Reflections from Arts and Humanities in Action

Continued from page 13 to (or ironic sketch) of the tortured creative dressed in tattered clothing with their weight in dues, whose mind was simply not enough to sustain them in the real world.

Drawing from Lewis Hyde’s “The Gift: Creativity and the Artist in the Modern World,” Professor Harper explained that art exists in two economies: the market economy and the gift economy. Art can survive without the market economy, but it cannot live without the gift economy.

Art as a gift means it exists to bind us all together; it’s in service of other people.

His lesson was not about modifying your passions into something profitable in today’s context. Instead, it was for us artists, to understand the choices that we are making and the life we imbue our creations with.

You can make money in art was the presentation's ultimate point. The world will always need and benefit from it. Furthermore, the starving artist is a myth because an artist cannot truly starve if hunger is a measure of fulfillment; to make art is to be continually nourishing and nourished.

I had confidence, but I needed the inspiration to believe that anything I could accomplish might be meaningful to other people. I gained that through this program.

I am endlessly grateful to all of the professors and alumni, as well as Emily Griffen, Professor Sarat, and all those working behind the scenes who believe so deeply in me and my peers. The AHA program offers an authentic view of the real world, proving that there’s nothing humanities majors cannot do. Plus, they took us to the musical “Hamilton” in Boston, so it was definitely worth it!

by Quinn Nelson ’25