The Art of Ukrainian Easter Eggs -- Pysanky

This is the season during which many (at least those of us living north of the equator) continue to celebrate the holidays associated with spring.

My heritage is Ukrainian and Ukrainian is my first language.

Although I was born in Canada (and was in Canada last week to give a talk at the University of Waterloo), I can say that I grew up in Yonkers, New York, before going off to Brown University, my alma mater (four times over since I have 4 Brown degrees including the PhD).

As I was growing up, every spring, a group of us would gather to make pysanky, which are Ukrainian Easter eggs. This is a delicate endeavor, requiring steady hands, plus a beeswax candle, a stylus, and various colorful dyes. The beeswax is layered over the eggs in patterns to preserve the latest dye color that the egg has been dipped into. One starts with "drawing" a pattern with beeswax on the white, undyed egg, proceeds to dye it in a yellow color, draws another pattern, and proceeds in this fashion, all the way through the final and darkest color, which is, typically, black.

The raw eggs can first be blown out of their contents, which requires almost a surgeon's skill. Then it's time for for their "painting" and decorating. I always worked on my pysanky with eggs, whose contents had not been removed (and, luckily, over the years, we have broken no more than 2 such pysanky -- the odor can be quite unpleasant, so handle with care).

Yesterday, after dropping our daughter off at Deerfield Academy -- her team was off to Andover for a big Saturday track meet, we stopped by a bazaar in South Deerfield, where some pysanky were being sold, along with many baked goods, and even beautiful Ukrainian ceramics. I was overcome by nostalgia. There were several pysanky made out of large goose eggs, and they were simply stunning!

The above pysanky are from our collection and we have acquired them from family and friends (a few underneath the top ones we even made ourselves). The various symbols on the pysanky have specific meanings -- I especially like the delicate wheat patterns and the animal patterns, in addition to the embroidery-like designs. Many have agricultural themes.

You can find out more about how to make beautiful pysanky here.

Eggs symbolize birth, and the making of pysanky is just one tradition that gets handed down from generation to generation, and whose art and beauty everyone can enjoy.

Art as an Escape, Google, and Why More Americans Don't Travel Abroad

As we endure a true winter in New England, and some of us are getting tired of the white, snowy landscape for weeks on end, despite its beauty, I thought it appropriate to write on "escapes."

I love travel, and since I teach and conduct research on networks and especially transportation & logistics, travel is part of my "practica." My international travel is almost exclusively coupled with professional travel. I have also lived abroad in several countries, with these experiences being some of my very best.

I gain inspiration from museums, whenever I have a chance, and art especially feeds my mind and my soul. One of my recent favorite museums that I had a chance to explore two summers ago while in Paris (where I spoke at two conferences) is the Musee Marmottan Monet. When I close my eyes I can transport myself to the perfect Sunday in Paris when my family and I visited this museum and were surrounded by Monet paintings followed by the most delicious lunch of baguette sandwiches in the neighboring park. The website for this exquisite museum housed in a mansion will break up this winter's whiteness.

CNN Travel has an interesting article entitled: "Why more Americans don't travel abroad," in which it is reported that only 30% of Americans hold passports (and this is a jump from only teens a few years ago and attributed primarily to the requirement of travel to Canada). The article notes that 60% of Canadians hold passports and 75% of those in the United Kingdom.The below quotes are taken from the article:

"Not taking the leap is comforting, because this is the American life," said Matthew Kepnes, international traveler and creator of NomadicMatt.com, a blog chronicling his travels and observations. "Breaking outside anything that is your norm is scary."

Tourism experts and avid travelers attribute Americans' lack of interest in international travel to a few key factors, including: the United States' own rich cultural and geographic diversity, an American skepticism and/or ignorance about international destinations, a work culture that prevents Americans from taking long vacations abroad and the prohibitive cost and logistics of going overseas.

If you can't get away but would like to feed your soul, thanks to Google and its Art Project, which was reported on in The New York Times, you can now take a virtual journey through some of the world's art museums.

Above are some photos taken in Paris two summers ago.

Of course, at this point in a New England winter, we may all just decide to move to Hawaii, where I spoke at a fabulous conference last May!

Just A Rumor by Anna Schuleit at UMass Amherst

I had the distinct pleasure today of attending a reception in honor of the artist, Anna Schuleit, and her "Just A Rumor," a dramatic painting, which was painted upside down on a wall of the Fine Arts Center at UMass Amherst, with a reflection in the campus pond. Anna Schuleit was featured today in the Wall Street Journal, and since she was a Fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University the year after I was one, this was an event that I did not want to miss. Plus, it is so intriguing to try and figure out whose face she painted upside down! Can you guess?

The above photos were taken at the event, and include several of Anna Schuleit, of her painting, the reflections in the pond, and of some of the guests.

What I most appreciated, besides this dramatic public painting, and its changing reflection, was when Schuleit spoke about why paintings are so important and how they help us to stop and to slow down in this era of decreasing attention spans and moving images on computer screens. The late afternoon was cloudy and there was a slight wind, which created waves in the pond, so the reflection of the painting, which was completed by Schuleit only an hour before, moved soothingly with the waves.

Schuleit, whose work has garnered her, besides a Radcliffe Fellowship, a MacArthur genius grant of $500,000, will be in residence at UMass Amherst this term. She joked that she might want to study nursing during this period.

It was special that our Provost, Dr. James Staros, showed up to this event, as well as my Dean at the Isenberg School, Dr. Mark Fuller, and even our wonderful state representative, Ellen Story.