9/11/2017 0 Comments CagedI grew up in the same city, Irvine, California, my entire life before I moved across the country to Pittsburgh for college. Irvine is known for being an extraordinarily safe planned city, like a 'bubble.' Throughout my 18 years living there, I often felt trapped and restricted by the city, my strict and overprotective environment, and the preconceptions that people started to have of me after living there with the same people for so long.
I portrayed this feeling of hopelessness and entrapment through the white cage surrounding the bird, which represents me. Everything in Irvine, just like the cage, is very sterile and white, both physically and emotionally; the bird is the only object of color in the project, because it wants to explore past the blandness of the cage. The bird's wings at the beginning are at rest, and it is unable to fly. At the front of the cage, I cut out various shapes that represented different aspects in which I felt trapped, both big and small; these shapes primarily make up the cage in which I am trapped, both physically and symbolically. The chicken represents my part-time job that I had at a popcorn chicken restaurant for 10 months; the bubbles at the bottom left corner represent Irvine as a city; the hands in the center represent my shyness prevalent throughout my childhood. All these are either roles I played, personality traits, or something physical I left behind in Irvine when I came to Pittsburgh. In breaking this cage, the bird is finally able to leave all of this behind, and get ready to take flight, seen in the last three photos. In leaving my home for college, I hope to leave behind a stifling city, my roles, and insecurities and get a brand new start to explore both myself and the world, just like the bird. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |