Essay Tips Part 4: Editing

If my calculations are correct, you probably got your midterm research paper back a couple weeks ago, and it was covered with red pen marks. With only four short weeks left before your final paper is due, you’re wondering how you can improve your writing to boost your grade for this last assignment. Below, I have listed some of the most common mistakes you should look out for while editing your paper. This is a lengthy post, with no pictures, but I promise it will be helpful for you art history students out there.

1. Using “WH” words outside of a question

Who, what, where, when, why, and how. In everyday conversation we say things like “that is where I bought my watch” or “this is how you tie a shoe.”

 However, in a formal paper, “wh” words should only be used when posing a question. So, if this was a formal paper, that last sentence would be a mistake. I could rephrase it as “…words should only be used if posing a question.” I don’t bother making that edit here on the blog because I want to have a conversational tone, but I would never (knowingly) submit a paper with that mistake. Rewriting your sentences can seem tricky at first, but you’ll figure out a way to rephrase. Instead of saying, “We do not know who painted the still life,” say, “The artist of this still life is unknown.” Here’s an example from one of my papers:

Mosaic art thrived even further in the Byzantine Empire where Constantine passed a law exempting mosaicists from taxation.

Mosaic art thrived even further in the Byzantine Empire because of Constantine’s law exempting mosaicists from taxation.

(Honestly, this isn’t even the best sentence because the last half reads a little awkward. I could have simply exchanged “where” for “because” and the sentence would have read fine.)

2. Ubiquitous “they” or “it”

Research papers are rooted in fact, so you want to be sure that you are getting that fact across correctly. Phrases like “it is said” or “they believed” leave things too open ended. Who says this? Who believes this? Art historians? The culture? The artist? Even if you feel like you are being redundant, clarification is always better. Let’s look at an example:

As Christian celebrations moved from the catacombs to newly built churches, they aimed to decorate their interiors with art that exuded permanence.

In this sentence, “they” would be referring to “Christian celebrations” which makes no sense because “celebrations” cannot aim to do anything. I probably thought I was referring to Christians as a whole, but even that is false because not every Christian had a say in church décor. Here is the correction:

As Christian celebrations moved from the catacombs to newly built churches, the church leaders aimed to decorate their interiors with art that exuded permanence.

Now we know the specific decision makers behind church decorations.

Here’s an example where “they” is ok:

Christian artists shared iconography between Christ and the emperor so that the people would recognize his sovereignty.  With the strong tie of church and state in Byzantium, some emperors even requested this similarity so they could identify with Christ, creating a parallel between human and divine rulers.

“They” is being used in the same sentence as “some emperors” so we already know the specific group in question without having to reiterate it so closely.

3. Sentence Variation

In trying to correct the previous edit, it is easy to fall into repetitive sentences. You do not want to start every sentence with the same word, be it the artist’s name, or more commonly the word “the.” Here’s an excerpt from my first research paper:

The vertical depiction most accurately resembles an antelope and typically has a small body, large head, and long horns. The males are usually attributed with the pierced mane like the male in this set. The lace-work mane is not for decoration alone, but also has symbolic purposes. The zigzag pattern represents both the running pattern of the roan antelope, and the path of the sun between the solstices. As a whole, the male figure represents the sun. The female figure is associated with the earth.  The dancers wear raffia coverings in reference to water. The unification of these three symbols conveys the three factors necessary for fertility in both human reproduction and crop growth.  The human reproduction aspect is represented in the presence of the child on the female’s back.  The Chi Wara performance reflects the importance of cooperation between male and female forces. The “male” sun is believed to fertilize the “female” earth through man’s act of farming.

