Terms of Engagement

Our course this term will be a moveable feast as we prowl across London in search of cutting edge, classic, and even, in a few cases, older art in order to gauge what drives the aesthetic imagination of arguably the ARTS metropolis of Europe.  While this is a literature class, and there will be a fair amount of reading, the bulk of our seminar on wheels will be taken up with outings to the amazing number of arts altars dotted across the London landscape.  There are no prerequisites for this class and it is open to all majors.  Do please note that several of the junkets listed below DO HAVE ADMISSIONS fees and that said FEES WILL NOT BE PAID BY THE FOUNDATION; that having been said, every measure will be taken to assure that this experiment in aesthetics, pedagogy and travel will be no more nor no less expensive than a regular class back in sunny San Diego.

ARTSjunkets™

The class is designed in an innovative fashion in order to accomodate your busy schedules in and around London.  Here is how it works and how your grade will be determined: on average, a typical CSU class that rewards students with 3 units for their work, takes about forty hours of classroom time each semester.  Summer sessions are no different, hence to ensure you get the most bang for your buck, our 21st Century UK Arts Now! course asks that you select from the menu below (visit this page weekly for updates, additions, deletions and notes).  There are MUCH MORE than 40 hours of field trips, screenings, gallery chats, etc. listed here; that gives you some freedom in selecting which course “texts” fit in with your busy schedule. We will call the units of work associated with these outings “ARTSjunkets™.” Note that I have trademarked the term in case someone wants to steal our catchy concept and make a mint off us!  2nd more serious note: the pace of this class starts in high gear with MANY fieldtrips etc., these will DECREASE as the semester unfolds, so do try and accumulate as many ARTSjunket™ UNITS as soon as possible--there WILL be extra-credit for accumulating MORE than your fair share of these aesthetic 'coins.'

Reading Assignments

Students are encouraged to use their internet resources to research events listed in the menu below to supplement their field trip experiences.  Also note that we WILL HAVE a few standard format class sessions wherein we will discuss contemporary UK Literature.  Our first reading will be Nick Hornby's HIGH FIDELITY--please purchase and begin your reading of Hornby's novel.  Other works will be added shortly.

Writing Assignments (Online!)

All writing assignments will be posted and completed at your very own personal UKartsNOW! web page--see the pen and glasses links below
 
 

All students will be free to offer reviews, commentaries and critiques based on prompts from the Professor as well as random comments you might want to pitch in response to other students's writings; I, too, will be holding forth in this cyber forum and the students are especially encouraged and challenged to submit comments regularly (at least 2 entries a week).  Grades will be assigned for these entries, so quality, of course, will be AS important as quantity.  One other last writing assignment will take the place of a final exam; it is a 3 to 5 page synthesis of your various ARTSjunkets™.
 

Grade Breakdown

40 ARTSjunkets™ UNITS                       50%
Online Writing Prompt Responses       40%
Take Home Final/Assessment               10%

Office Hours

I will not be keeping regular office hours at Foundation House, but I am readily available via email, memo@sdsu.edu, and mobile phone, 07791767352, and will be happy to meet with you at your convenience.

...the tour also included a stop at the University of London where we visited Jeremy Bentham, father of the Panopticon, among other things, in his private box.

30, June 2003 MONDAY @ 6:00; NOTE we will gather at the Gloucester Road Tube Station Lobby at 6 sharp for our trip north on the Jubilee line to SWISS COTTAGE.
HAMPSTEAD THEATRE's US and THEM--Admission is £12! (however, they do have stand-by tickets for students for 5 quid or pounds!)

Dig the ultra-modern design of the Hampstead Theatre

US and THEM is a play about differences between Unitedstatesians and the English. the play starts at 7:45pm so we want get their early to get our tickets, hit a pub and prepare for a night of hot UK contemporary theater!  The play was written by Tamslin Oglesby and directed by Jennie Darnell.
6 ARTSjunkets™
 

Ian, Leslie, Andy, Jen Wood, Naomi, and Cedric enjoy dinner before the US AND THEM performance at the Hampstead Theatre--highlight of the play? One of the female leads was ill and so an understudy was drafted to do the play script in hand!
 

Expert DONALD tells tales of woe and murder on the JACK THE RIPPER tour.
 

Jack the Ripper calls for a London Walks tour and EVERYBODY comes out for fun: Ian, Cedric, Heather, Erica, Stephanie, Kristen, Jen, Julie, Leslie, Eli and Amanda.

Steph and Leslie confer as a troubador serenades at the 10 Bells where one of Jack's victims sipped her last pint.

Barbara Kruger

Between FEAR and LUST, the LONDON CALLING group hangs out at a new  gallery of art by the one and only Barbara Kruger: Erica, Kevin, Bill, Kristen, Stephanie, Naomi and Heather were on hand for the event.

