There are certain things I wanted to express about this class that I could never write on an evaluation sheet. When I discovered I had to take an Arts in New York Seminar, I thought I would have an upper hand having came from an arts environment. I was definitely wrong. The first thing I realized was that I was lazy. In high school, I did four periods a day of acting. By the time it came to the weekends, I was seemingly never interested in going to a show. I did on the occasion, but only because I felt I needed to be up to date on my theater knowledge. I went to the natural history museum because it was near my high school and some gallery openings, but beyond that I was lazy. Looking back, my attitude was really unfortunate. I loved that IDC pushed me (in the right direction) to go to more and different kinds of events. Never would I have gone to a China festival at Carnegie hall or Quartet at Bam. For this I am thankful. My favorite performance of the semester was without a doubt, Fall for Dance, at City Center. Although I wasn't inspired by Les Biches, I was introduced to Mark Morris who I have come to have a minor obsession for.  Two of my good friends are professional dancers. One of my friends aspires to only dance for Morris' company and my other friend has even worked with Morris! I only discovered this after I expressed that I had been learning a lot about his style. I was even fortunate enough for one of them to show me how to do some of the movements from Polka. I thought it was very exciting that I could share their passion in some way. As for the readings, Barthes still plagues me. I don't know if I will ever really understand him, but I am glad I was challenged. Some of the other readings were similarly challenging, but all extremely interesting. I liked the Poetic Fallacy, the Acocella pieces, and Learning to Look. I thought Learning to Look was very helpful in that it broke down art into simple and relatable terms. Still, I would like to have discussed the sections we read in class. Beyond everything, however, I was most challenged by accepting modernism. Why did people want to break down the conventions I admired?  I think the concepts we learned will just have to continue to sink in. Through out it all, IDC presented a constant challenge. I never had an instant gratification of, 'eureka.' My thoughts were always slow to develop! But, IDC was a breath of fresh air from high school classes and a truly great class for first semester freshman year. It really got my brain pumping! Thank you, professor!