up, I played football, basketball, baseball, I surfed, skied, through discus; eventually earning a scholarship to play football at James Madison University. As I focused my entire life on sports (especially football) I gave everything I had in my body, heart and soul to make the most of my athletic ability. Going into my freshman year at JMU, I felt like I had made it. I reached my life long goal of earning a Division 1 (double A, not single A but i'll take it) scholarship and I truly felt on top of the world. As my football year began there, I constantly looked at my future at the school and hoped, prayed and truly believed that I would be a huge impact of the team and school. Sadly, my hopes and dreams of this impact were crushed when I was hurt (breaking my back) in my third game of my freshman year when getting hit late as I caught my first coll...

Aesthetics of Dance: Dance is practiced in most aspects of life for a variety of reasons;  including social, educative, political and therapeutic reasons, the art of dancing can be compared to the other arts in the fact that they too are instilled in aesthetics (like music, painting, etc.). Some define dancing as, the rhythmic movement to music, typically following a set sequence of steps. It is considered to be a form of ritual and/or tradition in many cultures. Dance itself is extremely different in each culture throughout the world, as each culture holds their own meaning towards the act of dancing. Many argue that in today's world, the true aesthetics behind dancing have been lost for the dancers themselves have been trained to in a sense regurgitate the emotional aesthetics throughout. I disagree for even though many reenact dances, aesthetics still hold their existence. The act of dancing is the next step to the aesthetic trilogy (music, art, dancing)....

Emotions of Music: Music holds an entity of its own; being happy, sad, angry, whatever it may be, each song holds individual emotional characteristics that make up its essence.  Through m usic’s emotional expressiveness, their emotions can be seen as psychological agents, who have their very own emotions to express.  Author, Andrew Kania writes on the idea of emotions in music describing e xpression as, "something persons do, namely, the outward manifestation of their emotional states. Expressiveness is something artworks, and possibly other things, possess. It is presumably related in some way to expression, and yet cannot simply be expression for the reason just given"(Kania). I believe that a work of music can truly express any sort of emotion possible. Through the use of tempo change, a variety of instruments, sounds and vocals, music can truly convey what the musician is either feeling or wants to express. That is what I find as the beauty behind music. Music in a se...

Argument from Beauty for the Existence of God The  argument from beauty,  also known as the  aesthetic argument  is an argument for the existence of a realm of immaterial ideas or, most commonly, for the existence of God. I utilize arguments made by  contemporary British philosopher of religion, Richard Swinburne , who wrote about the existence of God, advocating a variation of the argument from beauty. The base of his argument is stated as," God has reason to make a basically beautiful world, although also reason to leave some of the beauty or ugliness of the world within the power of creatures to determine; but he would seem to have overriding reason not to make a basically ugly world beyond the powers of creatures to improve. Hence, if there is a God there is more reason to expect a basically beautiful world than a basically ugly one" (Swinburne). What I see that this argument poses is the idea that through the experience of beauty one sees the proof...

Everyday you walk around CNU I can gurantee you that someone proclaims the school as "beautiful."  Why is that?  Our university mirrors the art and architecture of Greek and Roman architecture and it is straight mimesis that Plato warns of.  Perhaps Plato was right in that the imitation of the imitation would arouse the emotionsof the people in the city.  CNU not only mirrors the past but it also mirrors its competitors in that it tries to copy the same art style as its competiting univeristites within the state.  Perhaps we as now enlightened aestheticians should call for an aesthetic shift in the future contruction work of the university.

Merleau-Ponty is critical of empiricism in that it sets an irreducible gap between the subject and object because the empircist says that all knowledge is from oberserving the outside world.  He is critical of rationalism and idealism because these two modes set a conceptual-perceptual category, this has issues because the world slips past us and casuses delay, there is never a perfect synthesis.  Scientific Objectivity is a view from nowhere, you can't abstract the subject from the world. Merleau-Ponty wants to reutrn to an embodied ground of expereince that first makes these abstractions and models possible.

In Walter Benajmins, "The Work of Art in The Age of Mechanical Reproduction," he warns that art's purpose may change with changing political climates and art forms.  What he warns of is that artworks will take on political messages that are interlaced within the artwork that convey to the audience in a wider appeal a critique of the current political climate. Look at the current trend of late night comedy host, these hosts are comedians who infuse their comedical wit with current political issues.  Benajmin's warning of art changing is more present than I think he thought it would become.

December 12th, 2017 Christina Leary - Spiritual Impulse of Art In Kuspit’s article he talks about the spiritual impulse of art and how he is interested in maintaining it because he believes it is being lost. This reminded me of Van Der Leeuw and his idea of the “religious man” and his world view. I think it is very fitting that we sort of started the class talking about that and now we are ending the class sort of wrapping all of that up, even though we can never very easily wrap up anything. The part of the article I found to be the most interesting and relatable is when he mentions how the word spiritual used to have hold strong and clear meaning because it was grounded in the religious but now we are moving away from the religious and it is less clearly defined. For me the spiritual and the religious are so intertwined, they are roots of the same tree. However, he asserts we are going through a paradigm change and the connectedness of the religious and the spiritual is bein...

