Courage to Be Student Fellow Reflection: Julia Kiernan
 

Julia Kiernan

What kind of courage does it take to reach into unknowing? How can justice come about from a courageous artistic practice? As much as speaking up can be a political act, how can moments of silence bring about change? These are all questions approached by poet, musician, and artist Jerome Ellis in his performance and lecture, which was the second installment in the Courage to Be series in the 2024 spring semester. Jerome’s interdisciplinary work blends jazz, musical improvisation, poetry, sound recording, oral performance, and much more. As a person with a stutter, much of his work is centered on what happens when speech is shaken loose from its normative function.

During his performance, Jerome presented his meditations on this idea, discussing his stutter and how it has become a valuable medium through which to make his art. Throughout the lecture, there were moments when Jerome would stutter in the middle
of a sentence, and the room would fall silent. These moments, as Jerome elaborated, were unpredictable for him and his audience. Though in day-to-day life this unpredictability can cause complication and frustration, embodying the role of performer means that the silence is given its space to ‘speak.’ As audience members, we agreed to listen. Sitting in these ‘pools’ of silence (as Jerome refers to them in his essay The Clearing) with Jerome, the audience became transfixed by the collective experience of being in silence together. There was a sense that all of us were suspended in a space of potential energy, the space before speech breaks air. After his spoken lecture, Jerome picked up a tenor saxophone and began to play along with a prerecorded track of his own music. He improvised sweeping melodies that swelled to fill the lofts of the Blithewood Mansion foyer, slowly walking up the grand staircase and nearly disappearing to the second floor. Alongside his work with language, Jerome’s music allows for another avenue through which to explore silence and unpredictability.

That Jerome is able to cultivate such a space of gathering and possibility is truly miraculous in a world of constant internet chatter, political polarization, and social despair. Jerome’s work is a resounding testament to the importance of artmaking as a way of accessing ambiguity and difference. We were lucky to have experienced his work immersively, and I highly recommend watching the video below to get a sense of his performance.

I have thoroughly enjoyed working with the Hannah Arendt Center as a student fellow for the Courage to Be program. As a second year student working on moderating into the Written Arts program, my work with the center provided generative insights that fueled my excitement about pursuing a career in the arts. Corresponding with Jerome throughout the year as I planned this event was a unique experience that I’m lucky to have had. I want to give special thanks to Kai Lin Kwek Rupp, Adriana Ondrejka, Jana Mader, Maggie Hough, and Phil Lindsay for their help and support in facilitating this wonderful event!