Every sentence (except for one) in this paragraph starts with “the.” Here’s how I fixed it:

The vertical depiction most accurately resembles an antelope and typically has a small body, large head, and long horns. Males in the Segou style are usually carved with a pierced mane like the male in this set.  A lace-work mane is not merely decorative, but also has symbolic purposes. The zigzag pattern represents both the running pattern of the roan antelope, and the path of the sun between the solstices.  As a whole, the male figure represents the sun, while the female figure represents the earth. During rituals, the dancers wear raffia coverings in reference to water. The unification of these symbols for sun, earth, and water conveys the three elements necessary for fertility in both human reproduction and crop growth.  Human reproduction is represented by the presence of the child on the female’s back.  The Chi Wara performance reflects the importance of cooperation between male and female forces. The “male” sun is believed to fertilize the “female” earth through man’s act of farming. 

It’s still not perfect, and I would definitely write it differently now, but 5 sentences starting with “the” is a huge improvement from 10 sentences. Making these changes can be frustrating, but creative rewording will help improve your variations. If the artist’s name is your issue, start by changing up your noun/pronoun. Instead of “Caravaggio did…Caravaggio believed…Caravaggio painted,” try “Caravaggio did… He believed… the artist painted.” Then mix up your sentences more so they don’t have the same cadence and length every time.

4. Word Choice

My biggest pitfall was always word choice. In trying to sound educated, or even in just trying to add variety, I often used superfluous words which only complicated my sentences. (Superfluous being a word that in itself is superfluous.) If there is a simpler way to get your point across, use it. I also used colloquial phrasing, which is ok in something like a blog, but not in a formal paper. Unfortunately, this is not the kind of error I can find with a simple ctrl+f in my papers, so I don’t have an example for you. But, I am sure that there are plenty of websites with examples and corrections for syntax and diction.

5. Expand on Subject-Specific Terms

After doing loads and loads of research, it can be hard to remember that your reader does not have all the background information that you have now. If you introduce a term or concept that is not general knowledge, be sure to take the time to define it and explain its relevance. You don’t need to delve into a whole new thesis, but give just enough clarification so that your reader does not feel left out or confused. For example, in my research paper on Indonesian shadow puppets, I referred to the puppeteers (dalangs) by male pronouns for the whole essay, and even mentioned that it was a profession passed down from father to son. But, I then quoted a female dalang, which took my professor off guard. In my second paper, I spared a single sentence to explain that with the recent growth of performance art schools, the profession was becoming more accessible for woman. I didn’t digress into the details of the whole article I had read about these new schools, but I did give enough background to account for my sudden pronoun change.

6. Create a Plan of Action

So you’ve written your paper and you are ready to edit, but you don’t know how to catch all your mistakes. Everyone has a different technique, but until you learn your best system, here are some suggestions:

·         Read through multiple times – focus on one kind of edit for each read through

·         Read slowly and out loud so that you can catch mistakes that your mind skips over

·         Read the essay sentence by sentence – backwards (this will help you feel the rhythm of your sentences and to check that each sentence is a complete idea on its own)

·         Be sure that every paragraph relates to your thesis and is building towards a conclusion (even if your conclusion is that your original thesis was wrong)

·         If you don’t understand your professor’s edits (double prepositions – what are THOSE?!) take the time to look them up and read several examples until you are sure you know what to look for in your writing

BONUS TIP

Did you know that “Xth century” is “Xth-century” when used as an adjective?

As in: In the 16^th century, paintings were generally . . . vs. 16^th-century paintings generally featured. . .

Essay Tips Part 3: How to Write About Whatever You Want

The trick to writing about whatever you want is really quite simple, and boils down to one simple tip: connections, connections, connections. Find a connection between your required topic and a topic that interests you and then write about it.

Sometimes your secondary topic will be something that is already sitting in the back of your mind, and sometimes you’ll discover it during your research.

James Ensor The Bad Doctors

A Predetermined Interest

I took 20^th Century Art History the semester before my Baroque class and fell in love with the work of James Ensor, particularly his painting The Bad Doctors. The painting was still on my mind when it came time to write my Baroque research paper. Remember my essay on Hendrick Heerschop’s The Doctor’s Visit from Part 2 of my essay tips? I really chose that painting so that I could write about Ensor’s painting. Both paintings convey doctors that society believed had bad medical practices. In the 17^th century, old-fashioned doctors were mocked

as fools, and in the 20^th century, patients feared the development of invasive procedures. I researched each era’s medical beliefs (another reason researching outside of art is beneficial) and BOOM, I had the perfect way to connect these two paintings. I got to write the paper I wanted, while still fulfilling my Baroque requirement.

