With the appointment of the new Vice Provost for the Arts and Associate Vice Provost for the Arts, the university has taken a critical step toward improving artistic opportunities for undergraduates. These two administrators have made clear that the future of the arts at Homewood is a bright one.
For this Hopkins' arts initiative to succeed, the university must attract and court more students with artistic and creative personalities. Although the university obviously has high academic standards, many of its students lack the usual correlation between intellect and interest in the arts. Our undergraduates are smart, but in a way that drives them more often to the MSE than to the BMA.
As the arts program improves, the important task of attracting artistic students will fortunately get progressively easier. This change will be felt not only in the arts programs themselves, but also in other areas such as social life and even the classroom. We will hopefully be able to shed the archaic image of the Hopkins bookworm, replacing it with that of the well-rounded and intellectually engaged student who both appreciates and participates in the arts. This engagement will have important benefits, chief among them that we will simply be happier.
Pablo Picasso said, "Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life." As philosophical and dramatic as this statement may be, it has relevance for undergraduates at a challenging university like Hopkins. For many students, artistic pursuits allow an escape from the toil that Hopkins classes demand. Whether it's the established a cappella scene, garage bands, dance companies or the Film Society, we see Hopkins students increasingly engaging themselves in the arts.
We commend the university for following through on its ambitious goal to improve the arts at Hopkins. From here their responsibility is to ensure that each new class brings an ever-larger supply of artistic freshmen to fuel this Homewood renaissance.
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