Freshman Seminar Fall 17 DWC

It all started on the first weekend of Fall 2017 when I went to one of the most modernized museums in New York City. I was not fond of going to museums in my childhood but MoMa, Museum of Modern Art changed my habit. I went there with my sister while she was visiting NYC and we had a lot of unique experiences in MoMa. There was a Frank Lloyd Wright’s exhibition called “Unpacking the Archive” which shows the designs and artifacts of the most prolific and renowned architect in the late 1800s. There are also small building modules and electronic tablets where tourists like us can design and build anything we like. Moreover, we can see paintings by the greatest artists of all time like Claude Monet, Vincent van Gogh, Henri Rousseau and so on. I would say MoMa is a must to experience the truly wonderful abstract art in Manhattan. All of the things I saw inspired and motivated me to seek new knowledge and prospects throughout my entire life.

On September 2, I attended the Vietnamese Student Association Club. I would recommend this club to people who are trying to experience different cultures or people who are interested in Southeast Asian cultures. VSA is a super cool club to join in my opinion, since they were super wild since day one. I attended this club with my friends and we all felt that the club was welcoming and it’s always packed. VSA wasn’t just a club where you sit and learn about the culture, since they had spring roll day; where you learn to make spring rolls. In my opinion, I really enjoyed my time at VSA and I wish more people could attend. Although VSA was amazing, the amount of people there was crazy. I really liked the big crowd, but I also disliked it because it was super hot and crowded. Anyone who’s interested in culture should go or you can go for the food. – Lets go VSA!!!!

On Tuesday, September 12th, I visited the Theodore Roosevelt Birthplace National Historic Site. Honestly, I would not suggest going to this museum, unless you have a serious passion for our past presidents or Teddy Roosevelt himself. I was a little disappointed with the museum because I thought I would be able to take a selfie in the bedroom that Teddy grew up in, but that exhibit was closed off. One of the cool things that I was able to learn about our former president was that he apparently loved drawing cartoons. One of the exhibits had a bunch of cartoons that were drawn by Teddy himself. Anyways, if you have any interest in Teddy Roosevelt, I suggest going to this museum. If you couldn’t care less about the president, then definitely do not go there.

On September 1st, my new college friends and I decided to embark on a cultural and historical journey to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It was the first museum I have ever been to and the fact that I was able to get in for free made it so much more memorable. Despite almost tripping and falling on the stairs while walking up to the museum, I can say I very much enjoyed my visit to the Met. The grandness of the museum was what I noticed at first because it was a little overwhelming seeing so many pieces of art in one place. The artistic abilities of people throughout history amazes me and the historical value in some pieces really opened my mind.

From sculptures to paintings, the Met was really an interesting place to visit if you enjoy learning about history. I learned a lot from the descriptions on the side of certain pieces of work and the context behind certain pieces really made me appreciate the art even more. I constantly found myself in awe over what people had to go through to create certain pieces because you could at times tell what a person is going through just by analyzing their artwork. There were honestly so much substance in that museum that I have to go back and visit again someday. This was an eye opening experience for me and I highly recommend that if you haven’t visited the Met, you should because everyone can benefit from looking at art through history.

– Thomas Qiu

Last week, I went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art with several of my classmates. If you haven’t visited and you’re interested in art and history, I highly recommend to stop by. It is one of the world’s largest and finest art museums. Even if you aren’t as passionate for history or art, this museum will guarantee to awe you with its huge halls and breathtaking architecture that you can easily get lost in. (We sure did a couple of times!)

My favorite exhibit in the Met is the European Paintings from the 19th century. I am infatuated with impressionism artists such as Monet, Renoir, Degas, Pissaro and Toulouse-Lautrec. They all have unique art for their time period and even though some were not recognized during their lifetime, I feel as if its honoring them to appreciate and view their art now. The museum offers everyone the chance to be in close proximity of this fine art that was made way before our time and wea very lucky to have access to this huge collection.

