Practical Wisdom Through the Arts: The Power of Aesthetic Experience in Our Lives
Hosted and co-sponsored by the Harvard Catholic Forum
Led by Karen Bohlin, EdD, Director of the Practical Wisdom Project at the Abigail Adams Institute
In a culture that prizes speed, productivity, and performance, this six-week seminar offers a place to pause, look closely, and engage one another in dialogue. Participants are invited into a shared aesthetic experience—reading poetry and contemplating works of art in a way that, in the words of Josef Pieper, teaches us “to learn to see again.” Together, we’ll consider what it means to be phenomenologically present to a work of art. Drawing on poetry from Chaucer to Langston Hughes and artists such as Brueghel and Rembrandt—and taking advantage of some of the unexpected places we find art right here in Harvard Square—we’ll ask how the arts might deepen our attention, enlarge our understanding of the human condition, and perhaps even make us more capable of wise and wholehearted engagement with the world
Dinner provided.