Orchard Beach
honor’s thesis: Awarded summa cum laude
“'Your grandfather was in his glory, suffering for his God.' When my grandmother uttered these words my mental floodgate opened and I recalled my winter days trekking through Orchard Beach: my hands numbing while grasping my camera, the frigid wind bursting through the threads of my jacket, the hail pellets hammering onto me from the clouds above, and the feelings of dejection engulfing me in a chill that surpassed any cold a thermometer could read. Instead of choosing to visit the beach during the open season when crowds mingled and enjoyed the warmth of summer, I went in the midst of the New York winter. Similar to my grandfather’s retreat experience, I willingly made and embraced a pilgrimage to a place that was deserted and cold. It was in suffering that I would find relief from my pain, in solitude that I could feel connected to others, in the cold that I could find warmth—or so I had believed."
My memoir and photo collection entitled Orchard Beach display the various spaces, objects, and people that I used to orient myself during a particularly tumultuous period of my life. Using Orchard Beach, my grandparents’ Bronx home, an oil painting of a fisherman, and various other elements, I physically mapped my internal woes and personal ambitions as a way to situate myself and ultimately transform. This theme of orientation in space has been of great interest to scholars in the academic study of religion, specifically Mircea Eliade and Jonathan Z. Smith, former colleagues at the University of Chicago. Though both Eliade and Smith agree that humans use space to orient themselves, their foundational understandings of orientation differ sharply, as do their views on scholars and practitioners. This Honor’s thesis explores their competing perspectives, considers Orchard Beach through each lens, and finally argues that Smith’s interpretation aligns more closely with the experiences detailed in my artwork.
