Vincent Van Gogh and The Potato Eaters

One of the greatest museums I have ever been to in this point in my life is the Vincent Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, Holland. I have always enjoyed viewing art, but never to the extent of this particular museum. I was truly fascinated with walking around to each painting and reading the stories, thoughts, and inspirations of Van Gogh throughout his professional career as an artist. One particular painting that I enjoyed was The Potato Eaters. Van Gogh prepared himself for years before he began this particular masterpiece. After a few years of painting Van Gogh realized that his skills were not enough to prove himself to the world through his vision of The Potato Eaters. Therefore, he began to paint still life pieces in order to practice using various color schemes together and simply handling the brush. Van Gogh also used subjects to practice facial features, but the people that would agree to sittings were mainly prostitutes. The paint he used, the canvases he painted on, and the people he used as subjects were all cheaper methods Van Gogh used to keep costs low.

Van Gogh moved closer to his masterpiece by practicing painting portraits of various peasants. His road to the final project makes the painting even more fascinating to me. His intention with The Potato Eaters was to produce a natural “peasant” setting where the images were not simply an imagination of the artist. “He wanted to stress the face that these people ‘have dug the earth with the very hands that they are putting in the dish and …that they have earned their food so honestly.’” Van Gogh did not intend to depict a cheerful setting where peasants sat around in an ideal sense. Rather, he depicted the life of peasants sitting around a table having a meal of merely potatoes, the only thing they could probably afford. Even though the colors he chose for The Potato Eaters are dark and dreary, I get a calming feeling from the painting. I feel saddened by the life of these peasants knowing that many others were living just like them all over the globe, however, Van Gogh was able to create a piece that many people today can view and become overwhelmed by its beauty.

After studying social and global inequality, this painting spoke out to me in a way that might not have before the course. It is no surprise that there are bourgeoisie and proletariat people in every society. There are those that hold power and those that work for those in power. The individuals who are the workers, work to feed the powerful their elaborate meals and cover their back with beautiful clothes. Looking further into the unfortunate inequalities all around, it saddens me that there are elite people everywhere that could aid those less fortunate. When I viewed The Potato Eaters I was able to see a group of proletariats in their natural setting, just like Van Gogh intended. The subjects in the painting were portrayed as drained, tired, and somewhat sad. Van Gogh did not try to hide anything; he showed the workers for who they are as a part of the inequality sector. They sat around the table and ate the potatoes they themselves grew and picked. While the elite down the street are sitting around an elaborate table with servants and a gourmet meals.

My Encouragement to Travel

Traveling is obviously one of the greatest things someone can do in their life. Especially in our day in age where its almost an aspiration for a young individual to do a bit of traveling before they settle down with a spouse and children. One of the greatest aspects of traveling I have now discovered is knowing friends and/or family in a host county. Visiting allows us to see the country from their point of view and experience the daily routines of people in that particular place. I have been fortunate enough to know family from several parts of Ireland. Dublin, Shannon, and Cork are among them, but the majority of the family is from Waterford. I was able to travel to Ireland when I was in my early teens and then again during my late teens. That traveling turned into necessary steps in my life to open my perspectives of the world outside the United Sates. However, I can make that statement now; if someone would have asked me 10 years ago about my experiences in Ireland, I would have never appreciated the country and its citizens to its fullest. I would have rambled off some fond memories of the trips, but would have not had any depth behind them.

By signing up for the NIU at Oxford program, I was able to re-live my experiences in Ireland. I decided that I would take a visit to Dublin and stay with a cousin of mine before the program started.

While visiting with my cousin we got to talking about celebrities, popular TV shows, and trends. However, none of the topics originated in Ireland. They [my cousin and her roommate] brought up people and shows that originated in the United States. I was very surprised to hear that they do not even enjoy shows that are out of Ireland, or even Britain! They believe the life of celebrities is fascinating and even knew that Brad and Angelina were about to have their twins (a fact that I did not even know!)

Anyone can make that argument though; there are people from the U.S. that could have had the same discussion consisting of those that know about popular celebrities and those that don’t know…or care. But the shocking part of the conversation came when they both knew who was running for president, who is already out of the race, and who “should” be president of the United States. I didn’t even know what they formally called the head of their government! I questioned why that was and even asked them about it. “We’re taught your history. You’re not taught ours.” But they didn’t say it in a negative manor; they said it with a little laugh and said, “But you have all the interesting people there!” I think that if I would have asked an elder man or woman of Ireland the conversation would have gone extremely different.

It’s interesting to interact with the men and women of another country in the sense that it gives an insight to the world outside the U.S. I wouldn’t have even thought that people from other areas of the world new the popular culture and politics of our country. This is mainly because I never ventured to care about theirs. Through the ability to travel, my eyes have been opened. A quest for knowledge should begin to form when we realize we do not know as much as we should…at least that’s what happened to me through my travels.

Struggle for Superpower

When reading through Thursday, July 3rd's newspaper I came across an article on China becoming the world superpower. I remember talking about the shift between powers throughout history and this article mentioned several concerns regarding the shift. Because China is expected to be the most powerful to ever dominate, the public is weary. Technologies have allowed for people to see into the growing wealth and power creating unease in the ways China Chooses to act. The concern over world influence is established because China chooses to act in a way benefiting the government instead of the international "good". The choice to support Sudan instead of Darfur (ethnic slaughter) creates a public concern. It is seen that human rights are overlooked allowing the economy to rise about. Some see this situation as modernization. The article states the critical thoughts are propaganda by the West. This thought very well could be true because the West does not want to give up its power. The entire issue is about the struggle to hold onto power, and it seems to be as though as long as people (societies throughout the world) are continuing to form opinions based on what the news is telling them, their thoughts will be controlled. Not until people begin to look beyond headlines and research for themselves will true knowledge occur. People say knowledge is power, but what happens when the knoweldge is false?

