“I can only note that the past is beautiful because one never realises an emotion at the time. It expands later, and thus we don’t have complete emotions about the present, only about the past.”
― Virginia Woolf
It was while watching Christopher Nolan’s 2001 film Memento while the sun was setting (in a sparsely occupied lecture theatre) a few weeks ago that I started to consider our relationship with memory, emotion and perception with more critical insight. Growing up in a family constantly surrounded by the arts, my love for different modes of artistic expression (especially language and film) is one that runs deep. Occasionally I am very touched by something, and then I tend to consider it for a long time. I was still thinking about Memento hours after leaving campus, musing on the nature of reality and the confusing but simultaneously utterly liberating postmodern school of thought.
Our interaction with war, conflict, memory and commemoration has been a very personal one, and despite writing my exegesis on the subject, I was compelled to talk more about how powerful I think our engagement with the past, in all its forms, has been this year. The programme is incredibly special, not only for the accumulation of such a wide range of backgrounds and perspectives in one space, but for the openness of discussion and willingness to express ourselves in such different ways. As someone who has often felt trapped by the requirements of rigidly formal academic study, Arts Scholars has been incredibly freeing. Perhaps my favourite thing about such a course is the collision of so many disciplines – of music, art, history, classics, media, politics and English. The past is something that is remembered and perceived in so many ways, and I truly believe that to explore so many facets of the representation of our collective and personal history regarding war and conflict is to do it better justice. More than once, I have been profoundly moved by the way we have engaged with such a complicated, evocative subject material. As Barbara Kruger would say – “The personal is political.” And this year, the personal and political have intersected so strongly, challenging our notions of remembrance and sacrifice, of identity and language and what it means to alive in a rapidly changing world, with the lived experiences that we have.
The presentation of the memory projects was one of the best parts of the year, alongside our visit to the museum. It reminded me of the questions posed in Week 7, surrounding emotion and connection : “Are emotional responses to history a distraction from ‘the facts’, or a crucial part of critical analysis?” and “Did you form a stronger connection with texts that were more personal to you? Do you think art that becomes personal is more meaningful?”. Before this year, my understanding of history, and even more broadly with my understanding of war and conflict was of a set objectivity, an impartiality that does not factor emotional resonance into our analysis of the past. Yet, I was confronted with the rawness that such an exploration of our backgrounds and our research held. My work with the war in Syria, of mass cultural degradation and loss of life. Leticia’s poetry tucked away on its paper aeroplane, Brooke’s artwork, Theo’s presentation and its interaction with identity and family history – and so much more. All of it made me think of the personal and subjective ways with which we always interact with the world, and how simultaneously devastating and beautiful that can be. Our connection to memory, as in Memento, is complex, focalised as it is through the lens of our own thoughts, fears, feelings and experiences. And it taught me, as I listened to the stories and the presentations of our guest speakers, that there is no shame in weeping in an archive, touched as we have been by such personal accounts of the dead, of those we live to remember and promise never to forget. I do believe that to have an understanding of history is to have an appreciation for those who have lived it, even when it can be emotional, so we can better understand the world as it continues to grow and change.
Thank you all for your wonderful projects, even those that we did not get to see, and for being part of such a dynamic exploration of war and conflict, in the context of our lives, and those that came before us.
Photos taken at Auckland War Memorial Museum (August, 2020)
This is such a beautiful and articulate post, Hela! Your comment that “to have an understanding of history is to have an appreciation for those who have lived it” is one that I thoroughly agree with. In reading through statistics that describe history, I find it hard to relate to what was experienced, and yet when faced with stories of individuals and communities, as we were in the museum, I begin to appreciate the fact that history details experiences of real people. History was the present at one point, and I certainly think that an understanding of history not only helps us to appreciate those who have gone before but also to better understand ourselves and the world that we live in. In our world, life isn’t separated into different disciplines of history, English, sociology, music, arts, classics, etc., but they all interrelate to form our reality, and I think the acknowledgement of this in Arts Scholars is something very powerful indeed.
This is a beautiful summary of the year Hela. You’re right on the nail on how this programme has allowed us to explore the many different facets of war and the research we do on it. It felt like there was a divide between literature and reality a year ago. Now, that line has been largely erased. The quote from Barbara Kruger is also an apt descriptor. Being around others during the vivid discussions we’ve had has solidified and expanded personal viewpoints, which allows us to ‘realise’ the political ones.
It feels like we can now approach different topics with a huge array of tools, including those which will never had a ‘right’ answer. Even approaching our memory project questions resulted in a fantastic display of talents with completely different takes on the original quote. I also completely agree that fitting in our entire thought process and reasoning into the exegesis was a miracle task.
Perhaps however we can take that as proof that we are all excited about our projects, our voices, and what we can use them for. We all have our stories to tell, and this year was just the beginning of that journey. Hopefully we maintain our passions for a long time to come!