Orgullo Ciego By Wilfredo menendez
Inspiration: For this piece I decided to use a german expressionist style of block printing. This was mainly because of the fact that german expressionism was used to show pain, sorrow or critisism of society. These are all things that I portrayed in my piece. But similar to german expressionism, these emotions aren't immediately identifiable.
|
Meaning: Many of my pieces tackle contemporary social issues and this one is no different. Recently in Puerto Rico it has been discovered that a large amount of coal ashes, from the countries energy plants, have been being dumped in a landfill near a town. These ashes have not only had a negative impact on the surroinding fauna, they have also had a negative effect on the health of the citizens of said town. Even though this has been going on for many years, and that the effects of this had been discovered many months ago, it was ignored until now. Elections in the island just concluded last month, and only one of the candidates running for governor of the island mentioned the issue. What this shows me, and the people of Puerto Rico is that the candidates from the major parties don't like to address the messy topics. I watched the election unfold closely, and one thing that I noticed is that candidates ran on artificial campaigns. All they ever talked about was the good things their party had done, and not what they would fix if elected. They ran campaigns on patriotic platforms that pushed blind pride (which just happens to be the name of this piece). They indirectly encouraged people to ignore the things wrong with the country. So, through this piece I wanted to portray this way of campaigning.
Process and Reflection: One thing that I found difficult while making this piece was the printing process. I have definetly improved on the process since I did a blockprint last year, but I'm still not where I wish I could be, hence it still took way too many tries to get a clean print. Another thing I found difficult was the actual carving process. Since it requires a good amount of force to carve the piece, sometimes I use too much force and carve too far. I found this mainly happens when trying to carve small parts like the hands and legs. Another difficult thing to make was parts with lots of detail, like the star. It took immense carefulness to make the legs of the star. One thing I like about blockprints, is the way it makes you think of new ways to make objects. For example, the man in the piece, I couldn't have made it as if I was just sketching him, so I had to use shapes to make an abstract figure of a man.
ACT Questions:
- My inspiration is clearly reflected on my work. I used the rugged features of german expressionism in the actual making of the work and you can also see it in the theme.
- Both me and German Expressionist artists focused on the parts of our cultures that people, in my case politicians, don't like to talk about and just like to hide.
- During my research I have found that many aspects of Puerto Rican political campaigns are a mix of American campaign styles with Latin American cmapaign methods.
- The major theme around my research was elements of Puerto Rican election culture, I also wanted aspects that are still visible in modern society in the island, to show all the things that are wrong with it.
- While researching I found that German Expressionist Artist, much like myself focuses on culture of his home country. Which I inferred is because, he is proud of where he is from and wants to share it with the world.
Research:
Schmidt-Rottluf, Karl. Kopf/Kristus. 1918. Genius. Spaight Wood Galleries. Web. Oct. 2015.
Pechstein, Max. Head. 1920. Almanach 1920. Spaight Wood Galleries. Web. Oct. 2015.
Schmidt-Rottluf, Karl. Kopf/Kristus. 1918. Genius. Spaight Wood Galleries. Web. Oct. 2015.
Pechstein, Max. Head. 1920. Almanach 1920. Spaight Wood Galleries. Web. Oct. 2015.