A 15th-century French illuminated manuscript depicting Marco Polo's Far Eastern travels is the centerpiece of Molly Duggins' undergraduate thesis. But this fall, the art history College Scholar will journey to an Asian land that Marco Polo only heard tales of: Japan.
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| College Scholar and art historian Molly Duggins '01, shown in front of Willard Straight Hall on the campus's Arts Quad, will travel to Japan in the fall under a Fulbright scholarship. Nicola Kountoupes/University Photography |
This spring, Duggins received a Fulbright scholarship for a research project in Kyoto, where she will study how Asian curators present indigenous exhibits, on their own terms. It's a project that's off the beaten path from her Marco Polo thesis, but closely follows a similar theme and logic that can be traced in the multidisciplinary path Duggins has chosen for herself.
"I'm interested in looking at the Western construction of East Asian identity through the appropriation of culture in museum display," said Duggins, who lives in Wilton, Conn. "I'm curious to see how curators, raised in their own culture, exhibit Japanese art."
What's that got to do with Marco Polo? More than you might think. Duggins' thesis was based on chapters in the lavishly illuminated 15th century manuscript Livre des Merveilles, or Book of Marvels; it is not a traditional art history analysis, but a departure from it.
"It's an effort inspired by my work with [art history] professors Laura Meixner and Kaja McGowan to step 'out of the box' of the rigid Eurocentric canon of art history that's based purely on the physical properties of an object," Duggins said. McGowan also was Duggins' adviser.
By studying the cultural, political and economic factors that shaped the Western view of the East, Duggins uses the manuscript as a sort of cultural base camp from which she maps a multidisciplinary landscape that includes elements of anthropology, literary theory and visual studies.
"The images offer insight into the European receptivity of and reaction to genuine East Asian culture in the West before established European hegemony," Duggins explains. "As constructions of Eastern civilizations, they reflect both contemporary Western conceptions of the non-Christian 'other' as well as shed light on current European cosmographical beliefs. Finally, as a calculated display of foreign culture meant for a specific public, the depictions of the marvels of the East within the Livre des Merveilles constitute an early example of the Western appropriation of the 'other' through art, a practice that lingers 'til this day."
And that concept brings Duggins back to the future, which will be Kyoto.
McGowan said Duggins herself is a "'marvel' in every sense of the word; she has been a joy to work with, and I wish her all the best in her future endeavors." In a reply that amounts to a glowing recommendation letter, McGown said that Duggins was the most extraordinary student she'd worked with in her four years of teaching at Cornell.
"Molly displays academic excellence and integrity which is unrivalled, even among my most promising graduate students," McGowan said. "I have had the rare pleasure of assisting Molly in the realization of her future goals, specifically her interest in becoming a museum curator sensitive to the changing patterns of cultural appropriation in exhibition practices, East and West. Molly's keen interest in the history of French medieval art has extended well beyond the classroom, culminating in a semester abroad in Paris last spring, where she was not only a deserving recipient of the Frederic Conger Wood Fellowship, but also a Sarah Lawrence College Study Abroad Merit Scholarship. Here at Cornell, she has created for herself a challenging interdisciplinary curriculum that has allowed her to contextualize the art of the Middle Ages by studying it through cultural, historical, literary, religious and socio-political perspectives. Her abundant enthusiasm for her subject is tempered by an intellectual depth and maturity which is remarkable."
While a student, Duggins has also served as an intern at Sotheby's of New York in its Chinese decorative artworks department and in the Japanese and Korean artworks department at Christie's of New York. She was a member of the History of Art Majors' Club, the Cornell Museum Club and served as a volunteer with the Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art's educational outreach program called OMNI (Objects and their Makers: New Insights). Somehow she also managed to find time to sing with Cornell Touchtone's A Capella Ensemble, a student performing group, and play intramural hockey. This summer she will perform in Edinburgh Scotland's Fringe Theatre Festival with the Red Bull Players, an informal Cornell student theater troupe.
Through it all, Duggins remains calm, poised and understated about her achievements.
"Things have just fallen into place, and that is very lucky for me," she said. "It just worked out well."
Indeed.
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