Studio 5Exhibition Text
December 2016
Digital Collage Title; Distorted Existentialism My inspiration for the piece Distorted Existentialism came from Andy Warhol's two works, "Truck Portfolio" and "Mao Portfolio"and "Persistence of Memory" by Salvador Dali. The piece was created through detailed manipulation of photos that I took in my trip to Palestine in the summer of 2016, where I brought back landscape photos for manipulation. Inspiration & ResearchWhen researching these two artists, Andy Warhol and Salvador Dali, something I had to keep in mind was the fact that these two artists were producing their work relatively the same time as each other, and had even died two years apart. Despite this, their work and pieces produced are very different, within different movements, mediums and overall styles. Although I was able to take inspiration from these pieces because I am able to take away a very similar interpretation. Both Truck and Mao portofolio share a sense of exitentalism with Persistence of Memory, where they do not covey some sort of common theme to even the majority of the people. While other researchers believe the overall theme within Persistance of Memory is time, while Dali himself said that he painted this piece to "systematize confusion and thus to help discredit completely the world of reality", which leaves the piece to even more room for individual interpretation. On the other spectrum, with Warhol in the pop art movement who created works based from what was intriguing while leaving his work up to interpretation to an even further.
Process & ExperimentationWith the inspiration and methods of Warhol and Dali in mind, a goal created was to leave the piece to interpretation while presenting a clear connection to my sources of inspiration through similar utilization of their methods and piece techniques. The process began with choosing a high definition photo for use, and immediately it became clear that in order for Warhol to be properly represented in my piece, it would be a wise choice to include a person, I had chosen a cousin who I have in Palestine. Although a front facing photo would strengthen the connection to Warhol, I found that after experimentation, it would sever the connection to Dali, which led me to have a side profile rather than front. Copying the image and creating multiple panels and allowed me show the changes and other effects that I had implemented, a design element inspired directly from Warhol, while the distortion that I included came from Dali piece that I researched. The color manipulation was done through a tool available on Photoshop that allows you input numeric values to change the visual hues present within the selected portion of the photo. The Distortion was done through the use of "Clone tool" on Photoshop as well which allowed me to create the distortion effect through the use of patterns and textures that were already present within the photo.
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ReflectionIn conlcusion, my piece "Distorted Exitentialism" did accomplish my goal of conveying its theme in a similar method involving interpretation such as in the Works of Dali and Warhol. Despite this, in this piece there are multiple ways in which I believe I can imporve on. One example being, how I could have added more panels and within each panel manipulating the same photo even further, which if done through distortion and color manipulation, could strenghthen the connection between my two sources of inspiration at the same time. In additon, I believe that there is plenty of room of room to improve on proffesonalism within the piece, which allow the work to more effectively represent the time invested as well.
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ACT Questions
1. Clearly Explain how you are able to identify the cause effect relationships between your inspiration and its effect upon your artwork.
The connection between the inspiration and final piece can be identified within the method and techniques used within the piece, and similar design elements that can immediately seen upon observation.
2. What is the overall approach (point of view) the author(from your research) has regarding the topic of your inspiration?
The author of my research that had written their interpretation of the works that I took inspiration from would believe that my interpretation is missing the message or theme that the artists were attempting to convey. Which if further investigated is not true, because when I drew my interpretation, I also considered what the artists had told the people at the time.
3. What kind of generalizations and conclusions have you discovered about people, ideas, culture, etc, while you were researched your inspiration?
Something I did not realize unil performing the research for this piece was that despite these two artists inspirations living in the same time period while working around similar themes, the work created is still vastly diffrent in method and technique and final product.
4. What was the central idea or theme around your inspirational research?
The Central idea or theme that was present around my research was definitely self interpretation because despite these two artists creating very diffrent work, in the same time period, they both share an element of self inerpretation within the two piecs. Neither piece or work from these artists, convey a specific message that an observer could take away.
5. What kind of inferences (conclusions reached on the basis of evidence and reasoning) did you make while reading your research?
An inference that I had immediately made in the very early stages that proved to be completely incorect was that the two artists that I had been investigating must have been working within completely different time periods because of the diffrences within their work, despite this, the artists did indeed work within the same century and had even passed away two years apart.
The connection between the inspiration and final piece can be identified within the method and techniques used within the piece, and similar design elements that can immediately seen upon observation.
2. What is the overall approach (point of view) the author(from your research) has regarding the topic of your inspiration?
The author of my research that had written their interpretation of the works that I took inspiration from would believe that my interpretation is missing the message or theme that the artists were attempting to convey. Which if further investigated is not true, because when I drew my interpretation, I also considered what the artists had told the people at the time.
3. What kind of generalizations and conclusions have you discovered about people, ideas, culture, etc, while you were researched your inspiration?
Something I did not realize unil performing the research for this piece was that despite these two artists inspirations living in the same time period while working around similar themes, the work created is still vastly diffrent in method and technique and final product.
4. What was the central idea or theme around your inspirational research?
The Central idea or theme that was present around my research was definitely self interpretation because despite these two artists creating very diffrent work, in the same time period, they both share an element of self inerpretation within the two piecs. Neither piece or work from these artists, convey a specific message that an observer could take away.
5. What kind of inferences (conclusions reached on the basis of evidence and reasoning) did you make while reading your research?
An inference that I had immediately made in the very early stages that proved to be completely incorect was that the two artists that I had been investigating must have been working within completely different time periods because of the diffrences within their work, despite this, the artists did indeed work within the same century and had even passed away two years apart.