Poetry Project
(untitled)
Peace is a comparison to what could be.
Peace isn’t war.
To have the absence of conflict, man lacks ability.
War is an allergy,
Infecting and causing amour
Of fighting, clashing and posturing.
Peace is a comparison to what could be.
You become obsessed with the feeling of glory
after you respond like Thor
To a person up in your face ranting.
To have the absence of conflict, man lacks ability.
The desire to hate flows through your body
as other’s peculiar ideas you explore,
But realize that these conceits are fighting.
Peace is a comparison to what could be.
What gets hit the hardest is your psyche
That begins to morph as you start to ignore
The appalling fact inevitably occurring.
To have the absence of conflict, man lacks ability.
The plague has spread throughout our body,
a plague with no man made cure
That would combat the knowing.
Peace is a comparison to what could be.
To have the absence of conflict, man lacks ability.
Link to kinetic text video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWgX1trNh-g
Link to kinetic text video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWgX1trNh-g
Artist Statement
During our past school year we read a lot of texts in our humanities class, but the reading that stood out to me the most was “The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas”, and this reading is my content inspiration. This reading was about a society called Omelas that was an absolutely perfect society, or so it seemed on the outside. The only flaw with this society was that there was one child, who basically was the whipping boy for everyone else, and this child had to suffer or else everyone else could not be happy. During seminar after we read this short story we came to the conclusion that the only way you have happiness is by knowing what suffering is, and equally you can’t have peace without violence and I was a very strong supporter of this. So the connection to my poem happens in the line “To have the absence of conflict, man lacks ability”, and I repeat this line four times throughout my poem to instill the idea that was birthed in our my seminar group.
My inspiration for the type of poem that I’ve written was “Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night” by Dylan Thomas, but it isn’t completely a villanelle as his poem was. In a traditional villanelle there are six stanzas and the rhyme scheme is A1bA2/abA1/abA2/abA1/abA2/abA1A2, where A1 and A2 are two different lines that rhyme, and are repeated through out the poem as designated. What I did is take the villanelle form, but then add an extra line in every stanza besides the first one, that way I can elaborate on my ideas more. I liked this form because I was able to instill the ideas that I wanted to into the readers mind easily, and I like having guidelines to get me going.
My performance is a kinetic text that I designed in After Effects with a voice playing over as the video plays. I got this idea from all of the kinetic texts we watched in class throughout this poetry section of the year. The thing I like the most about kinetic texts is they apply to more senses than just speaking a poem and it allows you to visually put emphasis on words or phrase as well as vocally. Another big deciding factor for doing the kinetic text is I really can’t present poetry in front a audience, and I learned this also during this section when we had to memorize a poem and recite it in front of the class and I did terrible, so I stuck with something that I knew I could do fairly well as to not cause any unneeded stress.
Project Reflection
During this past project we analyzed multiple poems, explored different types of poetry and looked at all of the ways we could present our poetry. For instance we watched three or four different kinetic texts that were made by professionals or previous students that made really good projects. Also we read and analyzed new and old poetry seeing how the poets used multiple poetic devices to create there master pieces. After we did this for a couple weeks we began to compose our poems, and our only “rules” is that it had to be related to peace, violence, and/or war. However throughout this process we were encouraged to stay open minded with our poems and be open to any suggestions or different inspiration that may come to us.Mrs. Fisher insured that we would have different ideas coming into our heads was making us do process journals every couple of days to see our progress and get us thinking about ways to change up what we’re writing.
The biggest thing I learned from this project is how to effectively use poetic devices to enhance your poetry. Also I learned to not beat a dead horse and talk about the same things in the same ways, as in if you’re going to talk about a common topic put it in a different light. When we started this whole poetry project I really wasn’t excited that I was going to have to write a (serious) poem and present it in front of a lot of people at exhibition, but as the project progressed I became more comfortable with the writing part, but I still had trouble with the presentation part, but I got it done so I think it turned out well.
This project really helped me with using my language and writing to more effectively connect to the audience. The change that I believe helped my writing the most from my beginning drafts to my final drafts was using similes and metaphors to take common ideas and make people look at them in a very different way, and this was a suggestion that Mrs. Fisher gave me. Another thing that I improved over time was using language and wording that would not commonly be associated with the topic I was discussing to describe and discuss that topic.