Indonesian Shadow Puppet

A New Interest

If you remember from Essay Tips Part: 1, I picked my Asian art research paper based on aesthetics. During my early research, I found an article that inspired my thesis. I read the article Relationship Between the Art of Wayang Kulit and Disney’s Twelve Principles of Animation by Dahlan Abdul and Sidin Bin Ahmad. With this new lens to my research, I found so many other connections between the shadow puppets and Disney Animation. I expanded on Abdul’s and Ahmad’s thesis to write my own paper. I strengthened my argument by using the animations of Lotte Reiniger as a stepping stone between the two styles.

Now if I had just said that I wrote a Baroque paper on James Ensor and an Asian art paper on Disney, you would have thought I was crazy. But, with the right connections, it’s possible.

The important thing when trying to write a paper about “whatever you want” is to remember that you still have to stay within the parameters of your paper requirements.  Do not completely abandon the period or art movement of your assignment. Even if you write the best paper in the world, you will probably fail for neglecting your real assignment. Art history is such a vast area of study that if you can’t find something that interests you, you probably shouldn’t be taking an art history class.

Some Connection Ideas:

• Compare how the art reflects a change in society over time
• Compare how the art reflects differences in two societies at the same time
•  Explain how an art style was adopted by another culture and used to inspire a new movement (African and Asian art had a huge influence on Western Modern art)
• Was a historical artwork used in a movie? Did they use it correctly? Are the location, time period, and purpose accurate? If not – provide all the corrections with strong evidence.
• Are there stylistic similarities between two far away cultures? Explore why.
• Compare two artworks that are responses to the same societal upheaval (Reformation/Counter Reformation, War, etc.)
• Compare how two artists approached the same topic (annunciation, nativity, the seven deadly sins, etc.)
•  Approach an artwork from a feminist lens.
• Combine the last two – see how a topic is approached differently by a male and female painter (Judith and Holofernes, and Susanna and the Elders are great topics for this)
• And so many more connections to be made!

Good luck with your semester and don’t hesitate to email me with topic requests and essay questions! boiledbunnies@gmail.com

Part 2: How to Write a Research Paper When There is No Info on the Artwork.

To write a well-rounded art history paper, you should start off with some general knowledge on the artist, the cultural climate, the art movement, the process of creating the artwork, and the symbols/meaning in the artwork. So what do you do when you know none of these things? Well, take a moment and look and the catalogue entry for your artwork. It is very unlikely that you have literally nothing to go on. You probably have a date and geographic location at the very least, which really is enough to get you started.

The Doctor's Visit

1. Writing about an Artwork with an “Unknown” Artist

Unless you go to school in a city with a large, popular art museum, your local museum will probably have dozens of “no-name” artists with the occasional headliner in each gallery.  Such was true for my paper on Hendrick Heerschop’s The Doctor’s Visit. While Heerschop is a known Dutch Golden Age painter, there are not many biographical analyses on him – at least not any that I could find. I also couldn’t find any information on the painting beyond the gallery label. However, doctor’s visits are a popular theme in Dutch genre paintings. And do you know who painted doctor’s visit scenes? Jan Steen, Samuel van Hoogstraten, and Gerard Dou – all well-known Dutch painters with detailed essays on their paintings. So for my essay, I looked at the paintings of these well-known artists and compared their more detailed symbolism to the fairly simple composition of Heerschop. By finding differences and similarities between Heerschop and the other painters, I was able to talk about Dutch doctor paintings as a whole rather than focusing on this one painting. As a bonus, Dutch Baroque art is so easy to write about because scholars already know a lot about the culture and how it was a catalyst for the changing art world at the time.

