In Red and Brown Water

The play ‘In the Red and Brown Water’ by Tarell Alvin McCraney is an enticing play that follows the life of a young girl named Oya. The play starts out with very traditional music and dancing by all of the actors, to the beat created by a three man band on the far left side of the stage. I was very compelled by these dancers and musicians because they set the tone for the entire play. The band used very unique instruments such as, what looked like, traditional African drums and wind chimes, giving the play a very cultural vibe to go with the actors’ very traditional dance. They wore all white wardrobes which gave all the dances an ethereal effect.

Once the dancing and music ceases, a girl introducing herself as Oya steps out into the middle of the stage. She narrates her actions for the audience and it soon becomes clear that every character does so as well, which made understanding the plot very easy for an amateur like me. From first introduction, the audience learns that Oya is a very good runner (almost good enough for nationals) but it is also becomes clear that her mother disapproves. The beginning of the plot revolves around Oya’s dilemma of going to states vs. staying home with her mother. She ends up choosing staying home over the states offer from “the man from state”, which in my opinion was the better choice, since her mother dies soon afterwards.

Oya continues her life by holding up her household and but it’s soon derailed when she is begins a love interest with Shango whom doesn’t treat her very well. Nevertheless, it is clear that they are deeply in love; made obvious with one recurring line throughout the play, when Shango reaches for Oya’s ear and “circles, caresses.” Shango soon leaves to join the army. When this happens, Oya settles for another admirer from her past, Ogun Size. They marry but her first concern resides apparently on getting pregnant. Events also begin to complicate after Shango, her true love, returns from the war. Even with both men competing for her, Oya’s main concern still remains on becoming pregnant…but with whom?

I believe this was the most important dilemma in the storyline for the main characters since at stake, was Oya’s happiness, future, and potential family. In the end, unfortunately things don’t work out in her favor. She chooses Shango but is betrayed when Shango knocks up another girl, Shun. The departing scene is Oya insisting on giving Shango a gift in congratulations; her ear; the ear that he had so often “circled, and caressed.” The audience is left with Oya passed out in the middle of the stage and a sense of wonder of “what’s after this?”

The only other plays that I have seen were Lion King and Rent on Broadway. These plays were both based on popular, well known storylines so of course I was very skeptical watching ‘In Red and Brown Water.’ I was a little overwhelmed in the beginning with the ‘all-of-a-sudden’ dancing and loud, unfamiliar music, but as the story progressed and the characters began developing, I really enjoyed the experience. I applaud McCraney on this production and thank him for opening my eyes to more types of theatre.

The Social Network

The Social Network

 

I watched The Social Network two years ago when it came out in theatres; so when I saw its name on the list of movies premiered in the Film Festival, the choice was obvious. Of course I watched it again because I remembered that I had walked out of the theatre thinking, “what a great movie!” What could be a more perfect than a college kid writing a review about a movie about other college kids? The Social Network is set on the Harvard University campus as a student there by the name of Mark Zuckerberg (played by Jesse Eisenberg) creates the social networking site known as Facebook; another favorite topic of mine. The plot is full of drama; and the directors make that clear by setting the entire film as a flashback since it begins with several people suing Zuckerberg while the rest of the storyline explains how it got to that point. One of the people suing him is Eduardo Saverin (played by Andrew Garfield; aka Spiderman). Eduardo starts out as Zuckerberg’s best friend from Harvard, the co-founder of Facebook, as well as the suave, popular counterpart to Zuckerberg’s socially awkward, pompous persona. As the plot twists and turns, Zuckerberg becomes badly influenced by a man named Sean Parker (played by Justin Timberlake), a self proclaimed entrepreneur and business failure, who managed to squirm his way to a cut in Facebook. The duo ends up scamming Eduardo out of his fair share of Facebook, inevitably ending up in lawsuit. The other couple suing Zuckerberg in the movie is the twins, Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss (played by Armie Hammer and Josh Pence). They’re accusing Zuckerberg of stealing their idea of creating a social networking site after they went to Zuckerberg in the beginning of the film in attempt to get him to build one for them; since he is in fact the genius that he is. “Technically” Zuckerberg didn’t steal their idea, but in reality, he did. The writers of The Social Network did a great job in confusing the viewers on who to root for. Throughout the entire film, I felt annoyed that I couldn’t pity the poor, dorky main character as I do in other films; mostly due to the fact that Zuckerberg was portrayed as a pompous know-it-all who was rude to almost everybody that spoke to him. I give props to Jesse Eisenberg for his acting in this film because there is no way a real person could be that socially awkward. On the other hand, I couldn’t possibly root for the Winklevoss twins because 1) they’re portrayed as the antagonists, and 2) their last names are just pretentious. Therefore, I became the #1 Eduardo fan. All in all, the actors were great, the conflicts were great; and I think I loved The Social Network the most because it put an intriguing storyline behind one of my most favorite websites/severe addiction of Facebook.

