Faculty Art Show at Lakeland Community College

There is a nice art show at Lakeland right now, featuring the work of the arts faculty. The works are in all sorts of media, from jewelry to painting to photography to ceramics to bronze sculpture. There is no unifying style, but it strikes me that the fragmented world of modernism is still very much present--and about 100 years after the modernist writings of James Joyce and T. S. Eliot, and the paintings of Picasso and Braque. That vision of an exploded world is clearest in the pottery of Derak O'Brien. Here are cell-phone photos of some of the art:

An Example of Eddie Mitchell's popular pointillism

Bruce Cline photograph

Theresa Hess's work makes you think about life and death

David Samiec's photo makes you think about the soul of all living things, even the smallest

Chris Berry's spectacular study of color

My favorite--Paula Blackman's evocative bas relief (in bronze)

Derak O'Brien's exploded ceramic pot--Modernism is alive and well!

Cleveland's Memorial to the Great Irish Famine

The Irish Famine of the late 1840's ended up killing about a million people and forcing another million to leave the country. Many ancestors of Clevelanders left directly or indirectly because of this cataclysm. There is a beautiful memorial to "An Gorta Mor," the Great Hunger, on the banks of the Cuyahoga River in Cleveland's Flats, right under the Detroit Superior Bridge and across from the Flat Iron Cafe. My Lakeland colleague Paula Blackman did the bronze figure of a mother and her children on the river-facing side of this monument.

Irish-Americans and the Famine in Africa

Irish-Americans should immediately respond to the terrible suffering caused by the famine in Africa--especially in the area called the Horn of Africa: Somalia, Ethiopia, Kenya, Djibouti, and parts of Uganda. I say this because of our own heritage and experience with the Great Famine that led to the death of a million Irish and the emigration of another million--including strands of my own family. Much of the world (including many Englishmen) did virtually nothing to help the starving Irish. Some saw the famine almost as the "invisible hand" of Adam Smith. It was no invisible hand! The famine was man-made--we have learned. The potato blight might have been caused by mother nature (though even that is arguable); but the famine was man-made. And it could have been addressed and relieved by human action.

The Irish diaspora is spread wide around the world, with lots of Irish in England, Scotland, Australia, Canada, and the United States. These folks should open up their pocket books and help the starving in Africa.

We won't forget the "Drochshaol," the Terrible Time, the Great Hunger, and how so many in the world stood by idly as men, women, and children died by the hundred thousands.

It's not hard to find reliable institutions that will help address the famine in Africa. I have sent a donation to Catholic Relief Services, http://crs.org/.

 Above, the Cleveland Irish Famine Memorial, on the East Bank of the Cuyahoga River, the area known as The Flats. Part of this memorial was designed by Lakeland Community College librarian and friend, Paula Blackman. Here's a link to a story on this memorial: http://www.clevelandpeople.com/groups/irish/irish-famine-memorial.htm.