My Postmodern Piece

For my Postmodern piece, I was working off of a quote that I used to inspire the arr. The quote reads, "There is nothing funny about Halloween. This sarcastic festival reflects, rather, an infernal demand for revenge by children on the adult world." When first reading this quote it seemed strange to me. It was such a bleak look at what is supposed to be a fun-loving holiday. Yes, Halloween has a dark connotation to it, but for the most part it is a fun day for kids everywhere. I took this quote and worked the dark aspect of my art to show the spooky and creepy part of Halloween.

I took the body of fully grown men and put enlarged heads of babies on them. This was just to show how the kids are taking over through the accepted practice of dressing up in a costume or disguise in this case. The babies are dressed and places at the top of the page in a large image to show their dominance. Then I showed strings coming from the bottom of the image in a puppet master fashion. Attached to the bottom of the strings are human figures meant to represent adults who are being controlled by there children. At the very bottom of the page, we see a city setting that is supposed to represent normal life for an adult. We see how the kids are getting revenge on the adults by controlling them in the real world. The adults are usually the ones giving the orders, but on Haloween, the kids get their chance to be whoever they want to be and give out any orders they please.

The colors used in this piece are not necessarily close to one another which helps the images to pop, but there is a pattern of colors used. Black, white, and red are the colors that are repeated constantly throughout the image and it gives it a certain rhythm that keeps you moving throughout the entire piece. There is a mix of different cultures and traditions in a postmodern fashion and I think it represents the quote well.

The Art of Data Visualization

PBS aired an episode talking about the visualization of data. They claimed that "the visualization of data is the history of science". When this was said they were referring to the fact that in the past we have relied on the things that we can see in order to interpret the world around us. In the next section, they claimed that we have evolved to be able to interpret what we see. Without this ability, we would not have been able to survive in nature. The example that they used was that we have to be able to see images and interpret if they are dangerous or not. Surely we would be susceptible to the threat of predators, nature, and other humans with malice intent if not for the skill of using our sight as a weapon. This makes perfect sense to me. From the time that we were babies, we have had to use our sight to interpret and make sense of our surroundings. We have to be visual learners because we cannot understand language at that age so what we know is solely based on what we see and feel. 

Another point that was brought up in the episode is that no visual representation can change the truth of the content. While I do agree that this is fundamentally true, I also believe that images have the power to distract viewers from the truth just as much. Humans sometimes tend to lean towards what is more aesthetically pleasing or easier to digest. We might choose to ignore things that we cannot see that we know may be harmful to us. If you think about it, that is why we are afraid of the dark because we do not know that is out there that could harm us. Visuals are everything. Similarly, if you think of the sense of hearing, you can see why people might be swayed to go with a more pleasant sound. If people hear a threatening sound they may be more hesitant to go in the direction from where it came. Taking things in a different direction, people may choose a partner based on their looks rather than the truth of personality. Sometimes they even convince themselves that the lies are the truth because of the need to have a visual that is more agreeable. So while the initial point is valid, I do think that there is a different aspect to look at when thinking of the issue. 

The last part of the episode focused on how information can be simplified by visualization. I agree with this and often overlook how much visualization simplifies my everyday life. One of the oldest and widely used forms of visualization that has simplified our lives are maps. From the time of the first map, it has been giving people direction and simplifying exploration in a way that was never possible before. Now if we look at what we have today in Google Maps and GPS, it makes our everyday travel 200 times easier. Imagine if we didn't have those images to guide us to our destinations and we had to rely on our memory. Google takes it a step farther with "street view". We take these things for granted but they would have been tools of wizards 100 years ago. Those examples along with others show us how much images mean to us. Think of the business world. With all of the number and different metrics that play into one decision, if it was not for visual charts and graphs, it would be almost impossible to represent data to a group of people who have not been immersed in the research. Visualization allows us to share and interpret information in new and innovative ways and we should all take a minute to count that blessing. What is very exciting to me is to think about how far we came and where we have the potential to go in the future.