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| The Present betwixt by a Future possibility |
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| A closeup of the second part of the image |
Process/Materials Explanation
Contemporary media influences how we view the world and how we wish to change it. Media today now partially reflects the prevailing attitudes people have regarding race, sex, gender, and identity. 10-20 years prior almost everything in media was extremely cookie cutter showcasing the same tired tropes that emerged in the last 50-100 years. (Men are masculine, Women are feminine, only weird people wear nonpopular clothing, the emotional depth of a wet blanket). It only recently has begun to reflect the extreme diversity of humanity that has existed throughout its whole history. As the media becomes more diverse and loose in its foundations so do the prevailing views of people. It becomes a self-reinforcing loop, a runaway effect that feeds into the self. It becomes a chicken or an egg situation wherein which influences which first is unknown.
These themes in the artist we looked at are shown by how they create their work. Each of their styles is the complete opposite of the dominant work of many artists of the past few centuries. The artists each have a unique style in how they wish to show themselves, society, or some social message. They all break away from the realistic and tame depictions of life and showcase the dynamicness of life and all the wonders and at times horrors of it.
I was inspired by Hannah Hoch’s Dadaism and its cutting and pasting of newspapers and images to create a narrative. I attempted to emulate parts of this style in my artwork. I also took a bit of the generalness of surrealism to create something that could only exist only a dream.
There wasn’t any influence from advertising and fashion in my project at all.
My project is what if were to open our heads and pull out little snippets of ourselves. Each piece of paper is titled a personality trait or experience and its corresponding description. Further along the image, it splits in two. One path laden in blood showcases the deepest fears many people have in society and how it colors our view of the future. These are the thoughts, the fears, the anxieties everyone has today personified as newspaper clippings. The other path is guided by an olive branch representing peace. Here are the thoughts of an optimist or at the very least a realist. These are the hopes for the future, the continuation of mankind. The fears of today are just for today and that the future, even if appearing bleak still can be positive in the future even if it’s not our future. The two pictures of the earth represent what these futures could look like. One earth ravaged and polluted its ocean significantly risen consuming vast swaths of land. The other is a view at night of a world full of cities covering the globe and next to it a moon covered in the same cities. Further along, the image has another set of heads that splits into the same set of paths. For each moment in time, we live we choose whether to work towards paradise or towards hell. Even though we work towards either fate we can never reach either but continue on a path that twists and turns.
My project speaks to the parts of me that are in conflict. The first half of me is the fearful one, the one that sees only the doom in the world. The other half is the hopeful one, the one that sees the good in the world. Many others and I hold varying amounts of these two states of mind every day. For every good piece of news, another bad takes it place pushing and pulling this balance. The headlines I wrote for the two paths in the image related to the sensationalism media places on things that occur. The over-exaggeration of things is most prominent in today’s media. Media today has an especially prominent negativity bias but if reversed to a positivity bias it would still be wrong.
""Kahlo suffered extensively for much of her life, and the most moving section of the show is devoted to her ecosystem of medical devices. But Kahlo did not conceal her pain, revealing her casts and leather braces with metal buckles in her work and turning her plaster corsets into art with elaborate designs of flowers, even a hammer and sickle. “She treated these second skins as canvases,” Ms. Small said.""
"If we look closely at the cacophony of seemingly random images that make up Hannah Höch’s large-scale photomontage, a cross-section of Weimar Germany’s cultural and political milieu comes into focus. Here, the “Kitchen Knife Dada”—a metaphor for Höch’s careful slicing and dicing—cuts a swath from lower right to upper left, separating Dada and “anti-dada” elements."
I used a photograph of my face profile view as the base of the picture. I then separated by face from my head. From there I went and digitally edited various objects for the photo. The paper clippings were created by me using a base image from the internet and then writing on top of it. They were laid on top of each other to give the look of a stack of papers. The first globe on the image (topright) was created by using a mix of Google Earth and an image I edited to get a dystopian look. The second image below was taken from a TV show with the moon next to it coming from the same show. The background towards the left side of the image is two newspapers a very lightly seen one and a prominent one in the bottom corner. To blend both sides of the image a gradient was used and blurred to connect both sides of the picture. The three real objects were taken from stock images and aligned to fit.
