With this project I wanted to explore the attitudes that Americans hold on the issue of guns and illustrate my perception of those attitudes.
I aimed to do this through a combination of text and imagery. Through monochromatic color schemes I’m attempting to illustrate my clouded thoughts on this subject. It is hard for me formulate a personal opinion on the topic. There is so much language from both sides that it is hard to get a middle-ground view on the issue of guns.
It’s almost as if there is no middle-ground and this is a black and white issue.
This idea of a black and white issue started to shape my project. But throughout my explorations, I continuously found that the language from both sides of the argument often overlapped. Much of the same phrases, tones, and key words were repeatedly used on either side of the national dialogue. In realizing this, the “black and white” aspect of the argument becomes language that is from both sides; both sides are both black and white to me.
As far as my methodology goes, I read many, many articles from the mass media on the issue of guns and gun control. I collected phrases, sentences, and words that stood out to me from each article. The product was two texts with selections from my collection, removing almost all punctuation, and arranging them in a way that seemed powerful. I screen-printed these texts onto two hand-made 4' x 5.5' canvases, one painted white, and one black.
The final piece was composed of one black painting and one white painting, titled:
“The Great American ____________ Affair.”
I look at this project more as a learning experience for technique and proccess then a finished product. I learned a great deal throughout my work on this project and plan to take what I've learned and keep pushing my ideas.
The font used is "Edmonsands" created by James T. Edmondson, everyone should check out his fonts,
