Fieldwork: The Art of Place Through Poetry and Dance

Fieldwork: The Art of Place Through Poetry and Dance

offered spring 2021

The Art of Place examines how place shapes artistic practice and the artistic subject. Specifically, this means our courses look to depict where we live—Oberlin and Northeast Ohio—and to examine how engagement with place impacts and sustains creative production.

We use the term ‘‘Fieldwork’’ to encapsulate a hands-on pedagogical approach that takes students into the local and regional community to develop an understanding of the roles of agriculture, history, geography, and culture in shaping the places we call home. Immersion and participation become the point of entry into a relationship where the artist renders a place and the place renders an artist.

In order to develop students’ sense of the place of Northeast Ohio, we are invested in experiential learning as a critical component of this cluster. The benefit and effect of venturing into local environs throughout the courses in the cluster is to bring a deeper and more nuanced knowledge to our art.

Arts practice requires one to be an active and responsive agent who is using creativity to contribute ideas and understanding to our cultural conversations. The arts are shaped by their environments but also help shape the environments that they address. It’s important to demonstrate to our students that being an artist means being an engaged participant in the world. This learning community will encourage students to combine creative and intellectual inquiry to pursue new levels of understanding and investigation of the world we live in. 

We will venture into the community in whatever ways we can do so safely and in adherence with Obiesafe protocols. If possible, individual courses also have plans for visiting such places as the African-American Genealogical and History Group to learn about the African American roots in our community, and the George Jones Memorial Farm to understand the scope of the agricultural economy in our area. We will also learn from the impressive resources of the Allen Memorial Art Museum, particularly the landscape-related art.

While our courses are united by an exploration of Northeast Ohio and the role of place in the artistic process, the theme of place allows us to address issues related to natural and human-made environments that reflect a wide-angle of concerns and practices in our specific disciplines.

Instructors

Course instructors for this learning community are Assistant Professor of Creative Writing Chanda Feldman, and Visiting Assistant Professor of Dance Holly Handman-Lopez.