On March 16, 2020—in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic closures, after DePaul University had made the wise decision to move all instruction online in the interest of public health and safety—I posted to social media: “In the midst of much more difficult and serious work to get my classes online for Spring quarter, I keep stopping and lamenting all the pretty dresses in my closet that nobody will see me in for at least 10 weeks. Teaching is a performance and I’ll miss putting on the show.”
My friend, the visual artist Daniel Maidman, emailed me shortly thereafter and said: “If you dress up in your class clothes and send a picture in them, I’ll do a loose line drawing in colored pencils of each one for you to post with your lessons or whatever your format is. No need to, but I’ve been puzzling over something creative to do with your missed dress-up opportunity all afternoon.”
Doing something creative with a missed opportunity sounded perfect, as did taking this chance to give my classes something unexpected that could make me more real than just an email address zapping assignments at them through a flat dead screen.
With the help of my spouse, Martin Seay—I took photos of myself in various poses in all 20 outfits I would’ve worn over the 10-week Spring Quarter. I sent them to Dani, who in turn is making 20 fantastic drawing-collages. In addition to sharing them with my students remotely on days the class would’ve met, I’m sharing them here. Here’s Day One: