Welcome to the third installment of MFA|EDA’s 4th Friday Alumni 6Pack. We are pleased to continue the new custom with a communiqué from Lexi Bass, from the Class of 2018.
Away we go:
1.
Homecoming
What was nostalgic about experiencing Cardboard Computer’s Kentucky Route Zero was how they captured the experience of highway driving at night. Returning after 6 years away to my home in the state of Kentucky, I am reminded of the persistent role of highway travel in daily life. As a young Kentuckian who wanted to see art, hear music, taste new flavors or even purchase clothes, highway travel was required. This usually meant return travel late at night and I had forgotten how dark our highways are at night. There is a certain poetry to Kentucky highways, in the day, a bucolic monotony of black farm fences, in the night a black void marked only by reflective lane lines and the illuminated memory of that same road in the daylight.
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2.
Difficulties
I originally devoted the next five items to each of the intricate obstacles I’ve had in my new position as Visiting Assistant Professor of Theater at Berea College, as they have been overwhelming. Instead, I’ll sum it up with the words of the professor whose film production course I’m teaching during his sabbatical. When I asked him to tell me about his own work as a filmmaker, he said “I haven’t made a film since I began teaching here.” I asked him, “how long ago was that?” He replied. “7 years.”
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3.
Denmark
Apparently Denmark is the happiest country in the world. Healthcare and education are free and the average work week is 27 hours. We have a resident Dane amongst us to confirm or deny this hearsay. If his smiling face is any indication we might want to consider pursuing increases in the Happiness Index instead of the GDP.
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4.
Color
When you cast colored light onto objects of certain colors, they subdue the frequencies reflected from colored material. In essence, certain colors disappear under certain light. One of my design students asked if being colorblind would affect his success in our class. I told him his perspective could only make the class more interesting and I was excited to see how his visual perception influences his technique and ideas.
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5.
Line
A line has both direction and velocity. Some people’s lines are straight from point A to point B. Others’ lines meander and end up in weird places. Some people’s lines make circles. Sometimes they keep circling on top of themselves to perfect the awkwardness of the original line. A path that closes a circuit becomes a shape.
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6.
Shape
Shapes are mysterious because we recognize them so quickly, even before we are able to name them. Shapes haunt our dreams, or keep us from sleep, or tell us to eat, or simply repeat.
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Next month: Rachel Boillot (’14).
See you then.
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