A Day In Our Lives #25

rissaw Leave a comment

Hey guys,

This week I am showing some of the collage work that I have been working on! In my practice, I focus primarily on women and the female experience. I was recently tasked with creating a book multiple times over, cutting it apart, and putting it together to make a story. I love collage and think that it is really calming to do. I have lots of old graphic design books that were gifted to me that I use in my work. I like incorporating my poetry and writing in my collages as well as some of my illustrations. Collages can be a really expressive medium. I love thinking about color and how it will affect how the viewer perceives the text. I sewed this book together and love how it came out. I feel like it is a really good representation fo what I believe in.
See you next week!

Marissa


Chroma #15: Am I Human To You?

dai Leave a comment

In this piece, I wanted to explore the idea of self-identity and perception. I remember once reading that “identity is comprised of three main facets: who we think we are, who we want others to think we are, and who others think we are”. I don’t really know what I’m doing most of the time and I rarely have original thoughts (so take this next paragraph with a grain of salt), but I feel like most people, especially myself, have been driven by the second and third facets our entire lives. A valuable lesson I had to learn recently is that people are never going to perceive you the way you want to be perceived, and you have to let go of the fantasy of trying to fit an ideal, whether it be through beauty standards, race, gender, or external pressures in general. Once you let go, a process I’m still working through, I believe you can live a healthier, less restrictive life. Yes, outward perception is an inescapable thing, but instead of forcing yourself to mold into a standard, or attempting to present yourself under a guise of normalcy, you can use it to express yourself creatively. For example, lately, I’ve been viewing my appearance and features differently. Instead of styling my body or face to fit a gendered and Eurocentric beauty ideal, I’ve seen my body as more of an accessory that I can use to express creativity and have fun with. This viewpoint has increased my self-confidence and allowed myself to become happier with myself. In general, I think a big part of maturing for me has been letting go of mindsets ingrained in me since childhood, things that I wasn’t even consciously aware of. What do you guys think?

Evolving Emotions: Trust- Poetry

EKArts Leave a comment

Pathological

 

A gun to his heart

a bullet struck a rib on its way

to the living room wall

 

I knew a boy

struck by lightening in the third grade

and again in the fourth

 

In April my legs gave way

like a rainy day

I tumbled down the cliffside

 

I suspect she killed her husband

last autumn, in the evening

I heard crunching

 

A beam of light

cut through the tree line

and took the cow across the pier

 

I was birthed speaking

syllabic sentences

and passionate paragraphs

 

My first words were,

“Don’t trust a thing,”

because it’s pathological, I promise

Mixed on Campus #5 – Maeve Lucas

Alice Conner Leave a comment

Name: Maeve Lucas
Mix: Transnational Adoptee
Major & Year: BCN; Junior

Q: How has being mixed affected your campus experience?

A: It definitely took me some time to find my place on campus freshman year. There were certain groups I didn’t fit into as well because I was mixed and didn’t fully identify as one ethnicity. Mixed@Michigan has really given me a community that has allowed me to grow into myself.

Q: What do you wish more people knew about the mixed experience?

A: Almost every mixed person has gone through some type of scrutiny. While everyone’s experience is unique, mixed people often face what most minorities experience. Though we can also be scrutinized by our own cultural group. It’s a very “in-between” feeling.

Q: What kind of person do you aspire to be / who is the most influential person in your life?

A: My mom. Sometimes people feel like transnational adoptees feel like they were “saved” by their adoptive parents, and I think that terminology is flawed. While my mom is my best friend and biggest supporter, she is not my savior. My mom is my mom like your mom is your mom. I aspire to be a mom like her. If I could even be half as great as a mom she is, I would be happy with that.

Deranged Auntie [INSERT NAME HERE]

Micey Leave a comment

This is a villain in my story, she’s basically like a walking nuclear reactor. She is one of my main character’s aunts. I’m still working on her name. I want it to have some medical basis.

Please assume that unless highlighted green, her clothes are black. I want her to look like a walking hazard/nuclear waste sign. I also wanted her to look classy, like she could be perched daintily on a mountain of her enemies’ skulls.

I experimented with her having spikes on her outfit. I wanted every bit of her to give off the message that she is dangerous, don’t get close to her. I think I won’t be including the spikes. I want her to look sleek.

Her outfit’s still a work in progress. Additionally, I’m busy trying to think up a symbol for her. Time to look at radioactivity symbols again!

Industrious Illustrating #36 – Con Ja Nai 2023

Robin Leave a comment

Hello again! If you’ve been following this column since last year, you’ll have seen the post I made last year about tabling at Con Ja Nai 2022! Well, now it’s 2023, and that means Con Ja Nai 2023, UMich’s free one-day anime convention, is tomorrow, April 8th, in the MLB from 12 to 10! I’l be at Table B3 selling prints of my art from 12 to 6 (Artist Alley hours)! Here’s my location circled on the map:

 

And here’s a catalog of the prints I’ll have available:

 

There’ll also be a computer available at my artist alley table for playing through a demo of “Flamechaser”, the yuri mecha visual novel I’m drawing the art for, so come check it out! I hope to see some of you guys there!