ArboreFun

A typical, miserable Monday morning beginning with three classes in a row starting with an 8am; weather is rainy, cold, windy, and signs of fall finally making an appearance.  I thought no way could this get any worse, right? Wrong. I started the day with my Psych 100 class. It’s in the Sparks building which is only steps away from Willard Building where this lovely English class takes place, so I usually manage to get there quite early. However this Monday felt quite unusual. I sit to my regular seat in English, with only one other person from my class in the room. I sit there for a good fifteen minutes before I realize that nobody else is coming in. Tracing back to Friday, which seemed ages ago, I distinctly remember hearing our Professor telling us to meet at the Arboretum. With this, I bounce out of my seat, informing my classmate along the way, and we rush toward the complete other side of campus. As we’re zigzagging through East, I think, this is exactly where my miserable day started. Fate was tempting me to call it a day and crawl back into abandoned bed which was just mere steps away from where I was at that very moment. But no, I managed to persevere on our trek towards the Arboretum. We reached our class in record time and joined to the group before they split to explore. The class had met under a huge white overhang that looked like it was straight out of a 5 star hotel. Past it was a maze of trees and plants. I was amazed that what only appeared to be a little garden of bushes outside my dorm room window, actually managed to block out the entire campus from our perspective. Under the overhang, we broke up into our respective small groups and were left to own devices. I soon found out that wandering around trees were very peaceful. After a month of being surrounded by thousands of other Penn State undergrads with cars and Cata buses going to and fro; being in a secluded garden with the only other people appearing to be my English class and a couple of other elderly people, kind of put me at peace with my day. Getting lost in streams of colors and scents of the flowers had a very therapeutic effect. I remember thinking: I’ve found my happy place. Getting lost in a maze of trees, being amazed by how many plants are still alive, finding my favorite flower (sunflower), and even discovering huge fountains and gourd pavilions; I didn’t even feel the time fly by. Before I knew it, class was over and everybody was already gone. My group and I made our way back to East and I remember feeling so glad that I hadn’t taken the easy route and went back to bed before even giving the Arboretum a chance. As we left, I realized that the sky had cleared, the sun was shining, and I had the rest of the day to myself; the perfect ending to a disastrous beginning.

"Affirmative Action"

                                          

In the past, I had never really shown very much interest in the subject of art. My senior year of high school, I took an AP Art History class and everything we studied never seemed to catch my interest in any way. I just didn’t understand how simple paintings and sculptures could draw so much attention. I just thought of the pieces as, merely just plain paint on canvas that just so happened to be worth a lot of money. So as you can imagine, I wasn’t very enthused when I found out that our very first “field trip” in English 15S was indeed a trip to the only art museum on Penn State’s campus, the Palmer Museum of Art. When I arrived, I wondered aimlessly around the first floor as I observed art from ancient Asia and Europe, and thought, “This isn’t very much compared to my several trips to the Metropolitan Museum of Art I used to take with my school, but at least it’s less walking.” After I circled the first floor about two or three times, I decided to explore the second level of the museum. As soon as I reached the very last steps of the staircase, the very first painting that caught my eye was the bright red and yellow mass of “Affirmative Action” by Jack Kearns. The little plaque next to it read “painted in 1987 with acrylic on canvas”. Even though it is only one piece out of the several in the very contemporary exhibit of the second floor in the Palmer, in my opinion is the most eye-catching. It depicts a woman smashing a large rock into pieces with what appears to be a hammer. Her facial expression is aggressive and her build is very muscular, yet her attire is very feminine as she dons high heels and a sundress. Although it was the colors of the work that caught my eye, it was the subject matter that made me stay and keep on observing. “Affirmative Action” was painted during World War II, when all of the men in America were oversees defending out country. So who would do all of the work at home? I’m sure all of you have learned from a history class in high school of some sort, that in this particular situation, the women of America stepped up to the plate and this painting draws attention to exactly that. It uses pathos to play to the emotions saying “women are strong and can hold up the fort just as well as the men” since back in those times, it was frowned upon for a women to be anything other than a caregiver, a cook, a maid, and most importantly a wife. The painting was a political message promoting equality among the minority groups of America and encouraging society to allow them to go to work and lend a helping hand when the country was in trouble. Jack Kearns did an excellent job of sending out this message in a creative ways. For this, he was known as “purveyor of Pop Art with a conscience.”   

About my Blog!

About Me; Hey! My name is Lin. I'm from Montgomery, New Jersey and I'm currently a freshmen at Penn State University. Since I live in such a small, strictly suburban town, there really wasn't much to do besides sports and academics. Therefore, my hobbies, besides academics and school related clubs, throughout highschool were rowing crew and hanging out with my friends on Princeton's infamous Nassau Street where I adopted the hobby of photography. Now, I take pictures of almost everything and I can't wait to start on Penn State's beautiful campus. WE ARE

Template; Since I'm new to the blogging world, I decided to choose an already made template from Blogger.com, and this specific one caught my eye. This is mostly due to the facts that 1)it was the only pink one & 2)I'm a girl, so the choice was pretty obvious in my opinion. I also wanted my very first blog to look welcoming and warm to any visitors so I thought this specific template accomplished just that.

Title; I was actually wearing a t-shirt that I had gotten from the university bookstore that says 'STATE' when I was creating this blog so it definitely influenced the title. I'm not a very creative person when it comes to names so I decided to choose the name Art STATE just to point out its two most important facts; 1)that it's a blog about the arts and 2)it's about the arts at Penn STATE. Simple and straight to the point.

Color; As I've mentioned before, I wanted to make this blog very welcoming and warm, so what's more welcoming than pink?! The hue definitely attracts my eye. :)  

Font; I chose the font 'courier' mostly beacuse I enjoy how official it looks without seeming boring. It kind of reminds me of newspaper font so it was a no-brainer for my very first blog entry.