kristen_grubbs
End of Days
Produced for an art challenge on "dystopias."
I don't even know how to describe how I got to this final product... I think this all came to be after a disorganized brainstorming session during which I thought of each terrible thing that would be represented in a dying culture. So I depicted a cruel and unusual death penalty, destruction of the female form and the objectification of a woman before an audience, book burning, a grey landscape, and a homogenized general populous. The onlookers are some sort of amalgamation of gas masks, the dress of fundamentalist religions*, and the (random) mental image of the Death Eaters from Harry Potter.
The books in the background symbolize the practice of shelving "banned" books and remind the viewer of all the famous possible dystopian universes. Titles included are The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood, V for Vendetta by Alan Moore & David Lloyd (title hidden), Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand, Children of Men by P.D. James, 1984 by George Orwell, The Road by Cormac McCarthy, Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess, The Trial by Franz Kafka, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick, and A Brave New World by Aldous Huxley.
*N.B. Though I was inspired by the hijab, a garment traditionally worn by Muslim women, I do not intend to give any particular commentary on whether or not I find the hijab to be a symbol of the oppression of women. I do not have a specific belief regarding the continued practice of Muslim women covering their heads in public. I thought of the garment because it has been so controversially thought of as a symbol of oppression and fundamentalism.
PrismaColor pencils, Sharpie, mechanical pencil.
End of Days
Produced for an art challenge on "dystopias."
I don't even know how to describe how I got to this final product... I think this all came to be after a disorganized brainstorming session during which I thought of each terrible thing that would be represented in a dying culture. So I depicted a cruel and unusual death penalty, destruction of the female form and the objectification of a woman before an audience, book burning, a grey landscape, and a homogenized general populous. The onlookers are some sort of amalgamation of gas masks, the dress of fundamentalist religions*, and the (random) mental image of the Death Eaters from Harry Potter.
The books in the background symbolize the practice of shelving "banned" books and remind the viewer of all the famous possible dystopian universes. Titles included are The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood, V for Vendetta by Alan Moore & David Lloyd (title hidden), Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand, Children of Men by P.D. James, 1984 by George Orwell, The Road by Cormac McCarthy, Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess, The Trial by Franz Kafka, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick, and A Brave New World by Aldous Huxley.
*N.B. Though I was inspired by the hijab, a garment traditionally worn by Muslim women, I do not intend to give any particular commentary on whether or not I find the hijab to be a symbol of the oppression of women. I do not have a specific belief regarding the continued practice of Muslim women covering their heads in public. I thought of the garment because it has been so controversially thought of as a symbol of oppression and fundamentalism.
PrismaColor pencils, Sharpie, mechanical pencil.