The Head and the Heart
By Bonnie Blair
Time does a funny thing to memory. When I pieced together this time last year, I first remembered the excitement of running around campus and keeping up with my classes and my friends. On Mondays and Wednesdays, I went to Spanish and gender and society classes, as well as Zumba with my friend Carissa. On Tuesdays I had 19th century art history, and on Wednesdays an art writing seminar in the evening. My parents and younger brother, Luke, would make the pilgrimage to Reno every two weeks or so for Luke’s high school baseball games. I would go to his games before work as a server at a restaurant in the Grand Sierra Resort and Casino on weekend nights from 5:00 pm to 1:00 am. I had a study abroad trip planned to Kraków, Poland in the summer, and I felt like I knew exactly what was going to happen next. This whole rendition of early spring 2020 sounds quite upbeat, doesn’t it?
When I did some digging in my journal and photos from last year, I found a more nuanced story. Though it was true that I was enjoying all my coursework, with regular visits from my family, and was ecstatic about traveling, I was also lost. Reading through my entries, they were suffused with questions of what to pursue post-grad (a year away at the time), plagued with self-doubt in the value of my ideas and my ability to see them through—even my faith was under fire. I was so busy flitting about that I struggled to find space for my thoughts, especially existential ones. Without realizing it, I had been nurturing vague ambitions, which had little inclination towards reality. My vision board—with pictures of distant cities, aspirations to fall in love (not exactly a goal I could achieve on my own), and get enough sleep for once in my life—were equivalent to nothing more than daydreams.
Vision Board 2020. Photo/Bonnie Blair.
Flash to March 12, 2020: the university announced that classes would be online after Spring Break. I recall that week being suddenly stormy outdoors, with whipping winds and unsettling skies. By Monday it had snowed several inches and the restaurants in the casino had closed…temporarily. My mind was spinning over the rapid developments. Of course, with the contagion of the virus we had to close, but I couldn’t help but wonder about how I would survive the shutdown out of work. Would I get a refund for my airfare and study-abroad tuition?
At this time, I would like to acknowledge my comparably mild experience during the lockdown and pandemic. I can only speak of my own experience, but I do so with the full realization that disappointment at the cancellation of a trip is nothing compared to the suffering of so many who lost their lives, health, economic security, family members, businesses, and so much more. We have all had our own trials during the past year, and I do not wish to make light of grievances that have continued to transpire since last March on political, professional, and personal levels.
After a week or two, I calmed enough to reconsider some aspects of the situation. With the hours commuting and working replaced with time at home, I realized that it made me uncomfortable to be with myself for so long. In between Zoom classes and homework, I felt the silence loudly. Once I adjusted though, I began to explore: digging into books I had checked out from the library months before, but had not read yet, expounding on a poetic thought from a walk, choreographing a favorite song, trying new drawing techniques. I took refuge from the onslaught of increasing cases, confusion of how to react, and the loss of my plans in my imagination. Immersing myself in excitement over Romantic landscape painting, the optimistic effect of education on gender inequality, new writing experiments, and the strange world of online learning, I developed a new routine. I came to appreciate surprises such as how the light would filter through the tree branches outside my window at a certain hour of the morning, and the delight of not being almost-late to everything.
Sketches of a plant and lamp. Art/Bonnie Blair.
Self-Portrait drawn from reflection. Art/Bonnie Blair.
Eventually I began to re-center and take time to consider those big question marks that loomed on the horizon. Reflecting on the parallels between the time preceding high school graduation and the present, I was unsure of what to pursue then as well, but wholeheartedly felt that I wanted to help others. This led me to enroll in nursing school upon entering college, which did not turn out to be for me, but I believe my love of art and art history comes from the same desire to care for humankind.
Art is truly a medium in which we can learn more about ourselves and about others. Individuality and collective experience merge in art through the inherent influence of society. That is to say, we are products of society and producers of society at the same moment. So, by interacting with art, we can encounter other people, cultures, and realities. Although the depth of this meeting is dependent on the work of art and the knowledge of its history, this opportunity, combined with open interpretability and visual (or more widely, sensory) experience, provides a space for a different sort of communication. I think it is this capacity of the arts that has the potential to revolutionize the world by inspiring empathy for one another. This view may be idyllic and romantic, but as I see it, trying to understand others who are different (or seem to be at first) from ourselves is a path that inevitably plants seeds of kindness and open-mindedness, and builds positive relationships within communities, and ultimately, the global community.
Hope, 2019, acrylic on panel. Art/ Bonnie Blair.
