I considered many different crazy conspiracies for this project, and I thought it would be more fun to do outside of the political or alien field. I decided to do a conspiracy theory on the death of Linkin Park’s lead vocalist Chester Bennington. The conspiracy is that he, along with his friend Chris Cornell(who is also from another band), were murdered and covered up as suicide by a gang of pedophiles. It is a very far stretched theory that even Mike Shinoda, the rapper of Linkin Park denied. Despite that, the conspiracy theories are pretty interesting, and it is a good choice since Linkin Park has been one my favourite bands.
For the piece I decided to do an art piece that has a dark and eerie theme, which suits the nature of the conspiracy. I started off by using a braier to make a rough texture for the background, and touching it up with brighter colours. I then painted the faces of the two victims and their cause of death. As for the conspiracy theories, I printed out article statements that work as evidence, which raises questions. Ultimately, what joins them all together are the threads that lead back to the hands indicating that they are all related.
This was a fun project to do since I got to experiment with a different technique in using acrylic painting. I’ve never really done anything like this before, and I think the artistic choice really suits that dark theme of the conspiracy theory. However, at the same time, I wish I used a much bigger board so that I can add in more evidence and make more solid connections which would make everything clearer. There would be a greater balance between the aesthetics and the content itself.
