Reshma Jasmin
Arts Scholar
Pentathalon Semester 1
As an experiential component of College Park Arts Scholars, I am attending selection of five art events during my first semester. These events will ranged in art mediums and hopefully, each will spark dialogue among my peers.
September 20, 2020
viewed from my dining room
Ted Talk
#presentation
As a neuroscience major deeply enthralled with the arts, this title immediately stood out to me. Dr. Viskontas explanation of the brain anatomy and function behind experience of music, or specifically of chills whilst listening to music was fascinating. I also loved that she followed that up and ended her presentation with a live demonstration of her singing a section of an opera that related to the topic at hand! I really connected to what she said about how both the arts and science seek to understand the human experience and the universe, because that's what I love about both fields, and what I hope to encounter in my study of different art forms as an Art Scholar!
Pentathalon Semester 2
Follow along this semester as I document my arts experiences this semester.
Malcolm & Marie (2021)
February 7, 2021
viewed from the basement at my parent's house
movie on Netflix
#film
As Malcolm & Marie was made recently, the black and white nature of the film is a conscious choice. I found that the absence of color emphasized how stuck in their own perspectives each character was, and the gradients of grey emphasized the moral and ethical grey of both character’s roles in the conflict. Another interesting choice was that the entire cast of the film is just two characters. Also, the entire setting is their home and the pace of time is authentic— it seems like there are no time jumps; the first hour and forty minutes of the film was an hour and forty minutes for the characters as well. Focusing on one couple’s argument on a single night displays that even just an inside look at one couple on one evening is nuanced enough to explore the intricacies of human nature and connection. Focusing just on this one argument and relying on solely dialogue exchanged between the characters to develop the stories of their relationship and construct each one’s personality and motivations means that the audience only sees the characterization and story development as the argument proceeds. The way the audience learns about the characters reflects how each argument made that evening reveals something about the characters to each other, so in our desire to learn about the characters, we as an audience are drawn into and invested in their struggle to understand, empathize with, and love each other. This film has mixed reviews, mostly negative from what I’ve read, which makes sense as no one really wants to watch or listen through two people arguing. Yet, I found the film compelling because while artistically it was very stripped down, it still displayed all the intricacies and struggles and convoluted emotions of human nature found in most stories in just one night’s argument between a couple.
Pentathalon Semester 3
Follow along this semester as I document my arts experiences this semester.
Spirited Away
September 17, 2021
The Clarice
Miyazaki film
#film #NextNowFest
Although to date I have only watched Studio Ghibli films in Japanese, it was still an enjoyable experience to watch the film in the English dub. I watched the film with fellow Arts Scholars Kyle and Lex (along with another friend who isn't in Arts Scholars), so watching the film felt like a good moment of fostering community with my peers. It was nice for all of us to rewatch the film and discuss how different the English version was, as well as how viewing the movie as adults felt. Personally, I had only watched Miyazaki films as a younger version of myself and this was my first time revisiting them in a long while.
In terms of the movie being in English, I found that I could better appreciate the visuals of the movie and spent more time focusing on directorial choices such as during the train scene. In the past this scene really resonated with me, but now I can better appreciate how much the scene where there is no real action and we see Chihirio/Sen and No-Face/Kaonashi on the train from an angled side-view. Miyazaki himself describes how there needs to be moments where the audience takes a breath in the movie. In terms of viewing this movie after growing up a little bit, I found this moment profound as it speaks to the need for rest. In my personal life at the moment, I'm honestly struggling quite a bit in terms of my mental health. In the train scene, despite all the chaos and urgency, Sen has no choice but to sit quietly and wait whilst on the train. Even in our busiest moments when we're sucked into a whirlwind of chaos, we still have to take a second to breathe, reflect, and simple dwell in the eye of the hurricane.
Pentathalon Semester 4
Follow along this semester as I document my arts experiences this semester.
Othello
February 06, 2022
living room of my apartment/apple books
Shakespeare Play
#literature
Othello is one of the most intriguing Shakespeare plays because it deals with the question of race, how it affects people, and how it is depicted from a time that I, with my whitewashed formative education, wouldn't anticipate any sort of diversity in representation. In Othello, we see Iago as the main antagonist, orchestrating Othello's downfall, but Iago narrates that his reason for hating Othello is a suspicion of an affair between Othello and Iago's wife Emilia. However, Iago employs animalistic racial language when trying to stop Othello and Desdemona's marriage; he calls Othello a "black ram tupping your white ewe" (Act 1, Scene 1, line 85-86). There's a lot to unpack with this imagery, especially with the religious and sexual implications of purity from a white sheep, but the most relevant to my current reading of Othello is the racism. Iago depicts Othello as impure and aggressive, and by including the color contrasts in addition to the animal metaphor, clarifies that the reason behind this nature of Othello's lies in his race. This is also apparent in the heightened purity symbolism of the ewe sheep when it is white, as blackness then appears dirty and threatening in a contamination way as well.
I went into reading Othello with the intention of reading it under the lens of Critical Race Theory. I intend to employ analysis based on Critical Race Theory for my capstone project, so in a sense. this was me practicing applying my research. I found myself picking up on smaller instances throughout a work that never explicitly calls to attention the question of race. It was also a bit challenging because I have no way of knowing what Shakespeare's intentions were with the depictions of race and racial discrimination and stereotyping in Othello. I picked Othello because I'd read it before, was in the mood for some drama by The Bard, and wanted to get myself back in the mood for analysis of art for productive things in a way that held no strings of pressure.