NARRATOR：

Listen to a conversation between a student and his art history professor.

FEMALE PROFESSOR：

How was the museum?

MALE STUDENT：

Great. I hadn't been there for a few years.

FEMALE PROFESSOR：

Did you enjoy the Van Gogh painting?

MALE STUDENT：

That's the thing-looks like I have to change my topic...

FEMALE PROFESSOR：

[concerned tone] Hmm, we're getting close to the deadline....

You were writing about the theme of night in the paintings of Vincent van Gogh? It-it's a wonderful topic...

MALE STUDENT：

I know.... People don't usually think of Van Gogh as an artist of nocturnal themes.

They think of brightness, sunshine... all that yellow and orange.

FEMALE PROFESSOR：

You're right, of course, about the intense light associated with his daytime paintings, but his night paintings don't exactly lack brightness.

MALE STUDENT：

That's the paradox that I really like-the paradox of painting a nighttime scene using so much color and light.

So I was planning to focus mostly on his painting Starry Night.

FEMALE PROFESSOR：

But?

MALE STUDENT：

When I went to the museum to look at the actual painting, like you told me to, it wasn't there.

FEMALE PROFESSOR：

Really? [surprised tone] Isn't it part of the permanent collection?

MALE STUDENT：

Yes, but it's on loan right now to a museum in Europe.

FEMALE PROFESSOR：

[disappointed tone] I see. Well, I am strict about having students write about paintings they can observe firsthand.

MALE STUDENT：

Well, I found another painting I could study instead...

FEMALE PROFESSOR：

OK...

MALE STUDENT：

I read that there are two paintings called Starry Night.

The first one was done by the French Realist painter Millet... It may've been the inspiration for Van Gogh's painting.

Millet's painting is located near my family's house in Connecticut-and I'm going there this weekend, and could study it then.

I made sure it's not out on loan...

FEMALE PROFESSOR：

That definitely would work, then.

Van Gogh copied many of Millet's compositions.

We know that he really admired Millet's work.

And a lot of us think Van Gogh saw this particular painting by Millet in Paris in the late 1700s.

MALE STUDENT：

Yeah. Although Millet was a Realist painter and Van Gogh a Postimpressionist, the two paintings still share lots of features-not just the name.

The most striking shared feature has got to be the amazing light effects.

I'm excited to go see it. But, one other thing...

FEMALE PROFESSOR：

Uh-huh?

MALE STUDENT：

I was thinking about getting a head start on my next assignment while I'm at the gallery in Connecticut-the assignment on miniatures.

They have a lot of miniature portraits of children as part of their permanent collection...

FEMALE PROFESSOR：

American miniatures?

MALE STUDENT：

Yeah. So I figured I could also get started on that essay... study a few while I'm there.

I'd focus on the meaning of the objects that some of the children are holding; some are holding flowers, one child has a rattle, another a toy violin...

FEMALE PROFESSOR：

That would be fine.

Uh, those objects-we call them attributes.

The attribute chosen to be included in a particular miniature was often meant to communicate parents' hopes and dreams for their child.

So I think you'll learn a lot about how people viewed children at the time the miniature paintings were done.