In the weeks/months leading up to exhibition we watched, listened to, and viewed (in art) different ways to present poetry, good and bad. As I said earlier we watched multiple kinetic texts, listened to different slams (people presenting poetry dramatically), and looked at our examples of how professional and/or student poets presented their work. What I took from these experiences the most is how to create a good kinetic text and the different aspects it needs to have, even though I didn’t successfully incorporate these ideas into my final kinetic text. Seeing these examples and partaking in this project greatly benefited my poetic skills and my ability to present projects in front of others and though I was never really excited about the project, I’m glad I went through it.
Political Cartoon Trio
Holodomor means “death by hunger” in Ukrainian, and this is now a term that is embedded into the minds of Ukrainians forever. In the late 1920s and early 1930s the Soviet Union began having problems with Ukraine. Joseph Stalin was the new leader of the Soviet Union at the time, and was angered by the strong industrial base Ukraine had, and their resistance to cooperate with the USSRs communistic rule. Eventually Stalin had enough of all this and in turn engineered arguable the world’s worst man-made famine. This action was taken for two main reasons; one was to weaken the moral of Ukrainian nationalist, the other, to feed (literally and physically) Stalin’s industrial plan. The main part of this took place between 1932 and 33, around 7-10 million Ukrainians died, mainly of starvation. “On my farmstead, an 18 year old boy, Danylo Hukhlib, died and his mother and younger sisters and brothers cut him up and ate him. The Communists came and took them away, and we never saw them again. People said they took them a little ways of and shot them right away, the little ones and the older ones, together” shared Tatiana Pawlichka in her accounts. However, after all of this damage was done, Stalin, and/or the USSR never received any justice for the events took place, mainly because the world powers that could’ve done anything were too busy not getting on Stalin’s bad side. To this day Russia has never officially recognized that the genocide ever existed.
In Stalin’s Pet Bear I depict my perspective of the beginning stages of the genocide. What’s happening in this cartoon is Stalin is looking over the map of the USSR trying to find food for his pet bear, Industry. As he is looking over the map he finds Ukraine and puts the marker on the country, showing where he is going to “feed” from. My idea from this project came from all of the accounts and stories I read of why Stalin did what he did to Ukraine. “To Stalin, the burgeoning national revival movement and continuing loss of Soviet influence in the Ukraine was completely unacceptable. To crush the people's free spirit, he began to employ the same methods he had successfully used within the Soviet Union.” Stated an article I found on the history leading up to the massacre. So this is my comical way of showing that.
Stalin’s Path to Glory is one I really think hits more on the sensitive side than the comical. In the cartoon Stalin has blinders on as he is walking on a brick path, which has names of people that Stalin “stepped” on, leading towards his glimmering goal in the future, a massive and very successful industrial system. But as he is walking the blinders are “protecting” him from seeing all of the death and devastation that he is causing. For instance you have a pile of skulls and bones that to me represents the people that have already died, and obviously starving little boy sitting by the path with a sign stating “YOUR FAULT”, and in the background you see another starving person being shot while begging for mercy. So the main message I wanted to get across in this cartoon is that I think Stalin didn’t much care about the people he was starving and murdering to get to his ultimate goal; "...(Our reporting) served Moscow's purpose of smearing the facts out of recognition and declaring the situation which, had we reported simply and clearly, might have worked up enough public opinion abroad to force remedial measures. And every correspondent each in his own measure was guilty of collaborating in this monstrous hoax on the world.” shared a man that was a Moscow media correspondent. So I believe that that is enough to show Moscow’s and Stalin’s goal and perspective of the whole event.
In my final cartoon I went back to the comical side of things. I’m depicting the cover up that Stalin tried and succeeded to employ, but more importantly that the world powers helped him if you will in fear of his retaliation if they didn’t. You see Uncle Sam busy helping Moscow “sweep” Holodomor under the rug. This is to show the fear that was in the world powers and the US in particular, mainly because they didn’t want Stalin against them in WWII. Where I got my idea for this portion is from my reading of numerous historical accounts and piecing the parts together. The main idea I received during these readings is the world powers (U.S.A) may have known about the accruing events and never took drastic action.