Your Take-Away:

•  Find well-known artists with a similar subject or style to your artist and use them to compare/contrast to your artwork. 
• Are you writing about a nativity scene? Find nativity scenes from the same area/time or from different areas/times to show the changes in depictions.
• Is your artist obviously a Caravaggisti? Talk about all the elements borrowed from Caravaggio. 
• Pick an artwork from a time of change in society – political, economic, and cultural turmoil or prosperity will always find a reflection in artwork.
• Some examples include the Counter Reformation, Rococo, and German Expressionism
• 
  

  

  Separation of Sheep and Goats

2. Writing about a Mystery Artwork

In last week’s post I mentioned my research paper on the Byzantine mosaic Separation of Sheep and Goats. I chose this artwork even though I only knew it’s era, location, and the subject. I chose it because I had questions that I wanted to answer. Originally, I was concerned with the identity of the two angels and the obvious color choice made in the selection of their tiles. Then I decided I needed to find the original purpose of the moasic. Eventually, I expanded my research to include the symbolism of sheep and goats as inherently good and evil. So how did I begin?

I started by scouring the library for books on medieval angels – theology, iconography, you name it. I tried to identify the mosaic angels as archangels, but there was no symbolism to support that claim. But guess what? That search for information can still be used in your paper! Remember science class? I suggested my hypothesis, summarized my evidence, and stated my conclusion. In this case, I was wrong, and they were probably general angels to represent all angels. I did find that red and blue are attributed to certain orders of angels, and matched those attributes to the positions of the angels.

To find the original purpose of the mosaic I searched for similar mosaics in books of Byzantine art and read about the divisions of artwork in a Byzantine church. I learned that only certain themes were allowed at certain heights on church walls, and that there is only one recorded sheep and goats scene at the apse of a church. The size and proportions of the mosaic also helped me guess at its placement because the elongated figures lend themselves to a high wall or ceiling, which would correct the proportions when viewed from below.

To research the symbolism of the sheep and goats, I started by reading several analyses on the Biblical reading from Matthew. I was surprised to find an article examining the societal opinion towards sheep and goats during the time Matthew would have wrote this passage. This insight into his intended audience added something special to my paper. The paper would have been fine without it, but this was one of those “extra step” moments.  

        Your Take-Away:

• Pick an artwork with questions that you can answer.
• Start with what you know.
• Jesus' purple robes and halo are a common representation that you should know from lecture classes.
• Talk about the development of familiar symbols/iconography.
• Don't be afraid to prove yourself wrong - state an idea, look for evidence, and conclude whether your statement was valid or invalid. If invalid, keep writing about more theories until you can support a valid hypothesis. 
• Try to identify the original purpose/placement of your artwork. Look at the subject as well as the physical characteristics of the artwork to help you.
• Research outside of the art-world. History, theology, culture, and more can open your eyes to relevant information.

The most important tip with any research paper is to have lots and lots of sources from diverse scholarly opinions. Your professor might require three non-internet sources,but can you guess my average number of sources on a research paper? Eleven sources. All of which were books or articles that I had to manually search through for information - no ctrl+f in a hardcover. And that’s just my credited sources! I probably read twenty or more books and articles with some being completely useless and others only reiterating what I already read. It is a lot of work, but it is so worth it when you find that single sentence nugget of information that drives your whole thesis home. Of course, it helps to be interested in your research, and I’m a pro at turning a seemingly dull assignment into an interesting project. Join me next week as I share my secrets in Part 3: How to Write About Whatever You Want.

Essay Tips Part 1: How to Choose a Research Topic

Presenting my senior thesis at the
 Memorial Art Gallery.

Believe it or not, school will be starting up again soon, and even though I’m gone and graduated, I still feel the buzz of a new school year. For an art history student, a new semester means (at least) one thing – a new research paper. I will admit that I was (am) a huge nerd and loved researching and writing papers. Just think about it – why else would I start a blog - aka assign myself a weekly essay? So, to help you prep for the start of school, I am going to write a three-part blog on writing research papers. 