After the Kruger show, the group gathers for wine and snacks at the post PARLOUR teahouse in SKETCH gallery.  SDSU Alum and Londonite, Kevin Gosset, Erica, Stephanie, Kristen, Heather, Erin and Naomi.

Erica assaults a sculpture at the ritzy SKETCH gallery in London--security guards DID NOT catch her; Dr. Nericcio, trying something similar later by accident, was summarily rebuked by crack museum agents.

also

2 July, 2003, Wednesday @ 5:30 in front of FOUNDATION HOUSE
LATIN CATHOLIC MASS at the Brompton Oratory; after the Wednesday services there is a brief exposition of the relic (yes, bones!) of Saint Phillippe Neri, for whom the Church is partly named.
Admission: FREE
Despite the best efforts of Romans, plagues and Henry VIII, Catholics still all over this peculiar island.  This field trip is open to ALL denominations.
2 ARTSjunkets™

also

2 July, 2003, Wednesday @ 8:30pm / SDSU LONDON CALLING GROUP DINNER, at the flat of the Director of the Program, chez moi! 
Admission: Free
on the menu: food to please meat-eaters and vegetarians alike.
My flat is on 109 Earls Court Road; Flat 27 of Sullivan Court Building; merely keep walking up Cromwell passing Foundation House, a Sainsburys and lots of apartment complexes. At Earls Court, make a left.
Sullivan Court Building is just past the Malaysian Airlines offices on your left.  Either all come together as a group and I will come down and let you in OR buzz me, but I am not sure the buzzer works too hot!
1 ARTSjunket™

Heather, Erica, Andy (happy male, center), Jen and Leslie after Dinner and Desert at the program Director's flat on Earls Court Road.

Leslie consults the heavens at the Director's dinner reception for the LONDON CALLING gang.
 

Home cooking, a Mexican picadillo dish, Indian pork entre and a vegetarian curry combo, seem to make Stephanie, Heather, and Erica quite happy at our reception banquet.
 

Kristen, Cedric, Jen, Andy, Naomi, Steph & Erica pose by the Millennium Bridge on the way to the fabulous TATE MODERN across the Thames.

also

3 July, 2003 THURSDAY @ 5pm sharp, GLOUCESTER ROAD tube station lobby for our ride over to the Blackfriars or London Bridge station.
RICHARD II at Shakespeare's Globe Theater
(note! ALL MALE COMPANY PERFORMANCE)
Admission: from £5 (if you don't mind standing) to £29.
One of Shakespeare's greatest plays about one of those many twisted and powerful psychopaths running the show on this equally curious and endearing island nation.
6 ARTSjunkets™

What actually happened is that they let us see a new play in development called JOE AND KEN about the life, writing and love's of ISLINGTON favorite son, Joe Orton!

Cedric, Stephanie, Heather, Kristin, Naomi and Ian prowl the set at the KING'S HEAD pub.
 

UK ARTS Now is the name of the course, and you might rightly ask yourself why are we going to a triple-feature screening of a SPANISH director's classics.  The reason has to do with the view of aesthetics here in London.  One of the things London does best is to showcase the best that film history has to offer--in other words, the reason LONDON feels so cutting-edge has a lot to do with they way it continuously pays homage to masterworks from the past; consider, for example, the cult of Shakespeare alive and well here in the UK, and the connection between this and the thriving theater scene here as well.  The same holds true for cinema and the Riverside's decision to showcase Buñuel's masterpieces presents a rare opportunity to enjoy the works of this savage, brutal, witty Surrealist (he made UN CHIEN ANDALOU with his odd cohort, Salvador Dali) on the big screen.

If we have time we should also check out the paintings hanging in their cool cafe/bar--here's the blurb from their website: "It features an exhibition of paintings by Mariana Gordon - FACE VALUE - AN EXHIBITION OF PORTRAITS - in the Cafe/Bar from 17 June to 27 July."
 

hope some of you can make it 2nite.

This Tuesday we will visit one of the greatest literary repository's in the world--the British Museum; while we did drop in a minute here in our tour of Bloomsbury with Victoria our great tour guide, we did not do the building justice; in addition, I want us to make time to study the LINDISFARNE Gospels, a medieval text whose blend of image and word is remarkably contemporary in its dynamics--illuminated manuscripts were the hypertext of their day with a sophisticated blend of the semantic and the semiotic.  Well worth a careful study.

Jen, Stephanie, Naomi, Kristen and Heather sit on literary history at the famous British Library.

Dr. Nericcio reconsiders his relationship with LITERATURE.

For Jen and Cedric, the show is just about to begin!
 

please note for those of you REALLY into Theatre that
there will be a actors chat with the audience, 20 minutes
after the Wednesday afternoon, 2pm, performance of
Richard III and you are welcome to attend that
show in lieu of this one on TUESDAY night!  Totally
up to you!

