Liberal Arts and the Love of Learning

Yesterday St. Catherine University initiated 19 new members into Phi Beta Kappa. It's one of the nice things about working here--being able to share a love of the liberal arts with other like-minded people who recognize the importance of lifelong learning. Among the values highlighted in St. Kate's Mission Statement is the integration of liberal arts and professional education. And this year the University is celebrating the Year of the Liberal Arts in conjunction with the last week's launch of the School of Humanities, Arts, and Sciences.

How does all that relate to this blog and the Ade Bethune Collection? In this way: Ade Bethune was continually educating herself all throughout her life--when faced with something new, she would devote time to learning all she could about it.

Here are some examples:

• In the 1930s she taught art at Portsmouth Priory School (now Portsmouth Abbey School) in Portsmouth, Rhode Island. One year she was asked to teach mechanical drawing, a subject she knew nothing about. Using the class textbook, she taught herself, making sure to always stay one lesson ahead of the class. The knowledge of mechanical drawing she acquired proved beneficial later on, when she began working as a liturgical consultant. It allowed her to draft plans for church buildings, and to understand architectural drawings. The textbook she used is in the Ade Bethune Collection.
• While Ade Bethune had created art using a variety of media, she had not done much with metal until she began working with the Terra Sancta Guild in 1965. Terra Sancta, based in Philadelphia, partnered with a metal shop in Israel to produce and sell religious items cast in bronze. Bethune recognized that she needed a fuller understanding of the metal casting process in order to create appropriate designs. So she traveled to Israel in the summer of 1966 for that purpose. She met the men working in the shop, and learned from them, communicating through drawings and bits of Hebrew and German. Among other things, Bethune realized the process of sandcasting does not allow small details to be clearly visible, so her designs needed to incorporate simple shapes and lines. In the Ade Bethune Collection are multiple examples of work she did for Terra Sancta Guild, including a "Tree of Life" candleholder, the first piece she designed for them.
• As Bethune became more active as a liturgical consultant, the scope of work she performed broadened. In addition to providing artwork for churches she became involved with choosing church furnishings, lighting selection and placement, and making recommendations for the design and layout of church spaces. And it wasn't just the visuals--she paid attention to how music would sound in a church. She viewed singing as an important group activity, and it was necessary for the sound to fill the space, so everyone had a sense of the music they were singing together. Among the that Ade Bethune gave to St. Catherine University are one on acoustical engineering and another on music, acoustics and architecture. There is no way to know how much use she made of them, but it isn't difficult to imagine that the woman who taught herself mechanical drawing would also educate herself about how sound travels through space.