“storm story” by logan magee

For our first Bridge project, I decided to think about who I was at 6-10 years old. One of the most profound events in my lifetime was Hurricane Katrina, which swept the bottom of the US with little discretion. I have always though of Katrina in three parts: the evacuation, living in Texas, and returning home. For my piece, I created a triptych to remember these 3 different stages in my life. The first panel has an illustration of a room, swimming in a river of cars. This represents the day I evacuated, which I remember clearly, as well as I remember the news screens from this time. In the bottom left corner is an example of one of the news broadcasts I remember seeing.

The next panel describes my time in Houston. The image is split by a carved map of Louisiana, Arkansas, Texas, and a sliver of Oklahoma. In the Texas area, the children run rampant in a small house with too-thin floors. The “STOP MAKIN’ ALL THAT NOISE” was something we heard often while playing or watching TV. On the Louisiana side, the storm clouds most of the state, with images of people spiraling in or out of the eye.The final panel includes a picture of my own home after Katrina, and a photo of the Superdome. I commonly used imagery of catfish as a dream-imagery connection, but also as a representation of New Orleans’ residents. In the final panel, the catfish (my family) swim across the page into my house.

Materially speaking, I only spent a little bit on my project. I was lucky enough to have a mom that remembered I owned a bag of acrylics. I also used a colored pencil, and line (wood gouging). I learned a new process: photo transfer with gel medium, and I believe it will be extremely helpful in future projects.

 

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