I recently paid a quick visit to my alma mater while on the way to a conference. I hadn’t been back in many years, and I spent the whole of my 1.5-hour whirlwind tour with a grin on my face. Although I’ve heard that the southern part of campus has changed a lot, the northern part, where the buildings that held most of my classes are located, seemed like it hadn’t changed a bit. I was sporting a backpack and so felt like a kid again as I walked the campus just like old times, ducking into the English building and the bookstore, stopping by the little art gallery in the student union, and heading into one of the libraries for a quick peek just before closing time.

I lingered the longest (still only a brief 20 or 30 minutes) at the Ackland Art Museum, where I saw the painting pictured above (entitled “The Dutchman”). It’s really dazzling, almost like a quilt done in paint, and done in such a way that you see new things in the intersections of the various shapes each time you look. It’s a really great piece by an artist named Moyo Okediji, whom you can read more about here if you’re interested.