I was a sophomore, taking the Art Humanities course, and had little prior exposure to great paintings. Halfway through the semester, we were assigned papers and given an instruction sheet. The sheet gave us some points to consider (composition, use of light, etc.) and then listed pairs of paintings from which we were to choose one pair, and compare and contrast the paintings. There were numbers in parentheses beside the name of each work, and a footnote indicated that the numbers represented the room numbers at the Metropolitan Museum of Art where the original paintings could be found.

I took the 5th Avenue bus to the museum and rented a folding canvas stool, then found my way to Titian's "Venus and the Lute Player," and sat down in front of it. It loomed large, sumptuous and overpowering. I looked up at the painting, then down at my instruction sheet, and repeated the sequence for quite a while until the painting began to speak to me. My thoughts and notes then began to flow with great ease. I then made my way to the second work, Rembrandt's "The Toilet of Bathsheba." I could see that contrasting it was going to come very easily, but finding what the two works had in common was not. But, as I sat and studied the painting and the instruction sheet, this great work began to speak to me too, and in a while, it was all there, in my head and on my note pad. Sitting down in the dorm and writing out my thoughts more fully was the easiest academic task of my four years at the College.

That experience was, for me, Columbia in a nutshell. I doubt it would have been the same at some less well-located institution in their Art History library, trying to take the same inspiration from prints. I tell that story to this day to explain the Columbia experience to others, including applicants. By the way, I aced the paper.