First Year Writing Prize | Fall ’26
October 26, 2026
The HSA department was very pleased to award this year’s First Year Writing Prize to Jackson Giumarra at a small ceremony during Convocation. Every year, the HSA faculty nominates writing by first year students for our First Year Writing Prize. The winner is chosen by a committee of HSA faculty who read the nominated papers. The award consists of a certificate, a check, and the author’s name on a plaque in our hallway. This year’s winning paper came from Professor Bill Alves’ HSA 10 section, and it’s an analysis of the work of American artist Barnett Newman, titled, “The New(man) Sublime: Barnett Newman’s Transformation of the Sublime” showing how Barnett’s art transforms the transcendence of the sublime into a profound awareness of one’s own existence. The judges praised the paper for its rigorous argument, weaving together multiple kinds of evidence including philosophical text, images, and artist’s statements.
Jackson is from Bakersfield, California, about 2 hours north of Claremont. As of right now, he hasn’t declared a major, but is considering both chemistry and engineering. We asked him how he got interested in Newman and he told us:
“I hadn’t heard of Newman before taking HSA 10. I grew up in a religious household and have been trying to explore spirituality outside of organized religion. Newman’s work helped me to further explore this. The sublime has long been expressed through religious imagery and grandeur, and Newman took it and made it accessible to anybody. He transformed the sublime from a transcendental experience where one confronts something external to a simple moment that causes one to look inward, creating an intense awareness of one’s existence in the present moment. His paintings don’t ask the viewer to believe in or know anything. They are an experience anybody can have. That idea resonated with me and my ideas of spirituality.”
We congratulate Jackson for his excellent work in this paper! The department looks forward to seeing all of the great writing that this year’s first year students will do this spring in HSA 10.