Artist Statement
A Fine Designer
Trudy Hoang is a designer and a fine artist. Her work is primarily two-dimensional, with a focus on digital design and painting, however, she also explores three-dimensional and four-dimensional media. She is interested in combining analog and digital media in her work, which she plans on exploring more in the future.
Trudy finds that digital design and painting convey her wide range of interests well due to their versatility. Sometimes she creates work based solely on aesthetic, where she experiments with color and form. Other times, she creates work based on issues that matter to her, such as social and environmental issues. When creating work based on issues, she brings in materials that directly address her concept, for example, magazine clippings to address representation and plastic bags to address pollution. She uses digital design and painting to support her concept.
Trudy became interested in design at the mere age of 10 when she designed graphics for online forums. She maintained her interests in the arts throughout middle and high school, taking weekend classes exploring photography, drawing, and design. In high school, she worked at Artists for Humanity in South Boston, MA, where she received training in painting and entrepreneurship.
Trudy is originally from Boston, MA, raised by her parents who are Vietnamese refugees. She currently resides in New York City, NY to pursue a BFA in Communication Design from Parsons School of Design.
Seminar
Bridge 1: Inquiry
Bridge 2: Context and Investigation
Bridge 3: Interpretation and Arguement
Bridge 4: Connections
EPIGRAPH, DAMASCUS
2016
JULIE MEHRETU
What was Damascus’s contribution to climate change?
Book:
After skimming through the book, I couldn’t find a chapter that related to my question so I did a different search and downloaded an E-book instead because there were no physical copies of the books I wanted.
Verner, Dorte, Breisinger, Clemens, and Wiebelt, Manfred. 2013. Chapter 4 Economic Impacts of Droughts in the Syrian Arab Republic and Floods in the Republic of Yemen. In Economics of Climate Change in the Arab World : Case Studies from the Syrian Arab Republic, Tunisia and the Republic of Yemen, pp. 95-113. Herndon: World Bank Publications.
Journal:
Ali, Saleem. 2016. Reconciling Islamic Ethics, Fossil Fuel Dependence, and Climate Change in the Middle East. Review of Middle East Studies, Vol. 50 no. 2: 172-178.
Bridge 5: Reflection and Presentation
Dirty Water:
Water Pollution and Marginalized Communities in the United States
In the United States, there is a social justice movement on the rise, along with an environmental justice movement. Oftentimes, people only understand issues through a social lens, ignoring the how environmental destruction plays a role. However, social issues and environmental issues are interconnected, as environmental destruction negatively impacts poor and marginalized communities first. Through the case studies of the San Joaquin Valley farms, the Midwestern pipelines, and the Flint River, this paper will discuss how water pollution affects poor and marginalized communities’ access to clean drinking water. In each case, there is a different pollutant, however, economic efficiency is always prioritized over the poor and marginalized, resulting in people not having a basic human right.
“Corporations take advantage of the fact that the marginalized do not have advocates for their rights, so they place their facilities in those areas to avoid harsh regulations. The corporations can maximize their profits because there is no need to worry about the consequences of the negative externality that the facilities produce because the marginalized communities have little to no political power. And even if the negative externalities are low, clean water is not allotted to marginalized communities because there is no money to be made for companies who privatize clean water sources.”
“There is an irony where the residents must work to be able to afford clean water, but what they produce on the farm contributes to the pollution that threatens their families’ and their own health. But despite this, they cannot work anywhere else because they do not have the resources and connections to do so.”
“The government is taking the little land that the Sioux have left and is destroying it so that the it is uninhabitable. If the Dakota Access Pipeline were to leak, the indigenous people’s access to water would be directly affected, as oil polluted water is undrinkable. They would be forced to relocate, if they have anywhere else to go, in order to have clean drinking water, continuing the migration that the American government has been forcing them to do since the time of colonization.”
“On the other hand, after finding out that General Motors, a corporation, was having issues with the machinery erosion, the government allowed General Motors to use Lake Heron’s water, while households in Flint are still using Flint River water. The people of Flint are overlooked while General Motors is getting what it wants because the government is more concerned about increasing the economy in the state. The people of Flint are dying of illnesses, since the water is contaminated by lead, hence the government is killing off the poor community by standing idle.”
Studio
Bridge 1: Inquiry
Bridge 2: Context and Investigation
Bridge 3: Interpretation and Arguement
Analog investigation furthered by research for my final project as it forced me to go onsite to the beach and aquarium and explore the issue first hand. Through drawing, I found that coral looked similar to trash and vice versa. When taking photos, I was more aware of how much trash was on the beach, despite the fact that it was winter and the beach was completely barren of people. I gained awareness of what type of trash was washed up onto the beach and how it fit into the landscape.
Bridge 4: Connections
EPIGRAPH, DAMASCUS
2016
JULIE MEHRETU
I chose this piece because, from research from Seminar, I knew that Syria’s conflict was worsen by a drought that forced farmers to move to Damascus to find work. Although my studio project’s focus was more about ocean pollution rather than about access of water, it was interesting to see how another artist interpreted the chaos caused by environmental destruction.
Bridge 5: Reflection and Presentation
Final Personal Reflection
When I was choosing my Seminar and Studio theme, I was first drawn to race and gender because they were both themes I explored in my classes last semester. However, I felt an inclination to do environment because it is another theme I am passionate about, but never tackled in my work, in fear of being labelled a “tree hugger” or a “crazy vegan” (even though I’m not vegan and only hug trees on occasion). I decided that this was the time.
At the beginning, I wanted to do my final project and essay on overexploitation of fauna, possibly criticizing companies such as Canada Goose. However, when doing Bride 1 and 2 in Seminar, I found myself observing recycled products and in Studio for Bridge 2, my diptychs led me to pollution. I then decided to focus on ocean pollution in Studio, but my focus for Seminar was more blurry. I knew I wanted to write about environmental justice related to social justice because of my own fear that people would not take my project seriously, so I felt like I had to cram a lot of information into my paper. But after discussing everyone’s topics, I realized that my thesis was too broad, so I changed my focus from the socio economic effects of water destruction to how water pollution affects the poor and marginalized.
When I did the diptychs, I began by using a material I was comfortable with: paint. Even though we were only supposed to use different materials in each one, I managed to use paint in most of them, even when I experimented with plastic and cardboard. I used paint because it’s versatile since it allows me to convey any 2D imagery I want. However, in my final diptychs I solely used trash, manipulating the shapes to represent trash pollution. I carried that on in part of my studio final, where I made a whale entirely out of plastic to represent how the ocean is filled with plastic.
