September

Guiding Light

“My mother has always been someone I can rely on and brings me happiness. She is always available to offer me guidance and console me when I’m going through a hard time. My painting shows my mother acting as a guide, helping me go through my journey of life which is represented by a map of rough terrain. Her touch radiates warm yellow light, a symbol of comfort that repels negative emotions.”

Recovering

My painting “Recovering” is about my anchor. Last year after coming back to school and getting involved with several school activities, I had some problems with mental health- overthinking stuff, getting pressured, not maging my time wisely- so I had to find a way to go back and make an anchor. As I was working on this art piece, I thought about what my anchor is and how I use it. Since I thought that I needed to focus and concentrate on my studying and academics, I chose studying as my anchor and started using my schoolwork to help me refocus and give myself a sense of accomplishment.

Runner

With this piece, my goal was to show a runner escaping a cluster of chaotic things. Running has been my “anchor” over the past few months, so I decided to have the person running away from the sort of nonsensical, disorganized madness that, without an anchor, can really leave people detached from what matters. I painted the runner fairly small because it allowed the overwhelmingness of all of the stuff behind it to show through, while also setting them in front of the objects to give the idea of an escape. I also used night and day to represent the more chaotic aspects of the right side of the painting and the calm of the left.

Why We Fight

My entry is about the recent overturning of Roe V. Wade. On the canvas, there is a television playing a news coverage of a protest fighting against the overturning. The people protesting look upset and are all holding signs with pro-choice designs. There is a woman intently watching the screen looking slightly unkempt with bandages. This ties into the theme of justice I was going for, where even if you are not able to persolly be there, you can still watch others fight for the same cause. With a constant barrage of bad news in today’s media, it’s easier to feel desensitized and pretend like it doesn’t affect you. A lot of people don’t understand the repercussions of such a case being overturned or who it affects. Even if Roe V. Wade being reversed doesn’t affect you, it can harm the people around you and takes away women’s rights to make healthcare decisions for themselves. You never know when something like this could affect family or friends—it hurts everybody. Understandably, there are a lot of circumstances that would prevent someone from being able to fight for themself. The good thing about this world is that there are still people willingly putting themselves out there despite all odds to fight for everybody, both for you and me. I felt like a protest was a great example of this message.

Cracks of Boundary

In this artwork, I aspire to instill a feeling of hope; as although the figure is presented with limited categories to force themself into, they still chose to be themself. I dually aim that this instills hope amongst those who have been faced with a similar scerio, who feel alone in their struggles. I hope those who do not struggle with such issues feel a call to action—to emotiolly support those struggling and help the reform of gender & gender norms within our society.

Stop Asian Hate

My artwork shows a group of Asians protesting to get justice for them, you can see in the middle picture I have a picture frame of a woman, she is Michelle Go, a victim of racism, as well as anti-Asian hatred, she has pushed down the tracks of the New York subway. I drew her because I want to reclaim justice for her in general and Asians in particular, Ms. Michelle Go’s incident has been a wake-up call because Asian Hate Crime has gone too far. Since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, Asian racism has also become more frequent, some people call our community the cause of the pandemic, and they also make derogatory comments, and said that we should return to our country

The Harvard Computers – Henrietta Swan Leavitt

My entry depicts a group of women known as the “Harvard Computers” who worked at the Harvard Observatory for a man med Edward Charles Pickering. In 1877, Pickering became the director of the Harvard Observatory during a time of great technological advancement, increasing the prevalence of photography, and subsequently the astrological data available to interpret. Pickering, in what appeared to be a progressive maneuver, employed his female staff to work examine, catalogue, and observe the data presented, however, the decision loses appeal when you take into account the workload of these women, their 25 to 50 cent wages, and their capacity to achieve greatness. Despite this, the women made significant contributions to the field of astronomy, especially Henrietta Swan Leavitt (pictured in the front) who discovered the period-luminosity relationship for Cepheid variables, a contribution that helped shape future astronomical discoveries. Henrietta and the many other talented “computers” performed incredibly important work, however, they received little to no recognition for their contributions.

Never Too Late

A watercolor piece about the mental health of soldiers and veterans.

Finish Strong

A guy is struggling with grades and mental health gets offered to run for the track team and enjoys it, ultimately finding his anchor.