And here we go:

Part 1: How to Choose a Research Topic

It is always best to go to a museum to select your research topic. You should already know that I believe that there is a huge difference between seeing an artwork in person and on a computer screen. Searching through a museum will help you find an artwork that stands out to you, which always makes for a more interesting paper. The geographical and chronological divisions of most museums will help you find related artworks to compare and contrast to your subject simply by scanning the room. Investigating an artwork in person will also help you give a more detailed/accurate description of the artwork’s size, texture, aging, etc. But be careful, a research paper is not a mere visual description of a piece.

If you don’t live near a museum, or the selection at your museum is scarce, it is ok to search online collections to find a research topic. Better to find something that interests you than to be bored researching a topic you could care less about. If you’re bored doing the research, your audience (your professor) will be bored reading your paper. Most museum websites have easy collection navigation that let you filter your search by geography, era, object, culture, artist, and so on. Don’t pick the first artwork you find just because it fits your professor’s criteria. Choose a couple options and then determine which will make the best paper. Always consider your thesis – will you be able to connect this artwork to a bigger picture?

Indonesian Shadow Puppet

Here are some ways to pick an artwork:

1. By Aesthetics

In this case you are choosing an artwork because it looks pretty to you. This is a good way to gauge what initially catches your eye, but you cannot base an entire essay on looks. For my Asian Art paper I was drawn to the elongated arms of this Indonesian Shadow Puppet. As a mostly flat artwork, it stood out against the stone deities inhabiting the majority of the MAG’s Asian Art gallery. I lucked out because this shadow puppet had a detailed gallery label with plenty of leads to start my further research.

The Doctor's Visit

2. By Interest

I think that this is the best way to choose a research topic. Your artwork should stimulate you intellectually so that you are motivated to conduct your research and organize a well-written paper. If you read A Short Guide to Writing About Art, you will learn about the different methods of art history, such as iconography, social history, gender studies, etc. One of my favorite methods is iconography because the development of symbols will often play into the other methods. Dutch genre paintings are rich with iconography, so for my Baroque paper I chose The Doctor’s Visit from my local museum. Religious Renaissance paintings are also filled with iconography, which means a lot of information to write about. Remember your thesis – you need to reach that page requirement without blabbering on with filler!

3. By Popularity

Bernardo Campi Painting Sofonisba Anguissola

Most “famous” paintings will have a lot of scholarly work already written about them. You are sure to find many articles and essays on Leonardo’s Mona Lisa and The Last Supper. This is great if you are being asked to compare two or more schools of thought on an artwork because there will be several perspectives for you to write about. Popular artworks are also a good choice for your first paper while you are learning research skills. I wrote my first paper on Sofonisba Anguissola’s Bernardino Campi Painting Sofonisba Anguissola because I could find a ton of information on both the painting and the artist, allowing for a well-rounded analysis.

On the other hand, you are unlikely to make any new connections and might just be regurgitating the same tired information your professor has read again and again. If you spent a long time on an artwork in lecture – you probably don’t want to write a paper about it. A research paper is the chance for you to become a mini-expert on an artwork so that you can teach your classmates something new and different from what you learned in class.

Separation of Sheep and Goats

4. By Mystery

This is similar to choosing an artwork because of interest, but in this case your goal is to answer a question. In my Medieval Art class I wrote about a Byzantine Mosaic called Separation of Sheep and Goats. The story is a well-known passage from the Bible and the center figure is recognizable as Jesus. I was most intrigued by the angels on either side of him. I wondered who they were and if there was any significance to their colors. If you click the image to go to the collection page you will notice that there is no object description, so I had to start my search from scratch. This can be an intimidating way to start a paper, but I was up for the challenge. Learn how to tackle this kind of paper with next week’s entry Part 2: How to Write a Research Paper When There is No Info on the Artwork.