Friends
My art shows three people of different races all together. I’d like to think it shows that regardless of skin or culture, what really matters is your kindness and personality.
February
Stronger Together
Our piece is a visual and interactive art piece which is documented as a single photo collage for the purposes of judging. The piece consists of a path covered with chalk footprints as well as quotes that exemplify the themes of hope and justice. The mission of our organization is to provide mental health support in a youth-driven, community based manner, so here we focused on emphasizing the importance of unity and community to create hope and justice. Every trail of footprints represents a member of our community who worked on the project, building and walking the path of hope together. The quotes we chose were relevant to individuals and the group as a whole, and were intended to reflect our sentiments on mental health. The piece serves as a reminder to us that we should always be hopeful because there is a large, passionate community around us, and that together we can create our own justice by breaking down the stigma around mental health. We hope that others take away the same message, and we created the piece so that it is visible from the sidewalk to passerby.
Dandelions
In my design I wanted to show that there is more than one way to look at something. In life we can choose to focus on the positive or we can focus on the negative. Every day is an opportunity to see the good.
Changes
Throughout my school years I have struggle myself with people putting labels on me: I’m the SPED kid, I’m not able to do this or hearing I can’t do that or complete a task because of my challenges with ADHD. I also experienced recently cultural discrimination at school by peers because of being Latina, because of my parents immigrants roots, or because I’m an English Learner still at school. When I worked on this piece, I just wanted to let my feelings and emotions out, and let the world and myself know that I’m free of labels, I can be more than 1 thing, I can be so many things and I can be good at them. I’m aware of my challenges and labels don’t define me.
A Sea of Garments
The concept behind my artwork is fast fashion and the many cases of abuse to which it is connected to. What my artwork represents is a teen who is saddened by the effect of fast fashion, but ignorant of their growing contributions to it. A figure with flowing hair is contrasted by the more explicit forms of fabric despite herself being made of fabric. She is the color of the ocean to represent its vast depth. This is representative of the growing production of clothing that gets larger every year; it almost seems that we’re drowning in a mountain of clothes. This is further enhanced by my chosen medium, consisting of fibrous materials (fabric and yarn) to emulate the materials used in the textile industry. The figure is closing her eyes to represent her ignorance of the problem as it grows around her. Despite the clothing, like I was alluding to earlier she is a part of the problem as well. Her rapid consumerism is taking hold of her life and hurting her simultaneously.
Self Love
I chose this category because self love is extremely important to me because I have personally struggled with it. While doing this I learned how many people are dissatisfied with themselves and it really made me frown but I’m glad that society as a whole can have a huge impact on this problem, and we can all learn to love ourselves!
There’s always light
I chose hope because I feel like sometimes there isn’t enough hope in this world. Sometimes it seems so sad, or drowsy. So I choose hope, because everyone should have a flame of hope inside them!
The Whole Pointe
The reason I chose this category was because when I myself was going through a hard time, I used dance to find hope. I wanted to let everyone know that there will always be hope, but when you let go of the string, hope can fly away. I was originally going to have the balloon up further from the dancer. However, that felt like hope was flying away. I almost didn’t add the balloon at all. I had to make several changes to it and had to redo it a few times because I felt that the message wasn’t clear. After a long debate in my head, I finally settled on the dancer holding the very tip of the ballon. Something that I learned was that hope can be lost at times, but as long as you focus on the positive, you’ll be able to retrieve your balloon again. (I also learned that I should never mix watercolor paints and acrylic paint together when I’m making an ombre.)
We Can See Hope
“We CAN See hope. This project was completed 100% virtually with all students/teachers online. We wanted to express what this past year has held within education and how all of us can still see HOPE. This is their reality, and with the help from their community and state, they can succeed. Mental Health Matters to ALL of us, and this is the most important time to SEE HOPE!”
A Day in My Life
The way my speech relates to what was asked, I wrote about the unfairness I encountered in my life, the discrimination and stereotypes I’ve been put in, and the injustice. I wrote about how many infortunate events have blocked me from getting to my full potential. I find myself being afraid to go out and play in my community and always looking behind our car wondering if the policeman was going to stop my family or if I see a policeman, it makes me feel anxious, uncomfortable, nervous. , and unsafe.