Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Analysis

Recently I took a tour of the James E. Lewis Museum of art located in Baltimore, MD. This museum is a part of Morgan State University fine arts building. As I walked into the museum I notice the beautiful entrance that consist of sculptures of very important people in history. In addition I was amazed by the infrastructure of the museum and the setup of the lighting in the museum. Furthermore, the transition in the height of the walls inside of the museum were very appalling. As I walked around the mesuem I notice that the paintings were not hanging up on the wall. Instead these paintings were placed on the floor leaning on the wall in a diagonal motion. Furthermore, in this museum there were a lot of African artifacts, sculptures, and mask from different parts of Africa. Also, there were brief information that went along with some of the African masks and sculptures.

Museums are a place that serves as an alternative source of information. As time advances, society desensitizes the privilege of having access to such a distinctive reference; threatening the prevalence of museums. In order for a museum to successfully fulfill its purpose, a curator must consider the authenticity, educational value, and relevance of an exhibit.

The novel “The Haunting of Hill House,” written by Shirley Jackson, closely follows the traditional tropes of an American Gothic. The main character of the novel, Eleanor, begins her journey to self growth after accepting an offer to live in a suspected haunted house for the summer. Moreover, Eleanor meets three other people that have an important effect on her development as a person. These characters slowly begin to question their own sanity due to the house’s destructive nature. Jackson appeals to fans of the American gothic through her particular description of the house and how the characters interact with it in order to show the environments foil of an absolute reality.

In Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Fall of the House of Usher” and Julio Cortazar’s “House Taken Over” the setting is at an old house and it's lonely. However in, Poe's story.the setting has a creepy stormy background, in contrast Cortazar’s setting is in a creepy house that seems to be haunted but the house is kept clean.

In Edgar Allan Poe’s “The of the House of Usher” and Julio Cortazar’s “House Taken Over”, the settings are similar because they both took place in a creepy house. However, in Poe’s story, the setting is the old house falling apart. By contrast, Cortazar’s setting the house is old but in good condition.

Gothic Literature is a genre that was popular between 18th to 19th centuries in North Germany. It is always being associated with Dark Romanticism which the emphasize was more on nature, terror and death, horror and many more. It involves dark and gloomy setting and also unexplainable things that are beyond human senses and reason such as ghosts and monsters. The main characters, on the other hand, are always ineffectual which they do not give much effect on the story plot. This can be seen through Washington Irving’s “Rip van Winkle” and “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” which can be considered as American gothic work in terms of its description of setting, the involvement of supernatural element in the story and also the characteristics of the main character.

Setting is the key element in Gothic Literature. It displays the different places and architectures that are essentials to visualize Gothic. The setting is highly significant in a Gothic novel because it helps to add horror and fear to its mood and dreadful weakness to its characters. As said by Snodgrass, the settings of Gothic literary works present an extensional symbolic psychological case to its human characters (158).Gothic fictions are usually set in isolated landscapes or highly secured prisons, secret passages or corridors, old castles or ghostly houses, and graveyards. According to Hogle, Gothic areas might be "a castle, a foreign place, an abbey, a vast prison, a subterranean crypt, a graveyard, a primeval frontier, or island, a large old house or theatre. . . (2)." In the past, most of Gothic works take place in castles. But in modern times, they are set in caves, covert passageways or tour where it can be easy to draw horrifying images of supernatural or gloomy unexplainable events such as ghosts and weird scary spirits. The setting of Shutter Island includes lots of Gothic elements represented in the island itself in addition to its surroundings such as the lighthouse, caves, secretive passages, highly secured prisons, graveyard, and ferry.

Imagination overcomes reason when something happens that could be the result of something wicked, however you do not know. An example of this happening is when your parents call you saying they will be home at 6:00 p.m. although they do not show up at that instant and it becomes 6:30 so you worry that they could have caused a car accident. This demonstrates that imagination overcame reason, because you think they could have caused a car accident, nevertheless in reality there was just a ton of traffic. Another example is when your doorbell rings very late at night when nobody should be ringing it so you think it might be an evil person or something else. This also proves imagination overcame reason, because you think of the worst possible outcome even though in reality your parents just ordered pizza inordinately late without telling you. Therefore, imagination can overcome reason when something happens that you think should not have happened.

For people, especially younger children, a way to feel a strong connection to the past is through objects that representation of that time in history. For example, after my grandmother passed away, I received one of her many rosaries, allowing me to remember our bond and the influence she had in my life every time I hold her heirloom. In today’s world, one of the only places in which a person is able to see historic artifacts and feel the connection to the piece of history that it represents is a museum. With the vast amounts of electronics available to the public, people, especially of a younger age, find less time to visit a museum and to learn about their heritage. The results of nationwide poll conducted as a part of the survey of public participation in the arts shows that “21% of adults in 2013 visited” an museum, which is drastically lower than previous nears and is predicted to continuously drop

Fall River Historical Museum was written by Jan Heller Levi. It is based off of a real life situation which involved the Borden Family. This case is filled with undeniable mystery; most of it surrounds the family’s youngest daughter, Elizabeth “Lizzie” Borden. The theme of this poem is that every family has its problems and secrets. No family is perfect; they all have their issues and sometimes they boil over. Jan Heller Levi uses setting, symbolism, and tone to show how families deal with their issues over the years.

One day, the marquis suggests that Julia should marry Duke de Luovo, an old, evil character, quietly the same as her father. Julia refuses to marry the duke and sinks in deep grief and depression but finally convinced by her brother Ferdinand to elope with Hippolitus, the night before her wedding. Unfortunately, their escape is failed; the Marquis and the Duke attack the couple in the hollow tunnels underneath the castle. The marquis stabs Hippolitus and throws Julia in a solitary boarding prison located on the remote south part of the castle grounds. 25

In the early 18th century a new genre of fiction prose, named "Gothic Novel" was introduced. The term ”Gothic” used to refer to the German tribe of the Goths.

Throughout American literature and cinema history, the premature burial of someone has been displayed. In the American gothic short story, “The Fall of the House of Usher,” by Edgar Allan Poe, this is portrayed as well. Roderick Usher buries his twin sister, Madeline Usher, alive because he believes that she has died. In Poe’s, “The Fall of the House of Usher,” it showcases Poe’s troubled past with the death of loved ones due to disease. Thus, it contributes to the theme one can never trust anyone, even one’s own family. The theme in this narrative is supported by various gothic elements, such as the dim and derry setting and the supernatural aspect of this piece of literature.

The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Don’t Ask Jack by Neil Gaiman and A Rose for Emily by William Faulkner all contain key gothic features. However, The Yellow Wallpaper portrays the most accurate representation of a gothic text through the use of isolation, dull colours, morbid descriptions and an unreliable author.

The Hollyhock House was designed by Frank Lloyd and is regarded as his greatest achievement in California. It displays a mélange of architectural themes that works perfectly well, yet many people feel that he is not solely responsible for the work. The house was built for an oil heiress in the 1920s. This paper is out to analyze the Hollyhock house and later compare it to other works of art in regions like Asia and other parts of America. This house is architecturally a unique marvel that feels retro and futuristic at the same time, thus standing out as the most significant structure in the 20th century by American architects (Department of Culture Affairs, Los Angeles). In this discussion, the assumption is that Wright integrated regional aspects of the location of the