On the same day the school received a letter from the Passionsits, it also received Fr. Richard Frechette's new book about his work in Haiti. Both are interesting reads. I especially enjoyed Fr. Rick's opening thoughts in his book about the resilience of life. He makes referencee to the fighting spirit of the salmon and the resilience of the leaves of deciduous trees. The boys of Saint David's School, under the leadership of our Student Council chose Haiti relief as the focus of their efforts this year. Each year the graduating class with the student council choose a charity to support. Their efforts were obviously appreciated and deeply beneficial to the work of the Passionists' and to the people of Haiti.
Yesterday evening, independent scholar and critic Michelle Marder Kamhi ( www.mmkamhi.com ), co-editor with husband Louis Torres of Aristos , an online review of arts; author of Who Says That's Art? A Commonsense View of the Visual Arts ; and grandmother of two Saint David's boys, gave a thought provoking talk on art for our grandparent community. An advocate of objective standards in arts scholarship and criticism, Ms. Kamhi focused her talk on the ways in which art critics such as Clement Greenberg promoted the shift from representational art to abstraction. Kamhi argues that the abstract and post-modern art prevalent today, which often requires explanation by docents in order to be understood, goes against art's purpose. Taking issue with Greenberg's contention that representation is an expendable convention of painting, she quoted the late art critic John Canaday: "Art is the tangible expression of the intangible values that men live by." ...
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