Tower of London and the Crown Jewels

During our stay in Oxford we ventured into to London many times. One of the times I went to visit the Tower of London. The Tower contains the Beauchamp Tower which held many high-ranking prisoners such as Ann Boleyn, the chapel of St. John, the Bloody Tower, and my favorite part the Crown Jewels. This is the world’s best-known collection of precious objects, now displayed in an exhibit. This exhibit contains gorgeous regalia of crowns, scepters, orbs, and swords used at coronations and other state occasions. Most of them date back to 1661, when Charles II commissioned replacements for regalia destroyed by parliament after the execution of Charles I. The Jewel house also contains the world’s two largest diamonds the first star of Africa and the second star of Africa. These diamonds were excavated from Africa by Europeans, not sold to the Europeans.

This is an example of patterns of colonization. Colonization is the act or process of establishing control over a country of area by a more powerful and often distant country. The Europeans went into Africa and took what they wanted, jewels. The core nations, which are nations of high growth that engulf other nations to ensure ongoing political and economic success, such as Great Britain came in and took the jewels from the peripheral nation of Africa. A peripheral nation is a nation that is dependent on core nations for trade and income. This resulted f patterns of colonization in Africa, eventually causing parts of Africa to become a metropolis. England sipened the diamond resources from the poorer nation of Africa.

A chat with the locals of Oxford

The first week that we were in Oxford a few of us had gone out. We met some of the locals, and mentioned that we were planning a trip to go to Amsterdam. The locals asked us why we wanted to go there. I stated that I would enjoy going to visit the house of Ann Frank, the Van Gogh museum, the Heineken brewery, and all the beautiful canals in the city. I had also seen a special on the today show where Matt Laurer had visited Amsterdam, and it looked amazing. They proceeded to give us a hard time stating that the only reason that anyone has to go to Amsterdam is for drugs, and that we could just get drugs in Oxford from “any black guy.”

This statement shows that the black stereotype is present everywhere. In the Bhattacharyya book of Race and Power there is a quote on page 25 where a young black man being spoken about by a young white child to his mother saying, “Look at the nigger. . .mama a negro.” This young black man stated that he felt imprisoned and it sealed him into crushing object hood by the words of this other child. In Durban high school the white students that became the minority began to feel the same way.

The Dolby article White Fright illustrates that blacks are seen as inferior being, and how the roles of racism can be reversed. This article focuses on a primarily white school that due to low admission rates begins to admit non white students. The non white students began to outnumber the white students. The white students were now becoming the minority, and began to feel that their academic achievements, freedom, comfort levels, and their options were beginning to become limited. “The white students began to feel resentful. That resentment expressed by the white students is under girded by fear; a fear that whiteness is no longer in control in South Africa, that the ‘other’ has seized center stage. White students sense that they are literally encircled by the dual threats of blacks and black economic prosperity.” (pg 9) It is see throughout the White Fright article that the fear of black violence is a constant theme.

The Mills article White Supremacy can also be applied to the original stereotype that all black men sell drugs. White supremacy is a racist ideology based assertion that white people superior to other racial groups. It is seen that insignificant traits such as race are related to significant theories such as selling drugs. This idea of white supremacy is so powerful that even non white people believe it. This idea of white supremacy is believed to have come from the colonization of Europeans.

Body Types and the British Museum

As I was standing taking in the British museum, I was thoroughly entertained. The grandeur of so many of the statues and artifacts is intoxicating. As I walked around I began to see a pattern of expected male body type and masculinity. Every statue of a man had a strong build. There was always a muscular stomach as well as broad shoulders. There seemed to be no evidence of being unfit as an accepted trait for males. I followed this theme in almost the entirety of the museum. This expectation of masculinity is continued today in the depiction of superheroes, male models, and in general the "accepted" male body form. Without the physique of so called perfection, with a strong back, arms, and legs and a chiseled stomach, it is as though a man loses his worth. This expectation of the strong male body has influenced sculptures and art for centuries, allowing a solid base for the current expectations of masculinity.
What is noticed in the statues and characterizations of women was that it is accepted and expected for a woman to have a full figure. No statues were of the current (Western) "ideal" of thin. The women of the past were seen as child bearing and their statued bodies exemplified this, a full stomach, wide hips, and full breasts were the womanly traits seen as desirable. Another common theme among the women, though not universal, was coverage of all or certain areas of the body. If a woman was nude she was many times covering her breasts or genitals. This to me established an idea of a woman being more modest, or at least an expectation of this. I found these characteristics of the statues fascinating because of our talk in classes aobut masculinity and the social expectations involved.

British Museum

Blog #1

I’m sitting in the British Museum right now trying to find the excuse they can use to sugar coat their conquest. Looking through the information pamphlet they supply a decent reason. To advance the understanding of the cultures they represent. Yet, this isn’t just for the benefit of the British. Let’s look at what ever benefits there may be. Considering the vast amount of people who visit London, knowledge of those cultures are expanding despite their treasures not being allocated in their country. Also, London is a nexus among Europe so those cultures that are outside Britain have access to a safe and prominent location. Granted it is not fair and mainly to the betterment and notoriety of the British people, but I can discern something good from it. It is located in a place where people of all countries can congregate. To the left of me they are speaking Italian and to the right I would guess Polish. We are in a way breaking the boundaries that diversity has created by uniting us under one roof. Yes, it is wrong the way they collected these items but there is a silver lining to every cloud. Maybe they should just give it all back (yah right!) but then we would isolate ourselves behind our history and make it even more difficult to see such treasures, having to travel from place to place. Sometimes one must accept that they were once the dominated, and learn from it. So they know not to do it to others, to preserve their culture and those they might encounter.

Seggeling