The Art Department’s annual European Study Abroad summer program brought history and art lessons to life through travels to Normandy, Paris and Barcelona.
Jean Donegan, art professor and department head, said that the trip is a wonderful opportunity each year for students of any discipline. She explained the magnificent educational value for students experiencing the art, culture and history of Europe.
“It is an enriching experience,” Donegan said. “You come back changed.”
Heather Dupre, ceramics senior from Houma, has been with the program twice so far. She explained that the experience has changed her goals for the future in only 16 days. Dupre said she hopes to secure a job in Europe after graduate school.
“On the first trip I decided that I would have to go back and see more,” Dupre said. “After my second trip it has changed who I want to be and who I want to become.”
Dupre explained that the trip to Europe provides more than the typical snapshot experience from a tourist’s perspective.
“The trip completely expands your world view,” Dupre said. “You get there and it is like angels are singing from above.”
Ross Jahnke, art professor, said that the trip covers a smaller region of Europe in order to explore greater depth. The point is to allow the group to experience the culture through as much emersion as possible.
Courtney Rogers, print-making junior from Larose, said the itinerary is packed with activities that are enriching but also entertaining. The trip also allows free time in between scheduled outings.
“There is so much that you would want to do, but would never know where to start,” Rogers said.
A European tour guide who speaks multiple languages plans many of the excursions and gives general information about the different places on the trip. The guide also makes hotel and transportation arrangements.
Donegan said she believes the college credit option is a great way for students to earn the arts and humanities requirement. She said the projects completed after the trip are an artistic expression of the memories.
“We have never done such a wide variety of work,” Donegan said. “We had art history, print making, ceramics, graphic design and photography.”
Before and during the trip, students worked on ideas for their projects to complete for credit through research. When the students return to the U.S. their projects are completed using the experiences and images from Europe as inspiration.
The projects ranged from photography scrapbooks and journals, to woodcarvings and posters.
Dupre did the photography course for credit on the trip. Her work focused on the architectural style in Barcelona, with influences like Antoni Gaudi, the Spanish Catalan architect, and art nouveau, an international style of decorative arts. From the almost 4,000 photographs she took on the trip, Dupre had to eventually narrow her selections down to less than 30 for her final project.
“The architecture is insane,” Dupre explains. “It’s so ornate. We learn about all these things for years, but then you get there and you experience it.”
Rogers made prints, an artistic type of stamp, of the various inspirational parts of the trip and the overall impression of the cities.
“Before we left, we had to create ideas to develop a topic that would hold the work together,” Rogers said. “By the time I came back, it was something completely different than I intended.”
Rogers carved some of her prints out of linoleum while in Europe, including her favorite, which was carved on a bus ride in between cities.
Kathryn Stock, graphic design sophomore from Thibodaux, explained that there is meaning behind most of the architecture and her goal was to capture it.
“The churches blew my mind,” Stock said. “Not only how beautiful they are, but the motivation behind the beauty and the dedication required to complete such detail.”
Haley Hebert, mass communication senior from New Iberia, wrote about her thoughts and experience in a journal as part of her credit.
“To look at the war from a non-American perspective and to walk on the grounds where it happened, places that were completely destroyed, and to look at the architecture from all the different centuries was very humbling,” Hebert said. “It made me realize how grateful we should be to live in this country.”
The students explained that although these cities of architecture and art are often mentioned in class, they never expected how much of the culture would revolve around the styles and inspiration.
“As much as Antoni Gaudi influenced us on the trip, we spend less than an hour on him in the art history class,” Rogers explained. “You never expect it to be that surreal, but when you get there the cities full of it.”
Sylvia Bourg, graphic design junior from Houma, explained that you have to choose where to focus because it is impossible to see and experience everything in 16 days.
“It’s like you’ve opened a big box of chocolate but you can only have one,” Bourg said. “At the end of the trip I was visually exhausted.”
The trip is open to anyone who would like to experience the history, museums, cathedrals, villas, excavations, beauty, cuisine and shops of Europe.
“It is being in the moment and experiencing the space,” Donegan said. “It is inspiring whether they take it for credit or not. It is about the diversity they see.”
“It is like the difference between life in black and white or color,” Rogers added.
Donegan said that about 56 spots are available for the summer 2013 trip, along with two faculty members.
The department of art is accepting applications for participants in the European Study Abroad summer program that it has conducted the past 18 years. This summer, the group will travel to England and Ireland.
She explained that the trip costs roughly $4,470, and the price includes airfare, first class to superior hotels, ground transportation, excursions, local guides, entry fees, breakfast, most evening meals and the professional European tour manager.
The informational meeting is Sept. 25 at 4:00 p.m. in Talbot 205. For more information and applications, contact Donegan at [email protected] or call the Art Department at (985) 448-4597.