Oberlin Remembers Author

February 21, 2020 Established 1874 Volume 148, Number 15 Oberlin Remembers Author and Artist Toni Morrison

Alice Koeninger Senior Staff Writer

Only a few weeks after the beloved writer and Lorain native Toni Morrison passed away last August, Professor of Studio Art and Africana Studies Johnny Coleman began planning an event to commemorate Morrison’s first birthday after her death.

The culmination of Coleman’s efforts was a nine-hour remembrance service hosted by the Oberlin College President’s office. The event turned out to be a huge collaborative effort, with support from Africana Studies, the Art department, the Lorain County Community Foundation, the Toni Morrison Society, and more. In an interview, Coleman singled out Director of Audiovisual Services Leslie Joseph and Digital Media Engineer Kyle Hartzell for their contributions. While organizing the event, Coleman reached out to everyone he could think of who might want to give a tribute to Morrison.

“My intention was to set up a dynamic possibility for people to reach from wherever they were to that space, [so that the event] was not limited by geography,” Coleman said.

He made announcements in church, at barbershops and barbecues, contacted the Cleveland Public Library and the Ohio Center for the Book, and talked to gatherings of pastors from all over Lorain County.

Associate Professor of Africana Studies and Comparative American Studies Meredith Gadsby was instrumental in contacting the founders of the Toni Morrison Foundation, many of whom sent in recorded reflections about what Morrison means to them. At the service, participants made tributes in many different forms: reading excerpts of her work, speaking about how Morrison influenced them, dancing, or giving other performances. The whole event was framed by a slideshow of photos of the Oberlin bench from the Bench by the Road Project, which the Toni Morrison Society began in 2006 to provide historical markers and dedications commemorating the history of slavery.

Coleman and Professor Emeritus of Dance and Africana Studies Artist-in-Residence Adenike Sharpley, who is a Santeria Priestess, built and activated an altar under the bench that called to the Yoruba keeper of the crossroads, Eshu Elegba, in order to form a connection with Morrison, now an ancestor. This altar was recreated on either side of the projection screen, with the number of flowers increasing throughout the day to give the sense that the altars were active and growing.

In front of the podium were four speakers in wooden house-like structures that each played a different, The Body Behind the Art: Figure Models Discuss The Job See Tribute, page 12 Toni Morrison International Day of Remembrance last Tuesday. Photo by Sophie Payne, Photo Editor

Aly Fogel Arts & Culture Editor

Walking through an art museum, it’s easy to find the names of the artists whose work hangs on the walls, but it’s rare that a museum-goer can name the models depicted in the artwork. Figure models serve as muses for artists, visual references that both the creator and the viewer appreciate, but these models are rarely given credit for their work. This is especially true for women of color, who have historically been misrepresented by white, male artists.

In the Oberlin art community, figure models are often Oberlin students modeling for their peers in Studio Art classes. Some of these students also model for community classes at the Firelands Association for the Visual Arts. There are still racialized and gendered power dynamics at play in the studio art classroom, but many models describe a positive work environment.

“It’s so funny, I look up and I see that everyone’s still watching me, and I kind of forget why everyone’s looking at me,” said College fourth-year Peri Levin about her experience as a figure model for an Oberlin art class.

As an Art History major, Levin explained that she was interested in figure modeling because it allowed her to understand the studio side of the Art department better, and she also appreciated the high pay rates. For many students, modeling is just a campus job albeit a strange one.

“It’s refreshing to walk into a situation and know exactly what you have to do and be able to do it,” said College second-year Claire Daily. “Every night it’s the same: You do 10 x 30-second poses, and then a standing pose, and then a sitting pose, and then three lying-down poses for longer periods of time. So it becomes very easy after a while. … It’s kind of relaxing.”

However, Daily explains that modeling can become physically uncomfortable. Levin shared Daily’s sentiment that holding poses for long amounts of time can be painful, but she added that the students and professors in her classes are understanding when she needs to take a break or change poses. “I don’t know if people can ever tell when I’m in pain,” Levin said. “I imagine they kind of can, but I think I also … go to a different place in my head and find a certain grace or calmness because that’s just part of what it is; your hands fall asleep, and your feet fall asleep, and it hurts.”

Because of the uncomfortable and vulnerable nature of the job, it’s important that professors create a safe space for their models. College fourthyear Jack Spector-Bishop, who has been modeling for three years, said that Visiting Assistant Professor of Art Mimi Kato is particularly kind to her models, which Spector-Bishop attributes to Kato’s own experience as a model.

“I feel like people who have modeled just understand how it’s just such a weird scenario when someone who is theoretically your employer is asking you to do things that are physically difficult with your body,” said Spector-Bishop.

Another strange aspect of the job, of course, is the final product. After posing for a class, the models are able to see many versions of themselves through different artistic lenses.

“I like to think of it as like the pre-modern version of when you take 20 selfies at one time and then you would go through them to see which one is good,” Spector-Bishop said.

Some might find this unsettling, but Levin has learned to love the artwork.

“I don’t even care when I don’t feel like I look attractive in the images,” said Levin. “Whether or not it’s because I just don’t think it looks like me, or because I think it does look like me and I don’t like what [that] looks like necessarily, I still love them.” Other models are interested in the way that artists see their bodies.

“It’s really neat to sort of see [and] think about how I see my face versus how someone else sees my face,” Daily said.

However, seeing your body depicted by others can lead to some frustrating and uncomfortable moments. Nearly all of the Oberlin models are white, assigned female at birth, and thin. College fourth-year and figure model Lyala Khan said that, because the artists in her class are mostly white, as are the models they have previously used, the students often create a very distorted version of her body.

“Most of the time, people will try to make me look skinnier than I am and also lighter,” Khan said. “And some of that is probably just plain racism, but a lot of it is also a fear of being racist and therefore representing me as a race-less, unidentifiable person as opposed to something that they think I would think is wrong.”

Khan explained that, whether it be at the FAVA or in the Oberlin classroom, white artists are often confused about painting non-white skin tones.

“A professor once told me that they had an incident in a class where a student literally had never used a non-white person as a model and was confused,” said Khan. “Even with white people, it’s not white paint. You need pink or whatever to get that fleshy color. But when you put [in] a little melanin, See Student, page 12