Articles

An Aesthetic Justification of Travel

Lindsay Oishi thinks you should travel to celebrate a particular object of art.

I always wait until the very last minute to pack. I relish that “oh my god I will miss my flight and forget my passport and …” panicky feeling, that long sleepless flight and that endless day of arriving and checking in and pushing myself into the oblivion of exhaustion that is what? A holiday. Looking at pictures of myself on vacation, I am often reminded of Goya’s series of engravings: “One cannot look upon this.” “This is worse.” “Will she rise again?” Goya’s Disasters of War are not the trivial inconveniences of travel – my comparison is more than a little disrespectful.

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