Image inspiration
Project Description
My project showcases the theme of artistic independence and creativity. Each of the artists we learned about broke from the mold of how art should be. Be it the extremely surrealist work of Wangechi Mutu or the diverse and colorful work of Mickalene Thomas.Contemporary media influences how we view the world and how we wish to change it. Media today now partially reflects the prevailing attitudes people have regarding race, sex, gender, and identity. 10-20 years prior almost everything in media was extremely cookie cutter showcasing the same tired tropes that emerged in the last 50-100 years. (Men are masculine, Women are feminine, only weird people wear nonpopular clothing, the emotional depth of a wet blanket). It only recently has begun to reflect the extreme diversity of humanity that has existed throughout its whole history. As the media becomes more diverse and loose in its foundations so do the prevailing views of people. It becomes a self-reinforcing loop, a runaway effect that feeds into the self. It becomes a chicken or an egg situation wherein which influences which first is unknown.
Writing
The artist we learned about showcased that what was once traditional art can be broken and transformed into something new and dynamic. That still life’s and realistic depictions of life are not the sole means of displaying artistic talent. but are just one tool people can use to express themselves, society, or some other message. Also, anyone can be the center of an artwork and not just the dominant group in society.These themes in the artist we looked at are shown by how they create their work. Each of their styles is the complete opposite of the dominant work of many artists of the past few centuries. The artists each have a unique style in how they wish to show themselves, society, or some social message. They all break away from the realistic and tame depictions of life and showcase the dynamicness of life and all the wonders and at times horrors of it.
I was inspired by Hannah Hoch’s Dadaism and its cutting and pasting of newspapers and images to create a narrative. I attempted to emulate parts of this style in my artwork. I also took a bit of the generalness of surrealism to create something that could only exist only a dream.
There wasn’t any influence from advertising and fashion in my project at all.
My project is what if were to open our heads and pull out little snippets of ourselves. Each piece of paper is titled a personality trait or experience and its corresponding description. Further along the image, it splits in two. One path laden in blood showcases the deepest fears many people have in society and how it colors our view of the future. These are the thoughts, the fears, the anxieties everyone has today personified as newspaper clippings. The other path is guided by an olive branch representing peace. Here are the thoughts of an optimist or at the very least a realist. These are the hopes for the future, the continuation of mankind. The fears of today are just for today and that the future, even if appearing bleak still can be positive in the future even if it’s not our future. The two pictures of the earth represent what these futures could look like. One earth ravaged and polluted its ocean significantly risen consuming vast swaths of land. The other is a view at night of a world full of cities covering the globe and next to it a moon covered in the same cities. Further along, the image has another set of heads that splits into the same set of paths. For each moment in time, we live we choose whether to work towards paradise or towards hell. Even though we work towards either fate we can never reach either but continue on a path that twists and turns.
My project speaks to the parts of me that are in conflict. The first half of me is the fearful one, the one that sees only the doom in the world. The other half is the hopeful one, the one that sees the good in the world. Many others and I hold varying amounts of these two states of mind every day. For every good piece of news, another bad takes it place pushing and pulling this balance. The headlines I wrote for the two paths in the image related to the sensationalism media places on things that occur. The over-exaggeration of things is most prominent in today’s media. Media today has an especially prominent negativity bias but if reversed to a positivity bias it would still be wrong.
Quotes
"If we look closely at the cacophony of seemingly random images that make up Hannah Höch’s large-scale photomontage, a cross-section of Weimar Germany’s cultural and political milieu comes into focus. Here, the “Kitchen Knife Dada”—a metaphor for Höch’s careful slicing and dicing—cuts a swath from lower right to upper left, separating Dada and “anti-dada” elements."
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