Owners of the World Series Piece 1 By Wilfredo menendez
Medium: Block print
Length: 9 Inches (22.86 cm) Width: 6 Inches (15.24 cm) Completed: October, 2015 The Old King by George Rouault & German Expressionism: As inspiration for this piece I used The Old King by Rouault. I saw a picture of this piece on the wall of my art teacher's classroom and thought that a interpretation of the piece would look good done in block print. However, I put more of a German expressionism spin on it. I did this by using the way of the kings position, but making it back and white and using lines from German expressionism style.
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Exhibition Text: The Meaning of this piece is to show how the powerful and rich 1% rule the world. Also, how they turn their back on anyone who isn't rich and powerful like them. This piece is kind off a social commentary and political commentary piece.
Process: In the process of carving I decided to get rid of the clouds. The process of this piece was very stressful. It took me two days to carve my piece. During the carving process my thumb and index finger hurt very much, but I got a lot of process done these two days. The first day of printing I created 8 block-prints with no success. The second day I made 7 block-prints with the last one being successful.
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Planning Sketches: Above are my planning sketches and process pictures of the process of my piece and the experimentation I did with it.
Japanese Culture: For the background of my piece I used inspiration from a classic Japanese drawing style. The rising sun is very typical in Japanese culture. I used it to represent the "New World".
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Meaning: This piece is meant to represent the imbalance in our modern society between the rich 1% and the rest of the world. On the news recently there have been a lot of articles about activist and government officials fighting to even the scales and redistribute wealth. For example, Presidential Candidate Hillary Clinton runs her campaign on the "Trickle Down Effect" of redistributing wealth. In this piece the man with the crown is a representation of the rich 1% while the kind of disfigured hand at the bottom represent the 99%. One of the hands is holding a basket which is to represent the need for redistribution of wealth, especially the trickle down effect that should be more of a down pour. Another one of the hand is holding something resembling a lighting bolt that is meant to represent that the people have and should always have the power to change a unfair system.
Research:
Rouault, Georges. The Old King. 1936. N.p. Web. Oct. 2015.
Schmidt-Rottluf, Karl. Kopf/Kristus. 1918. Genius. Spaight Wood Galleries. Web. Oct. 2015.
Rouault, Georges. The Old King. 1936. N.p. Web. Oct. 2015.
Schmidt-Rottluf, Karl. Kopf/Kristus. 1918. Genius. Spaight Wood Galleries. Web. Oct. 2015.