I’ve always enjoyed venturing out into the museum by myself and getting lost in the vast collection of timeless art. However, I found that going with friends to the Met is new experience that was very enjoyable. Coming to Baruch, I didn’t expect to get close to this group of friends as fast as I did. Going to the museum was always a great time, but it was even better to spend time with people that have similar interests as me. It was interesting for all of us view the incredible art and sculptures knowing the history behind it. If one of us didn’t know the background of a

piece, another would chime in and share some interesting facts and history behind it. Again, I highly recommend to visit this museum especially w

ith some classmates! It will be an exciting experience and can even create meaningful friendships between you and your

classmates.

– Jasmin Lopez

Last Friday, I visited the museum at FIT. Even though the museum was pretty small, it had a number of exquisite dresses, bag and shoes. The exhibition “Force of nature” showed us how nature has inspired fashion designers as well as artists in their creation of such unique pieces in their works.  This includes the usages of feathers, fur, patterns and flowers in their clothings as well as hats and shoes. Fashion has always been a big industry that everyone patrons, we may buy clothes, shoes, bags more than once in a year and browse through a vast collection of clothes.  This gallery showcases where some designers get their inspiration from, from animals, from the sky and things that are in their environment. It is amazing how creative we can be, turning simple things from our environment into some masterpieces that wows many. I wish that the museum displayed more fashion pieces and perhaps explain to us more about the process of how such statement pieces are created.

I really enjoyed this experience at the museum and will probably visit it again when they change their exhibition.

-Rui Qi Sim

On September 1st I visited one of the best museums in NYC, the MET, or Metropolitan Museum of Art. It has been a while since I visited this museum and I did not remember much of it. Sadly, I was not able to complete the whole thing in just one day. Monet’s paintings alone took up nearly an hour! I did however make my way through a decent amount of exhibits, including a beautiful Cristobal de Villalpando selection (shown below), as well as Comme de Garcon’s fashion showing. These three exhibits stood out the most because of Monet’s beauty, the size of Cristobal’s paintings, and the abstractness of Garcon’s fashion line. Monet’s paintings while appearing to have no definitive lines still show every single detail inside the canvas. Cristobal’s painting, ” Moses and the Brazen Serpent and the Transfiguration of Jesus,” is a 28 foot tall canvas encapsulating two biblical events in one transitioning piece, truly breathtaking. As for Garcon’s fashion line, it was very interesting but I guess I do not understand her take on fashion art pieces. They were very abstract to say the least but gather quite a large crowd inside the exhibit.

The reason I like the MET is because  even after a prolonged period of absence, exhibits such as Medieval Knights remain a center-piece of the museum. This brings me a nostalgic feeling allowing me to recollect past memories when I used to visit the same exhibits with my relatives almost a decade ago. I enjoyed this academic experience, being able to (without any cost) experience and learn about contemporary as well as past art and compare the two in a single day. To anyone hesitant about visiting this jewel of NYC, take the 6 train to 77th street and see for yourself, I guarantee you will find at least one piece inside the museum that you will love.

-Konrad Szenfeld

This picture was taken at a Beta Alpha Psi’s general meeting last Thursday in the Newman Vertical building. Beta Alpha Psi is one of Baruch’s most prestigious and oldest business fraternity. At the beginning of the meeting, we all had to sign-in online and then the members and the board of the fraternity proceeded with talking about the qualifications of rushing the fraternity and what activities they do. They talked about the fraternity’s main goals of brotherhood, professionalism and community service. To be honest, I did not like the club that much because of the fact that they are interested in people who are finance, accounting or csi majors. I will not be joining the club because I am a biology major, but I would be interested in attending some of their future activities and events.  I am open to and would like to join new clubs in order to meet new people.

Hi everyone!

Welcome to Freshman Seminar Fall 2017. This will be our shared site for the semester, where you will be able to post about events you’ve attended and more.

Best,

Ronni and Ambar