Bridge 1 part II: What If?

The Old Image

Questions by my partner:

1: What if this is not an image, but a film or just a video? What will be the differences to you?

2: What if the two characters in this artwork were an old couple? Will the whole thing become another type of story?

3: What if this image showed as a performance art, instead of an image, will it be different?

The New Image 

Questions and Answers by myself:

1: What if this picture is a video instead of an image?

If it is a video, then the information that we accepted would not be a moment, but a story. For instance, the two people will show their relationship and their personal characters by the talking and speaking. Because of it’s a series of motion, so as the time is passing, different lights will be created.

2:What if the woman in the picture dresses nice and clean they were sitting in a nice house.  The man was also an upper class before he had a bankrupt and had a depression. The woman left him during his worst time. Many years later, the women accidentally met the man on the street. She is still a wealthy woman, but he is homeless. By just looking at his outer appearance, the man was no more a gentleman, but we can still believe that he is a real gentleman by looking at his good table manners. 

If the content changed like this, then the emotion this picture showed will be changed. In the original picture, the wife is watching the husband eating like a gentleman. No matter how poor their life is, they are still peaceful and graceful. But after change the content completely, beside peaceful, the man also shows his self-esteem in the picture.

3: What if  these two people are not in a room, but on the street. They are two homeless people, but their action and the table setting are exactly the same?

If I see them as homeless people lives on streets, I will totally be touched by the man’s table manners. No matter how bad their living condition is, but they still respect what they have and deserved the respects from others.

The Final Artwork-Collage

I’m always obsessed with black & white photography because I think black and white are the two strongest colors. My new online picture is a staged photography that I found pretty powerful and shocked to me. I decided to make a photoshop collage to express my theme “EMOTION”. The original photography are composed by two main parts, the motion of characters and the shadow &lights the photographer created. Before I made my artwork, I answered my own “What If” questions and narrowed down the keywords that represents my theme “EMOTION”, which are “Inner Peace”,”Limitation”,” Table Manners”,”Poverty” and “Self-Esteem”. In the second question, I changed the content of the photography and the man’s self-esteem showed up. In my new collage, I chose to use different elements to represent the different keywords. For instance, the black squares represents the limitations and obstacles in life. I also used marker to cross out the man’s bar code tattoo, I was trying to convey the idea that people can not be defined by outside appearances. There are two squares filled in with the picture of old buildings to represent the word poverty. The old man’s face and the eyes are trying to create tension in this collage. In the end, the red dots are represent the inner passion and the esteem of the old man.