A Peaceful Escape

On Monday September twenty-fourth, I made my first trip to the Penn State Arboretum. For those of you who do not know what an arboretum is, it is a collection of trees, in short. Before Monday, I did not know what an arboretum was, but a quick trip to Wikipedia fixed that in a matter of seconds. After knowing what an arboretum was I still did not know exactly what to expect from the one on campus. I clearly have never been to one before but was interested in the new experience.  When I arrived at Penn State’s I was impressed even overwhelmed a bit.

I have always had a tremendous appreciation of nature. However, I do not think I would refer to myself as a nature-lover. I have never really gone out of my way to truly observe nature and give it the respect it deserves, although, I have in fact given small bits of my time here and there to nature. In general, whenever the opportunity to go on a hike or sit along a creek presented itself I would accept. I have always found nature very much relaxing and a great way to clear my head. By going to the arboretum I knew I would at least be able to get this much out of it.

As I was walking to the arboretum I continued to conjure up images of what it might be like. When I actually got there it exceeded all my expectations and amazed me. The peace and tranquility presented by the enormous garden overwhelmed me. There were many others there but as I walking throughout it felt as if I were the only one in the massive area. The interlocking and circular pathways seemed to come out of nowhere and were so inviting that one has to venture down them. These pathways scattered throughout made the whole garden almost endless and eternal. This greatly added to the feeling of being in and of oneself and had an incredible calming effect that took over and intoxicated me.

In the future I can definitely imagine myself coming here again. I thoroughly enjoyed my visit and honestly cannot find any negatives to the entire experience. I was able to clear my head of all troubles that developed throughout the previous week. While in the process I also got a lot of fresh air and some exercise from the rather lengthy walk. The whole “field trip” was a huge positive and gave my day a great start (yes, my days typically start around noon). I now have a very accessible and reasonable place to go to whenever I need an on-campus escape.

During my voyage to the arboretum, I found myself wondering if I would in fact bring a friend or two to this wonderful place. The answer is a yes with a few exceptions. I would without a doubt take someone here if I thought they would appreciate its beauty and tranquility. However, I would probably not bring someone along with me if I were looking to get away for a little bit. That escape time is for me and I do not think I would be able to feel free while having to entertain a guest.

The arboretum was a great place to venture to and a would definitely recommend it to all those, nature-lovers or not, to explore and experience for themselves.

An Appealing Image

The piece of art that I decided to investigate and write about was a painting entitled Boulder Crossing created by German-born painter Paul Weber. The painting depicts a beautiful nineteenth century New Hampshire landscape at the bottom of a fairly steep mountain. There are plenty of tall and flourishing trees alongside of the mountain. It appears to be right in the midst of springtime. Almost directly centered in the picture is a group of travelers. They appear to be following a trail through a forest and around the mountain. This trail has them cross a sort of makeshift bridge which seems to be constructed awhile back. This bridge stretches over a calm and quiet creek running through the landscape.

This piece was created in 1855 in New Hampshire. A significant historical moment that was quite prevalent in this time period and location was the Industrial Revolution. The Industrial Revolution brought many drastic changes to the United States. Many changes were great and helpful to the country as a whole. However, many changes were not well received and not encouraged. Among these changes were the loss of many forests and other beautiful features of nature. Because of these unwanted changes, artists began to travel around from place to place and paint all the beautiful landscapes that they came around. Included in these artists was Weber. He loved nature and wanted to capture every second of it.

Weber had traveled on this path many times. Because of this, a spiritual connection most likely developed between the landscape and him. This connection must have caused him to want to capture it and its beauty before it was touched by the rapidly changing outside world. In the painting, the sun is also shone shining through the trees and highlighting the bridge and the travelers crossing it. This could be a comment being made by Weber saying that nature should be used by people but not destroyed or altered. People should appreciate it for what it is in and of itself.

This piece of art works on my emotions in a very positive way. It reminds me that there is and always will be beauty in the world. No matter how ugly something can look there will always be something equally as majestic. This painting makes me feel like time has stopped in this one perfect moment and that it will forever live on through this painting. It connects to my values because I also am strongly against the destruction of natural beauty. It can often be so rare to come by and when one does come across it, it needs to be preserved and protected.

Weber creates credibility by doing this painting for everyone. He wants to share the beauty that he has discovered and experienced with the rest of the world. Weber was believed to be associated with the Hudson River School. This was a group of artists whose objective was to paint the American Wilderness before it was utterly ruined through the Industrial Revolution. Being a part of this group makes Weber very credible in his effort to help and be a part of the greater good. The claim being made by Weber, along with this group of artists, was that the new and changing world is coming at the cost of natural beauty. Also that nature is meant to be observed and appreciated for what it is, not destroyed for what it could be. This claim is persuasive because it proved to be true in many aspects including the destruction of forests throughout the United States during the Industrial Revolution.

This was my first time visiting the Palmer Museum of Art. I am traditionally not a museum-goer, although I did enjoy myself. I can imagine going back but not for any planned reason. It would be nice to go sometime to just enjoy the quiet and the peace and the art.

Boulder Crossing by Paul Weber

Analysis Of My Blog

Template: My main priority while creating this blog was to make it easy to read and navigate. Many of the aspects were used to make my blog unique and original. Although, for the most part, the more relevant decisions were made in favor of making the blog as simple as possible when it came to getting the needed information.  I wanted to make good, efficient use of space and not have anything too close or too far apart. It was very necessary to make everything easily distinguishable. The Picture Window template allowed for an interesting and visually pleasing picture without making the text difficult to read. I also did not want to have any vision of the picture directly behind the text as to not distract the reader from what he/she is reading.

Title: Since this blog is both personal and used as an educational tool, I wanted a title that suites both. I chose one that was creative, but also related to the class.

Color: I chose the wood boards background because it gave a structured and organized feel to the page. The other colors used were based on colors one would find it a forest to coincide with the wood.

Font: In light of the length of some of the posts on this blog, I decided that a crisp, clear, easily-visible font would be the most effective. For the title, however, I decided on a more fun and decorative font, which gives the impression that it was hand-painted onto the wood background.

Pages: I have decided against the use of pages for the time being. Since my 'About Me'  section is considerably brief, I felt it was easiest to just add it to the sidebar and make it easily visible. Due to the limited information located on the blog, thus far, I did not feel the necessity of the use of pages just yet.