Artist Statement; Relief of Music
This artwork shows the effects of how and what music can do to your thoughts after a long day. Music really helps me forget about the outside world, and to focus on my own thoughts, so I can destroy the bad ones and just relax on the good ones. I felt as if this was a great way to show my feelings towards how much music helps me when I am going through a rough time. Firstly, I started with a collage of layers of ripped pieces of sheet music overlapping one another to represent the music portion of the mask, and how music affects the mind. Along with the ripped sheet music, I also used the sheet music pieces to create two medium sized craters along the top right and the bottom left. Creating these craters was a way of opening up the mind to express how music can destroy bad thoughts. Before working on what belongs inside the craters, I used the media of charcoal and black paint to envision a burnt like scene. After that, I filled both craters up with the assemblage of red and orange materials such as puffy paint, ripped up paper, wires, felt, tacks, and small beads. the materials that were gathered together to create this image were representing fire. the fire itself is trying to represent the disappearance of the pathetic thoughts spiraling all through my mind. Even some of the orange and red assemblage made its way out of the craters to show the spreading of fire as well. Lastly, to tie up my project, I had created a blue butterfly, on the smaller side, to represent the freedom that music can cause to the mind. My butterfly was created out of a variety of colors of felt so that the wings were more flexible. Additionally, I added white dots to the tips of the black outlining of each wing to catch eyes and make it more realistic as well as a few jewels on each wing to make it stick out a little bit more. the butterfly's antennae were simply constructed together by two small black wires, curled at the ends, flipped out ways from each other. Putting a butterfly on the center of my mask was never the original idea I had for the creature that would have been added to my artwork. What made me realize that the blue butterfly was just perfect for this piece was because of the contrast between red and blue to make the mask more outstanding, but also because the blue butterfly is the butterfly that symbolizes grave disease. Grave disease is something my sister began to struggle with when she was about my age. This condition made her struggle with her thyroid and the level of anxiety she had to go through. I know that my artwork was definitely not based on her, and her struggles, but I felt that it was important to add a little bit of representation for my sister. To sum up all my thoughts, I hope that whoever is observing my artwork portrays how I really feel about music, and that this project makes them realize how much music can help the little things.
Emery Henert