Personally, I enjoy learning Soviet history and I love comical drawings, so this project was a blast for me to do. Due to my previous time I spent in Russia Soviet history interest me greatly because we heard about it from older Russians and saw all of the old statues and memorials that remained from Stalin and Linens’ control. I enjoy art, as I previously stated, but more particularly comical or cartoon art. The thing I like most about my finished product is my third drawing because of the different elements I was able to get across and I think that it just really turned out crisp and clean. Something that I learned and was really shown during this project is that scanning in my drawings that I did in my sketchbook to clean up on Photoshop is something that I can’t handle because of how much of a perfectionist I am. So unless I have a tablet to do my work on, I’m probably going to give up on scanning future cartoons or drawings because things that you would normally not notice with the human eye are made very obvious when you digitize the drawing. However over this entire project was very fun and I learned much more than I initially thought I would.
Citations
· Pawlichka, Tatiana. "Ukrainian Genocide Famine Foundation - USA Witness and Survivor Recollections." Ukrainian Genocide of 1932-1933. Web. 07 Dec. 2010. <http://ukrainiangenocide.com/survivors.html>.
· Moscow United Press correspondent from 1928 - 1934. Assignment in Utopia, p. 573. Web. 07 Dec. 2010. <http://ukrainiangenocide.com/survivors.html>.
· "Genocide in the 20th Century: Stalin's Forced Famine 1932-33." The History Place. 2000. Web. 02 Dec. 2010. <http://www.historyplace.com/worldhistory/genocide/stalin.htm>.
Genocide Project Reflection
When I think the past project I’m proud with how the project turned out in general, more particularly how I was able to convey most of my message through my drawings and I wouldn’t have thought they would turn out that good two weeks ago. Another thing that was pleasing was how easy the ideas came to my head. Of course they had to be refined after the initial idea was there, but I didn’t have too much of a problem with refinement. Most of all it showed me something that I enjoy doing that I other whys wouldn’t have explored doing.
If I had one more week to work on this project I would’ve one of two things. The first thing that I might’ve done would be creating one more cartoon that showed Stalin’s policy of media during and after the genocide. This was something that initially I was going to put in my final drawing but I felt that it would’ve made it too crowded, so I decided against it. I actually think that I’m still going to draw this one to bring the project to a close, and just for fun. My second option would be to have Roxy teach me how to shade with pin/sharpie to add the extra detail that I would’ve been elated to have. Even though the project is over I still think that I will try to get her to teach me to use in future projects and for personal things.
Of all the categories on the rubric I think I was strongest in the audience engagement category. One reason I chose this is because of the creative way I chose to depict the genocide. I always like to look at pictures or diagrams of things I don’t know about so being able to look at cartoons was appealing to other people. Also with I tried to make there be more than one message so that it would attract the audience to want to learn more about the genocide.
Professionalism was probably my category I was weakest in out of all of them. The thing that made me chose this category is my drawings weren’t as clean as I would’ve liked. An example is I used sharpie and pencil because I couldn’t shade in pen, so it doesn’t look as clean as it could. If I would’ve known how to shade with sharpie I think they would’ve turned out cleaner and looked more like professional political cartoons. Also in Stalin’s Path to Glory I felt that the whole cartoon was a little scattered and that I actually added too much to it, but I guess it turned out okay anyway.
Grading myself on professionalism I was between an A and a B because it wasn’t very bad, but there are things that I wish I could’ve cleaned up. On connections I gave myself an A because I believe I adequately used and represented my research. I also gave myself an A on the “focus” category because I communicated a clear message, drew upon my research, and based my project on evidence. On the last category, audience engagement I gave myself an A because I think that I created a very engaging project and it appealed to the audience well. I believe I earned around a 94 to a 95 on this project, so an A, because of how hard I worked and because of the result of all that, which was a good project depicting the Ukrainian Genocide in a creative way, or at least I thought so.
Propaganda Project
This poster fits historically accurate into WW1 in a couple of ways. The first way is by referring to the German war machine as the “BEAST”, and there are quite a few posters from WW1 that also use this reference. Also, I symbolized the German war machine with Kultur, and this was also a very popular and pretty significant comparison the Allies used against the Germans. Both of the previous historic elements were used by the Allies and Great Britain in particular to plant the feeling of hatred towards Germany, so in turn the citizens would go and enlist in the army to fight against them. The final historical element on this poster is having the pointy helmet on Kultur, and this was often used as well.
