College Work 2016-2017
AP Studio Concentration
We live in an external world where we interact with people, places, and things around us. However, we exist in an internal realm as well, where we process the intangible events that take place in our lives. Sometimes these two worlds come together and sometimes they observe each other from afar. I used the human body as a landscape to contrast internal and external spaces, focusing on portraying emotions as people search for a home, and pick up the pieces when their sense of home gets redefined.
Each piece was meant to show a connection to the external world while maintaining a personal element, as if the body is the earth and the weather rolls over it, shaping it as it moves.
A personal journey of finding “home” and losing it inspired these pieces. I pictured the devastation left behind when a person leaves as waves and storm clouds rolling inside the body. Multiple pieces touched on the feeling of being incomplete, while trying to stay connected to what I thought I’d lost. The telephone piece was an attempt to hold on to the connection long distance, but it was never quite enough. “I can see your words but they lost a piece of you with every mile they traveled to me. I can see your words but I don’t hear your voice.” The stage of holding on to my envisioned sense of home passes as I realize how destructive it can be to live in the past, and how dangerous it is to rely on someone else to feel at home. Trying to live through phone calls left the external world almost irrelevant as I tried to live in the internal space of my mind. “My home is in my mind, but so are you. So if you’re not here, where’s my home?” Feeling displaced and utterly homeless can suddenly make the universe seem very small and it isn’t until the rain storms and tornadoes have ravaged our body that we, as humans, realize that it is time to move on, that another person cannot define your home unless you let them, and when that person begins to tear your home from its’ foundation, it may be time to ride those winds to somewhere new.
Each piece was meant to show a connection to the external world while maintaining a personal element, as if the body is the earth and the weather rolls over it, shaping it as it moves.
A personal journey of finding “home” and losing it inspired these pieces. I pictured the devastation left behind when a person leaves as waves and storm clouds rolling inside the body. Multiple pieces touched on the feeling of being incomplete, while trying to stay connected to what I thought I’d lost. The telephone piece was an attempt to hold on to the connection long distance, but it was never quite enough. “I can see your words but they lost a piece of you with every mile they traveled to me. I can see your words but I don’t hear your voice.” The stage of holding on to my envisioned sense of home passes as I realize how destructive it can be to live in the past, and how dangerous it is to rely on someone else to feel at home. Trying to live through phone calls left the external world almost irrelevant as I tried to live in the internal space of my mind. “My home is in my mind, but so are you. So if you’re not here, where’s my home?” Feeling displaced and utterly homeless can suddenly make the universe seem very small and it isn’t until the rain storms and tornadoes have ravaged our body that we, as humans, realize that it is time to move on, that another person cannot define your home unless you let them, and when that person begins to tear your home from its’ foundation, it may be time to ride those winds to somewhere new.