However vivid this intellectual epiphany was at the time though, art museums and nearly everything else was closed for safety. As a young, healthy person, I decided to channel my revelation into help with the immediate crisis. I discovered a job ad on Facebook for a start-up project to manufacture ventilators stateside. Preceding the pandemic, Hamilton Medical (a sister enterprise to the local Hamilton Company) had produced the world’s supply of intelligent ventilators in Switzerland, with one employee building one ventilator down the assembly line until completion. Normally their turnout rate of about 30 or so per month was adequate to keep up with demand. Since the virus primarily affects the respiratory system, by late April the demand of ventilators had skyrocketed. General Motors collaborated on the endeavor to break the steps up into an efficient assembly line with seven subassemblies, three mainlines, and 100 ventilators per day rolling to the testing units. I worked on the various stations constructing the front panel, which included the screen, buttons, a knob, and a surprising number of stickers. Because kinks were still being ironed out on the road to FDA approval, we spent much of the time making conversation in between spurts of production.
I quickly realized how acclimatized I was to my artsy social bubble, where new art exhibits inspire enthusiastic conversation and artist lectures are all the craze. After testing the waters with some talk of art, I discovered that more so than not, the average person felt that they were not artsy or that art was not for them. This is understandable, given the cool distance of conceptual art and the discomfort that people can feel in a gallery or museum space without a background visiting such locales. I came to understand that my passionate idea of art for all and as a force of positive social change is largely limited to people who have been welcomed in.
I have always loved museums, but this pivotal realization of unreached audiences turned my aspirations toward art museum community outreach. I have been working towards this goal in my coursework and my internships at the Lilley Museum of Art and with the Art History Visual Culture Studies Forum, where I have been curating social media content and writing. Next, I will participate in a student panel and host two online guest lectures in the months to come. Although things are still fuzzy as to how the art world will be operating after graduation, I look forward to pursuing additional internships, volunteering in the arts, and working as a docent if possible!
Matias' birthday cake a moment before knocking. Photo/Bonnie Blair.
What about the heart you may ask? As my thoughts ordered, I longed to sprinkle affection on my friends and family, and the occasional acquaintance. An entertaining compromise presented itself one day with my friend Matias’ birthday. Though I knew that a party was out of the question, I still wanted to make him a cake. I borrowed the delivery method from Pedro Sanchez in the 2004 film, Napoleon Dynamite, which entails a “ding-dong-ditch” and catching a get-away ride on the pegs of Napoleon’s bike. Unfortunately, I don’t own a bike, but after dropping off the first cake and running, my roommate and I were hooked. We made dessert drive-bys for a couple more birthdays, and then some just for the thrill of anticipating our friends’ elated surprise and the adrenaline rush from the risk of getting caught. Even though we could not be all together physically, I like to think that our desserts made things sweeter in a contagious way, lifting up our friends and rippling to their friends.
During this time, I also reignited friendships that had taken side stage. Remember my friend Carissa from Zumba? We first met through my friend and her brother Matt, who I met at work when I first moved to Reno, and who was my first friend here. He had expressed interest in dating a few months into our friendship, and although I had declined at the time, we remained friends over the next couple of years. Our continued contact was facilitated by everyone getting together when Carissa came into town and then more so once she moved to Reno. We planned a girl’s night that happened to fall on the days leading up to the lockdown and ended up inviting the whole group. For a few months, I had been casually considering how we both had changed, so by the time we all went disc golfing the following week, I had weighed my options carefully and decided to make a move. Although flirting (asking advice on disc golfing form and making bad jokes) flew under his radar, after continued hints and everyone else telling him, he finally believed I was being more than nice. In an authentically pandemic fashion, we did not see each other in person for the first month and a half or so. Besides periodic Skype calls over movies, painting, and homework, we somehow ended up texting over Snapchat, Instagram, and regular messaging. Anyway, we fell in love.
Skype call with Matt. Screenshot/Bonnie Blair.
Another Skype call with my honey. Screenshot/Bonnie Blair.
After the conclusion of the semester in early May, we started meeting in person. Over the course of the summer, we went on as many hikes as we could between restaurant shifts and sore muscles. Reaching the summit of Mount Rose, meeting butterflies in the Donner meadows, and navigating confusing trails only to discover breath-taking views punctuated our courtship. We also went camping a couple of times and floated down the Truckee twice as well. I have always loved our arid state, but with Matt I experienced the landscape in an immersive way. It was truly a gift, and I treasure the way we were able to get to know one another better during tranquil ascents and the serendipity of exploration. This March marks not only a year of the pandemic, but also our first anniversary of dating. With him I walk forward not only with delighted anticipation of a post-pandemic world, but also in our adventures to come, both in the great outdoors and gradually reopening indoors.
View from the Mount Rose Summit. Photo/Bonnie Blair.
Matt and I enjoying the success of the hike. Photo/Bonnie Blair.
Bonnie Blair is a senior at the University of Nevada, Reno, graduating May 2021 with an Art History major and double minors in Sociology and Painting. Though she has lived in Reno for only three years, she has lived in Nevada her whole life, and its mountains and resilient plant life are reflected in many of her paintings. She is currently an intern with the John and Geraldine Lilley Museum of Art and the Art History Visual Culture Studies Forum. After she graduates, she is looking to gain experience in the art museum and gallery settings before obtaining her Master of Arts in Art History from Kansas University.
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