On Wednesday, Dr. Kahan showed us several clips from the movie “The Girl with the Pearl Earring” which made me realize that it takes observance to come to an epiphany about anything, especially something of an abstract nature. When a painter asked her to observe the clouds, she was quick to state the obvious: the clouds are white. But after focusing in, she realized that it was a mixture of colors, all the colors that had significance to her. Perhaps the yellow represented sun being hidden which means that the brightness of the sun is weak compared to the strength of the clouds. Without knowing her story, I can conclude that she might feel overpowered by a larger force or in this case, dominated by the demands of her religion/culture to cover her hair. She is also slightly dominated by the painter whose job to be creative forced her to remove the one thing that defined a woman: the covering over her hair. But the brightness was brought back to her when the painter started thinking creatively of her to use her luscious hair which made her look fiery in contrast to the paleness of her face. That’s perhaps the significance of the clouds to show that once the covering, as the clouds covered the sun, is removed a brightness shines from underneath.

I have no idea how to connect this to the title of the movie since I’ve only seen clips. Perhaps the Pearl Earring shows her brightness and how she was able to enlighten the painter with this brightness because eventually the painting that came from her uncovering her hair, became quite a beautiful and famous painting in society, even today. Similarly, the paintings in the Art Exhibit were difficult to understand at first glance, but reading into it shows its impact on culture through its representations of the brightness of the acts that people do in society. Both the movie and the Art Exhibit were inspirational to follow through with my passion and hopefully make an impact in the world.