Body Politics Research Post

Body Politics Sketchbook Pages

Body Politics Completed Poster

Body Politics Artist Statement

This piece was inspired by the culture in which we live where rappers relate themselves to gods and society elevates them to this status. The rapper's inflated ego has always been an established and recurring element, but recently they have begun comparing themselves to gods, believing there was no higher being that they could compare themselves to to show their greatness. This, however unfavorable, would be tolerable if it wasn't for the fact that society themselves now view them as gods as well, even while recognizing the slight comical and ridiculous air of it. At some point, society suddenly switched to worshiping these rappers in the way that the artists wanted, treating them with the same reverence, or sometimes even more, of an idolized God.

Kanye, being the most prevalent subject of this aspect of society with his Yeezus persona, then became the center of my work. By showing Kanye wearing biblical robes while employing his classic ice cream-eating pose, the viewer is prompted to think about why exactly these rappers are so elevated in society, when they are, in reality, comically ridiculous figures. The shirt works in tandem with this poster by displaying a barrage of quotes from various rappers relating themselves to the divine, so show what a truly widespread phenomenon this is. It was then styled to resemble tour date posters as well as festival lineup posters, where the most important headlining position and sizing is given to the quote that most strongly connects rap artists with gods.

Shirt Final

Body Politics Research Post

These are numerous quotes I've found relating rappers to the divine or god. I made this to look aesthetically kind of like how festival posters will make the headliner much bigger, and as the quotes relate the rap artist more closely to a god, the quote gets larger. I think I might rearrange this, however, and make the text white with just black rectangles encasing it, much like how lyrics appear online when you look them up. In addition to this, it needs something on the bottom, so I think I'll probably create a graphic of praying hands, much like appears on Drake's If You're Reading This It's Too Late album cover.

Body Politics Research Post

Lookin a little rough so far but Yeezus Eats Ice Cream ( working title I reference it by) is progressing.

Body Politics Research Post

Other religious celebrity icon inspired images I've created as prints

Body Politics Research Post-Poster Inspirations

So I started off looking at really simple designs, because I realized I liked the really graphic aesthetic compared to something more realistic, and I really like a minimal design.

But then upon exploring further and contemplating my concept more, I realized I wanted to do a portrait most likely, which led me to some more classic examples for inspiration sources.

So then I looked specifically for posters that merged the two: a portrait with a more stylized, graphic, block-color look.

So those were what I was thinking about doing as far as the style in which I create them. But then I just started researching posters relating to religion and rappers, mainly Kanye because of his Yeezus persona, and just amassed a bunch of different resources to draw from and research how others have gone about depicting these themes.

Final Project Ideas and Shirt Size

T-shirt size: X-small (or small if there's no x-small available)
T-shirt color: white


My idea for this project isn't necessarily centered around political issues, but I wanted to delve into the comparison between religion and celebrity culture, if possible. It's a really strong theme in some of my other work, as far as elevating celebrities, especially rappers, to the status of gods because they like to do so in a lot of their music anyways, and I feel like a propaganda project would be a really great way to represent this concept. I thought it would be interesting to push religion as a brand just like these rappers do with themselves, whom they relate to gods.

So that was my main idea, and beyond that I haven't really developed any others that I'm really that excited about. I toyed with doing political issues like women's rights and things like that that I believe are super important in politics, but then I'm worried whatever art I make based on that topic will just turn out looking like an old, tired, excessively-reblogged post you see posted on Tumblr or by your super militant feminist social justice warrior friends on Facebook. And I would rather avoid that, and I'm really excited about the rap gods because it's more in line with my work and it's a topic I love exploring, so I think I might go with that one.

Calligram

Nature Artist Statement

My intent with this piece was to show the relationship between man and the restrictions we place between us and nature. Nature parks always have signs posted to keeps humans in line, that are intended to keep nature pristine and preserved. But so often these signs can seem extreme, in that they spell out very explicit instructions on what you can and can’t do. So I wanted to push that to the extreme and place a sign at a park that restricts humans even touching and interacting with the nature. It just pushes this distance from something we claim to want to preserve even further. On the flip side, I wanted to show how we restrict nature itself as well. For example, any wildlife or animal preserve you visit will likely include fences or cages. And any way they spin it, we all know it’s for the safety of humans so they don’t get too immersed in nature because what happens may be dangerous or scary. But we don’t realize that these boundaries for our safety also restrict the wildlife itself in ways that may harm it or alter its natural state of being. So I decided to push this to the extreme as well, and restrict an animal’s basic nature because it can be “dangerous,” to show how ridiculous this is. These pieces were then placed side by side to show the self-imposed space we keep between us and nature and all the ridiculousness of it in a comical way.

Nature: Final

Nature: Research

These photos really express my thoughts for my project, in that they show this almost fear of nature, and restrict humans or the natural element accordingly, like how the dogs are only allowed off their leashes in a certain area, and even then not if they're going to poop or do anything gross like that, and so these limitations of natural processes really got me thinking in changing park signs to limiting nature or one's experience with nature.

Nature: Research

Andy Goldsworthy, another example of man's manipulation of nature, although his is much more natural. Also his sculptures and photographs are just stunning and I've geeked out over his work since high school, the ice and the eggs made of stones are so impeccable and wonderful.

Nature: Research

Kate MacDowell
Ceramics

Nature: Research

Maya Lin has been one of my favorite artists for a long while when it comes to dealing with nature. I had the incredible opportunity to see some of her work when her exhibit was displayed at the Orlando Museum of Art and just the scale of the pieces is so overwhelming and can't possibly be imagined by the pictures you see online or even on her website. I really like the way she shows man's interaction with nature, and Synthetic Landscape and Serpent Mound are some of my favorite works of hers. It really made me think about how humans influence the nature around us, which turned me towards my concept of the restrictions concerning nature.

http://www.mayalin.com

Nature: Research

Maya Lin
Serpent Mound

Nature: In Process

Fixing some shadows

Nature: In Process

Nature: In Process

Gradient Mesh

The most beautiful apple.

Illustrator Cupcake

Nature Project: In-process works

For my project I have been messing around with photographs that depict nature taking over a crumbling interior, like nature taking back over what man has made, which are the first two photographs, and even a photograph of a girl looking over this scene observing the process. But then I've also been messing around with flipping a clearly manmade space into a nature scene and doing the opposite for the second photo in the diptych, which is the last photo shown here. I'm not yet sure which direction I for sure want to go in, but these are my ideas so far.

Lynda Tutorials Tracing Bear

Illustrator Skull

Nature Project: Let's take some photos

Many many outdoor photos, far more than 10 for sure

And 10 indoor ones as well