Looking with Intention & Thoughtful Attention

 

Sunflower 'Chocolate Cherry' 2023. digital painting and photo collage.

This work requires the viewer to look with thoughtful attention to find the deeper meaning behind the visual. It's more about the viewer 'looking' rather than trying to figure out what the woman in the portrait is seeing. When we think about sunflowers, most of us think of or picture a tall golden sunflower. Some people might not even know that there are darker sunflowers. I didn't know this until my mother bought them. The sunflower in this piece is called the Chocolate Cherry Sunflower and is one of the darkest sunflowers, aside from the Chianti sunflower.  

Looking Past What You See 2023, digital painting.

Looking Past What You See is asking the viewer to do exactly that. When first looking at this, the eyes may pop out, and this would probably be the element in this portrait that a viewer will draw an interpretation from, wondering why the emerald-green eyes. But really this portrait is about looking past the eyes and seeing something else. 

Black Female Gaze 2023, digital painting.

This is a reference to a quote from the Bell Hooks reading about a scene from Passion of Remembrance: (1) "Dressing to go to a party, Louise and Maggies claim the gaze. Looking at one another, staring in mirrors. they appear completely focused on their encounter with black femaleness...Disturbing conventional racist and sexist stereotypical representations of black female bodies, these scenes invite the audience to look differently."

Bell Hooks Quotes: 

    1. "Dressing to go to a party, Louise and Maggies claim the gaze. Looking at one another, staring in mirrors. they appear completely focused on their encounter with black femaleness...Disturbing conventional racist and sexist stereotypical representations of black female bodies, these scenes invite the audience to look differently." pg. 130

    2. "Critical black female spectatorship emerges as a site of resistance only when individual black women actively resist the imposition of dominant ways of knowing and looking." pg. 128

Teens are Making Historical Events go Viral:

    1. "...the personification of countries in historical events is helpful in understanding intention...Crucially, these videos are providing an interpretation of the past." 

I've seen a few videos of teens playing everyday individuals who are affected by social issues in the past, but not much about personifying countries in historical events. In a sense, it is very similar. The videos I've seen are very clear interpretations of what teens have learned and they also provide a perspective from individuals who MAY HAVE experienced those events. 

    2. "...the videos are largely historically accurate, but even if they weren't they work as a useful historical tool..."

These videos can help in learning about historical events and the past because they sort of simplify the lesson into these quick and easy-to-understand videos. True, they may not be "complete" but these videos could be used as tools for understanding how an event happened when coupled with a lesson in classes.