5 ARTSjunkets™

Our tour of wonderful London cinema sites continues as we visit the one and only, the infamous, the magnificent National Film Theatre at the British Film Institute on the Southbank.  And what will we see?  Perhaps one of the best film noir masterpieces of the 20th century, Melville's Red Circle or LE CERCLE ROUGE--a film that continues to influence the work of American and British directors alike.

5 ARTSjunkets™

where: at THE SCOOP,
MORE LONDON RIVERSIDE
adjacent to CITY HALL
Queens Walk, LONDON SE1
nearest tube: London Bridge
http://freespace.virgin.net/s.rosenthal/oedipus/pages/oedipus.html
5 ARTSjunkets™

Enough of LONDON, the dutiful SDSU students demand, so it is into our posh FOUNDATION classroom for a session on the life of Rob Fleming in Nick Hornby's HIGH FIDELITY--Heather, Jen, Erica, Naomi (scratching leg), Kristen and Stephanie in attendance.

and
 

Sunday
July 13
7:20pm
Three Colours: White
Unbelievably rich film by Kristof Kieslowski
Riverside Studios
Hammersmith Tube Stop
more directions? go to
http://www.riversidestudios.co.uk
4 ARTSjunkets

Well, EDMOND was sold out, so the class opted instead for a trip to a JAZZ BAR, Jazz After Dark, for some rousing Latin Jazz

Dr. Nericcio, Ian, Erin, Andrea, Naomi, Heather and Erica enjoy the sights and sounds of the London Music scene.

The house band at Jazz After Dark.

LONDON CALLING Director with family, Lila, Lorenzo and Sophia outside the Tottenham Court Tube Station before the Beatles Magical Mystery Tour London Walks program.

Jen listens to Beatles fanatic, Donald P., on the London Walks tour--note killer raingear!
 
 
 

Cedric, Andy, Kristen and Erica crash the gates outside the famous ABBEY ROAD studios.

Erica, Andy (still dialectically questioning Janes's discourse ;-0), Jen, and Ian (backpack!) listen to Dr. Janes on a stop at our Cambridge tour.
 

1. BLC NATIONAL GALLEY FIELDTRIP

Wednesday
July 23, 2003
Required for ALL BLC/General Studies 450 Students
Open to all SDSU London Calling initiates!

>Wed 23rd July at 6.45pm, meeting at
>the entrance to the Sainsbury Wing of the building
>(which is on Trafalgar Square).  John Makey

For this field trip, we will gather at 6pm
sharp at the GLOUCESTER ROAD tube
stop for our trip over to the National Gallery!

FIE's John Makey makes a point about 15th Century European art during our tour of the National Gallery off Trafalgar Square in this clandestine photo!

Virtuoso Masterpieces by VIVALDI, BACH, HANDEL and
TELEMAN performed by the Feinstein Ensemble of London

7:30pm

5 ARTSjunkets™
http://education.yahoo.com/reference/dictionary/entries/41/j0084100.html

4 hour film documentary/interview with arguably the
MOST important living intellectual in the United
States
1:30pm/ Sunday

ICA is located on the MALL, at the foot of the DUKE OF
YORK Steps, 3 minutes from Picadilly Circus and
Trafalgar Square.

http:www.ica.org.uk
5 ARTSjunkets™

Lorenzo Nericcio, sleeping, Leslie Hackett, Andy Hart, Cedrick Lexia, Erica Anderson and Sophia Nericcio (using Anderson as a post-concert equestrian diversion), stand outside St. Martins-in-the-Fields church after our Thursday night candlelight Classical music of Italy concert.

Lila Nericcio, Erica Anderson, Andy Hart, Leslie Hackett, Heather Weldele and Cedric (back table,  right to left) and Sophia & Lorenzo Nericcio (front) celebrate as our LONDON CALLING 2003 program comes to a close!

The Lobby @ NFT, part of the British Film Institute (BFI)

WHITE TEETH by Zadie Smith
FINAL 549 CLASS
NOTE CLASSROOM SITE CHANGE!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thursday
August 14
1-3:30pm
where?????
BACK ROOM BENCH TABLE
AT FINNEGAN'S WAKE PUB

Come to class with a couple of passages
from ZADIE SMITH's novel that
you would want to do a close reading of if
YOU were Professor for a DAY!!!!!

what an amazing novel!!!!!!!

Given the jetsetting ways of our group, it just
may NOT be possible for ALL of us to assemble
to celebrate the end of our program.

That is to be expected owing to the international
dynamics of our special LONDON CALLING
initiative, but it is still a tad sad all the same.

Let me just say here and now that I am, without
hesitation and without reservation, utterly proud
of all of our achievements and wish you nothing
but success in all of your future adventures.

yours,
Dr. Bill Nericcio
Director, London Calling
SDSU in the UK