Thursday, May 1, 2008

BFA Illustration Senior Show, May 6-10, 2008

its going to be long and boring reading, my apologies.
i am attaching here the description of the thesis project, corresponding images will be added shortly.

In my thesis project I decided to concentrate on imagery illustrating the correlation between solar and human activity in 3 panels.
Medium: ink/litho pencil on tracing paper, acrylic washes, scale 18X22 inches.

Part I. BCE / A Stormy Past
The first panel depicts sun worship in different cultures mainly before the Common Era, starting with the sun chariot of Nordic Bronze Age mythology. The central piece done after the sun goddess Arinna reflects both the idea of the sun as a source of life and early matriarchal societies.

Part II. The Journey begins. Tough but patient diplomacy.
In this panel some images are dedicated to the solar deity, while others are related to the new patriarchal religions that had been formed – Christianity and Islam. The Western world is represented in the upper left section of the panel; the right section of the panel depicts images from Eastern Europe to illustrate the idea that with the formation of the Eastern Orthodox Church, the division between East and West became more distinct. Two low parts contain artifacts of the Americas, Africa and Oceania as well as patterns from the Islamic world. As the world was getting both larger, more various and more integrated, although displaced from the center of universe, both trade and cultural transmission were expanding national reach, while the Guttenberg Bible, the progress of arts and crafts, and the beginning of the scientific revolution took place, along with many wars and diseases.
The main image in the center of the composition (the sculpture from Maya culture) illustrates that the cultural interaction between Europeans and the Americas ended tragically for the Native Americans.

Part III. The Aftermath and Consequences
The composition in the upper section is based on a comparison of Austrian-German images and Soviet images. The lower section is dedicated to the USA and also a series of images from China, Japan, Korea, Vietnam, and Iraq. Here only the symbol of Falun Gong has any resemblance to the sun, other images represent man’s inhumanity to man.

By using elements with various graphic qualities I wanted to achieve a dynamic composition, stressing which integral parts are involved in the dialog, often times overlapping each other. Every human being, currently living or once lived, is an integral part of the circle of life, which could be ended very easily either by the efforts of the humans themselves or by some unforeseen events.