Bridge Project #5: The Reflection Project

The Crimson Hands of a Hard Worker: Short Story PDF

   

PROJECT DESCRIPTION:

For this multiple part project, I chose to do an extension to my short story that I wrote in my seminar class. The story took place in The Meatpacking District in the 1920’s and is one of my favorite assignments that I have ever written as I feel I grew as a writing during the process in order to create clear story arc and progressive character development. I enjoy sewing so I chose to make a dress inspired by the story to take photos in and create a cover for the story and make it into a booklet. The dress design is a reference to 1920’s sailor outfits. The sailor collar and navy and white fabrics are evident of this, alluding to the fact that the main character in my story was an immigrant (travel by sea) and that The Meatpacking District is near the ports/sea. For my photos, I took polaroids in order to stick with the time frame and give the photos a vintage feel. I held bloody bacon to add character and depth to the photo as well as tie it in with the main character of the story, who slaughters meat on the daily and is slowly being driven crazy by it. I edited the photos in photoshop, blew them up, reprinted, and put them on a background of bloody handprints as the blood in the photos wasn’t very visible. I then placed this in an antique wood frame, again to reference the time period as well as give the photos a clean finished look and show there was a story behind them, as the frame with photos looks as though it could have been found in an old abandoned house/warehouse from the 1920’s. The booklet is very simple and has the 2 polaroid photos in a quad with a black background and the title of the story underneath.

 

Materials Used:

Cotton fabric and ribbon

Wooden frame

Fake blood

Polaroid camera

 

Process Photos:

    

 

REFLECTION:

I feel as though this piece was successful as my peers said that the photo series show a story behind the dress and the person wearing it. Juxtaposing such a cutesy dress with unknown meat and bloody handprints leaves the viewer wondering what the story is behind the character. They liked that the viewing of my pieces was a process, first you see the dress, then the photos, then read the story and slowly find out more and more of what happened. Some also said the dress comes across as a sailor moon/Japanese schoolgirl outfit, which makes sense as it is a very similar design style… I could have fixed this by making the dress more loose fitting and have the pleats be a drop waist, which is what I had done originally but then changed to how it is presently because I didn’t like the look of it before. I like the idea of costume design and developing a character based purely on the clothing and this project was a good practice of that. I’m also glad I got the chance to do what I really love, which is sewing- It was a great way to end the semester.

 

Leave a reply

Skip to toolbar