imagingSpring16

For my self portrait I represented myself with numerous parts collaged together. I did this for in thinking about myself I realized I have several selfs which need to be depicted in order to represent me well. The dancers are a happy addition to the black and white image and also emphasize this point of different angles. The panels in the backgrounds represent my identity through history.

A space cowboy has the freedom to wander the galaxy as he pleases. With a total mastery of interstellar travel and knowledge of all the mysteries in the universe, a space cowboy has the power to save worlds. That is, when he’s not roping krydaxian spirit worms with his gravity lasso... While I may enjoy adventures in far off realms, I only hang my hat at home, the good ol’ deep blue earth.

For my self portrait I used a bunch of polaroid photos I took a few summers ago. The photos were taken at some of the important spaces I grew up in, Cathedral park under St. Johns bridge, Washington park, and the rose gardens. Photoshopped together the photos make a dream-like, mystified version of reality. 

Annie Newman - Self Portrait With my self portrait I drew inspiration from comic and film covers. Specifically, I was inspired by the aesthetic of the 28 Days Later comic cover, Kill Bill and Battle Royal. I wanted my alter-ego to be a woman who is strong, capable and kicks ass. I chose to make the overall look of the portrait graphic to reference both comic book styles and the heavy editing of the horror genre as a whole. I debated including a full hoard of zombies but technically there are few high resolution pictures of full-bodied zombies, but also I like to think that if I were hunting zombies there wouldn’t be many left. On myself I added wounds ranging from a dead eye to gashes and bruised knuckles as though I had personally been in the thick of fighting and come out the other side.

      My self portrait was sculpted in the idea of my polar opposite. I wanted to portray my personalities and my attitude towards life in a mural that expanded the distance of the wall behind me. I wanted this to tell a story about how I am, who I was, what my interests are, and what kind of light I paint myself in. The black and white filter placed on the background image was intentionally done to portray my polar opposite personality. I am not a dark and edgy kind of dude, but this background photographs states differently. the colors that engulf me are my true personality taking control of the entirety of this self portrait. This is my true personality and my true being. 

The persona I’ve created for myself is somewhat satirical–it represents me as a star baseball player on the front page of a sports magazine, as the face of DU baseball. This is satirical in that the DU club baseball team I play on is not an especially serious club. Myself and the club are presented in my persona as notorious athletes, but in reality our club is not well known at all, and we mostly play because of the fun we have rather than the serious competition suggested in this self-absorbed piece.

I chose to portray myself in the context of a circus. I’m writing stories about “The Circus,” and since it’s something I think about a lot, it made sense. The Circus is bizarre and full of weird things and weird goings-on but aspects of it are beautiful as well. A lot of the imagery used is French, and at least part of that is because I was over there while the Circus idea first started to take hold. The “vintage” aspect of the images has more to do with the specific aesthetic of old theatrical costumes and creating a unsure sense of temporality. The image from my historical restoration project was in a really specific pose which limited my options for it, but I tried to work it in as if I was coming over from outside the frame to join in the madness. The two clowns on the other side look straight at the viewer, contributing to a sense of separation: there’s inside the circus, and there’s everything else. In the story, getting out of the Minnesota cold plays a big role.

For this project, I wanted to do something around conflict so I decided to pit my younger self and my older self against each other.  I took the liberty to give my younger and older selves ideas that I thought would conflict with each other so I decided to do robots and machines vs. cats and other animals.  While I am still interested in robots today, I was more into them when I was a child, but I would say that I have at least some interest in animals.  The top part shows what my two selves still like or have in common such as being born during the year of the rooster and 80s themed things.  As for the bottom part of the portrait, I wanted to slowly transition the two ideas from machines to animals just to show the passage of time.

Kirpalani / Self Portrait For the final self portrait assignment, I decided to display myself as a digital time traveller; for a few reasons. The first being my love for online games; I decided to scatter elements from a few different games that I have recently been into and made myself a sort of game character. The digitization idea is enhanced by my decision to put code on the parts of my body that have not been suited with armor or the like. The second reason for this approach is solely due to my love of pondering the cosmos. There is also a guitar there to symbolize my love for music and an oxytocin molecule in the background to establish that I come in peace.

This self portrait is what I try to pursue every damn day of my life. In times of need I will call upon the animal spirit kingdom to bestow me with magical powers that will get me through school. I used Da Vinci’s, Vitruvian Man, to express the type of creativity I strive for, though don’t come close to. But the ability to create and express yourself is paramount to happiness! 

For this self portrait I wanted to express the feelings of being heavily influenced and yet not knowing what to do. I often find myself influenced my many strong characters in media but I don’t know who I am among them. I am searching for an answer and often find that I look to my past ( shown by looking at a photograph from my past) but still don’t know who I am in this world. And yet the influences continue to pile up. All of them seem to be helping me or point me in the right direction but I still feel lost and/or faceless. Many on these characters chosen have been influential in being who I am today. They have helped me become what I am. Although, I don’t know who I am or what my mark on this world is. The companies being flown in the sky were also influential and have played a huge roll in my life. I wanted this piece to feel like a collage of sorts because that is an accurate representation of how this characters piece together in my mind. The picture is made of many parts but the connections between them I have yet to find. 

Nathan Losee - Self Portrait This portrait is an attempt to describe myself as an unsociable person whom most people either don’t look at if they’re close, or they look at warily or with contempt from where I can’t see them. At the same time however, I’m not bothered by this as I have intense, thoughtful, and often complicated dialogues with myself in my own head. This protects me from feeling lonesome and allows me to look forward past everyone.

I am a carnivore. So is a T-Rex, the meanest carnivore around. So i thought to myself, what would the best carnivore around taste like. Probably the meatiest best thing you could ever eat.  Maybe one day this vision could become a reality and what has been top predator will become prey.   

Annie Newman - References

McKinnon