I believe that propaganda has a BIG effect on how the world perceives war and everything that comes along with it, mainly because humans listen to what other people who may have a higher social stance than them. Personally, propaganda doesn’t really affect me that much. Well I guess it actually does because I do think about it a good bit, except that I dissect it more than let it soak in a lot. This habit I’ve acquired because I like to think of things I see in a way that no one else does very much. Back-then I think it would’ve had a bigger effect and impact than it does now, simply because that was the main media everyone was exposed to. Now days you might see a couple of modern war propaganda posters, but only if you search for them, most of our exposure to war and its controversies comes from the news on TV or online. Now I suppose that some of the stuff in the media has the same effect that a propaganda poster would in the sense that it still effects you greatly. Also, now days I think the media mask the truth a lot more than it did in WW1, so people’s ideas about the wars are probably a little distorted compared to reality. The reason they do this I believe is because used to you were looked on as a bad person/business/news source if you masked the truth (lied) in things you were reporting on, but now it’s basically the social norm to lie about critical information, as long as it helps you out. But no matter how much or how little, propaganda still affects every person and this isn’t necessarily a bad thing, it’s just part of life and the world we live in.
Thorman, Cory. Angry Cartoon Gorilla in Cage. Digital image. Shutterstock.com. Web. 28 Sept. 2010. <http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-58611613/stock-vector-an-angry-cartoon-gorilla-in-a-cage.html>.
British Flag. Digital image. Www.euche.co.uk. Web. 28 Sept. 2010. www.euche.co.uk/images/british-flag.jpg.
Propaganda Project Reflection
The assignment our class just finished was called “The Propaganda Machine”. We’ve been doing participating in this project for about 2 weeks, but have been talking about WWI since the beginning of school. This project had two parts, part one was “becoming An Expert”, and part two was “Becoming Part of the Machine”. During part one, we had to use our expertise we learned in the previous weeks to analyze 3 pieces of propaganda, one from the Allies during WWI, one form the Central Powers during WWI, and a modern piece. During part two we had the job of creating our own original piece of propaganda that would be printed out and hung in our hallways. Creating the poster was a lot of fun, but we also had to write our own analysis of the poster we created. Both of these things are also posted on this blog.
Throughout this project, I made a lot of revisions on everything, and I have probably 4 drafts of my poster and analysis. The main reason for all of those revisions was because during class a couple of times we would leave our projects on our desk, then go and critique someone else’s and this was done so we would have a good finished project. Some revisions I made on my analysis that I believe greatly helped it were elaborating more on topics I would briefly touch on. A revision I made on my poster was making the Union Jack on my poster be more of the background, instead of having it off to the side of my text. Also someone suggested not having “enlist in the U.K. army today!” at the base of the poster, but rather have “enlist to fight today!”. So after I made these revisions, I believe my project turned out better.
Looking back at this project it was a lot of fun. I have some things I would probably change on my poster if I could, one being putting a helmet on Kultur the gorilla to add another element of symbolism that would aid in the viewer understanding what I’s referring to, but I don’t have enough expertise in Photoshop to be able to make this change. I did like how the poster in general turned out, and I’m proud of my use of Photoshop, as I using it for the first time. I really enjoyed being able to do a creative project that I could draw in and so forth. So yea, I liked this project and I look forward to doing projects in the future.
During this project I learned a lot about my work habits and things like that. One thing I learned was that I kind of still procrastinate, but I’m gradually getting rid of that habit. Also I learned a bunch about propaganda and the person’s mind that is behind designing all of it. Oh yea, and I learned how to use Photoshop for the first time. So now I can navigate around in it pretty good, so that was a big accomplishment in my mind.
If I had as redo of this whole project I actually wouldn’t change that many things. The two things I would change though if I could would be finding a better color for my background and putting a helmet on Kultur. I’ve already told about the helmet and why I’d want to put it on Kultur, so I won’t go into much depth about that. But the reason I would want to change the color of the background is I just think it looks a little bland and boring but I couldn’t think of or find another color to use instead. Besides these two things I wouldn’t change anything, so I guess that’s a good thing because it means I’m satisfied with my work, or it means I’m blind to my mistakes. Either way, we’re finished with the project and I enjoyed greatly.