December 10th, 2017 Christina Leary - Questions About Art This is a painting that hangs in my roommate's bedroom and it is one of my favorite paintings. Her aunt painted it, and something about it I just really love. I’ve met the artist quite a few times and she always says that when she gives her art away it is no longer “her’s” instead it is the art of whoever owns it and “what it means” is entirely up to them. After watching the movie in class I thought that Pollock and Linda had a similar style so today I asked her some questions and this is how she responded: ME: What type of painter are you? LINDA: Actually I don't paint anymore but I considered myself an abstract painter but not purely. There was always something recognizable (at least to me!) in my paintings. So I was never a “non-objective” painter. And it always seemed to be about the color and moving the paint around— somewhat painterly. ME: Tell me about this specific painting. LINDA: :) I was wo...

December 9th, 2017 Christina Leary - Comics as Art Outside Reading: McCloud, S. (1993). Understanding comics: The invisible art. Northampton, Mass . I’m currently in a class here at CNU that is about “Comics as Social Criticism,” and it is a really fun class. Today I am working on my final paper which analyzes the comic Watchmen overall the comic series is really cool, I would say it is a great piece of art. However, I believe some would object to this idea and I am not the only one. Author Scott McCloud has written a whole book on the subject of comics as art. First he explains what they, how they functions, how they are different across cultures, how they have transformed, etc. While he is doing all of this he is subtly making an argument for why comics should be considered art. The reason I find this topic so interesting and chose to write about it today is because just a few days ago I was holding my Watchmen graphic novel and someone in this class made a judgemental fac...

December 1st, 2017 Christina Leary- Authenticity of Commissioned Art in Placemaking Outside Article: Markusen, A., & Gadwa, A. (2010). Creative placemaking . Washington, DC: National Endowment for the Arts. Creative Placemaking is a method used by city planners, nonprofits, private businesses, etc. in order to attract people to their respective city or “place.” Placemaking is something we talk about here at CNU in the Center for Community Engagement. Freshmen year a group of students tour through Tennessee looking at three distinct places. My year it was Nashville, Memphis, and Chattanooga. This year I returned with the freshmen and noticed an interesting part of placemaking: commissioned street art.  At first I thought this aspect was only going on in memphis because I spent a summer there and was able to see it more clearly but I began to notice this is common in a lot of cities. In terms of it making a place aesthetically pleasing, it works well. However, questions i...

November 23, 2017 Christina Leary - The Purpose of Poetry Over thanksgiving break my family and I watched a movie together, it was called Almost Famous . After the movie my mother was trying to figure out the “themes” of the movie. My cousin asserted that there did not have to be a theme, that a good movie has two components: one, a fun plot and two, character development. For my mom there had to be a theme. After lots of discussion my mom said the movie reminded her of a poem and she kept repeating the only part she remembered, which was “though nothing can bring back the hour of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower.” I was interested in the rest of the poem so I looked it up and that section of it continues on with: “We will grieve not, rather find Strength in what remains behind; In the primal sympathy Which having been must ever be; In the soothing thoughts that spring Out of human suffering; In the faith that looks through death, In years that bring ...

November 20th, 2017 Christina Leary - Grotesque Art and Cannibalism Outside Source: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/2014/nov/17/shock-horror-grotesque-art-jonathan-payne ? This article was a good read and further helped to explain my confusion with grotesque art as I wrote about earlier in the semester. I had some confusion distinguishing between surrealism and  grotesque and figured out grotesque art falls under surrealism. What stood out as interesting to me was the roots of grotesque art. First, the word grotesque was coined during the Italian Renaissance,  which made sense to me with all of the cultural change occurring grotesque art seems to emphasize discomfort. However, the form was heightened with the first world war when these “horrors” became something real. The most interesting piece in the article, to me, was Dali’s self-cannibalising creatures , mostly because cannibalism is a universal taboo. I think it is such an encompassi...

November 17th, 2017 Christina Leary - Dewey: Art As Experience Outside Reading Article: Glass, N. R. (1997). Theory and practice in the experience of art: John Dewey and the Barnes Foundation. Journal of Aesthetic Education, 31(3), 91-105. I was interested in reading the article because I love John Dewey’s work on community, the public sphere, and communication. I was intrigued to see what he thinks of art.  The article focuses on a specific nonprofit’s practices to see if the match up with John Dewey’s theories on art and education. I found that to be even more interesting because I work for a non-profit right now and I have worked with a few others throughout college. Then I found out the article is about a Philadelphia based non-profit and I had to read it because I plan on moving there. All in all the article was a fun read but a few quotes stood out to me and I want to dedicate a little paragraph to each. The first quote is from Barnes himself and it asserts that, “W...