HW 21- Art Project 1

My art piece is a mirror. It represents the viewer watching the screen, headphones on, blocking out the world. To the person in my piece, let's call him "You", his physical self is nothing. That is why You is hunched over, eyes glazed over with 1's and 0's. The only way I was even able to draw this picture was through actual imagery, of both people around the world (Via the internet) and myself in a mirror. If you ever see somebody like You staring at a screen, it is clear to you that it is a mirror. However, from this mirror much can be built through self-realization. By seeing the way You looks at the screen in front of his face, the way he lacks any presence with his physical self, shows that he is overly immersed and others can see parts of themselves in this and correct their own ways so as not to end up like You.

This piece can make people feel through themselves. You represents something that everybody can relate to in some regard and people can decide for themselves if they think this is wrong or not and if they need to correct their own ways. The piece should be a little off-setting though, meaning you shouldn't feel completely comfortable with what you see You doing and the way You acts in front of the screen. If people can take a second after viewing this to reflect on their own ways in front of screens and with digital-representational-devices than the piece has served its purpose.

What was most interesting while making this piece was that in order to get the expression of You, I had to take a picture of myself in a digital state staring at my computer screen. This worked out perfectly for me to use as reference, but the look on my picture was very difficult for me to look at. I felt very aware of myself while looking at the picture and it made me both disgusted by the expression but happy that it was not my natural state on the computer but rather an exaggeration. I do know many people that resemble You in this picture and that makes me slightly concerned over people's well being and on how they can express themselves in reality if they spend so much time like You, blinded and overwhelmed by the 1's and 0's of the screen.