Exhibition Text
Take a Piece (of my heart) is a digital collage exploring the idea of self worth, taking inspiration from the film Edward Scissorhands. Inspiration came from the extreme angles of cinematographer Stefan Czapsky and was created by appropriating a still of the film and making it my own with my ideas. Exaggerated expression along with an underlying theme of fear from director Tim Burton and German Expressionism was the biggest influence for both Edward Scissorhands and Take a Piece (of my heart).
Essay
When I was younger I helped everybody as much as I could because it made me feel good to know I was helping people, not knowing what it could lead me to. I ended up getting taken advantage of by almost every person around my age that I met. They used my kindness to get what they wanted from me, whether it was a talking diary, homework answers, or someone to control; it worked every single time, too. People would be my friend just to use me and then throw me away like a cigarette. I didn't realize that I was being taken advantage of because I was so indulged with the friends that I thought I was making. I think of it as me being in a dream-like state because of how oblivious and innocent I was. I was deceived by them and I didn't think for myself, I always had others on my mind. I didn't ask for anything in return and it was the biggest mistake I could make, especially at such a young age.
I didn't know that these actions would form into bad habits. I didn't feel a need to get anything back until I was around 12 and realized that I deserved better since I had spent so much time and energy on all these people. Although I came to this conclusion, I wouldn't act on this opinion until a couple years later. I had spent the next couple months wondering why people wouldn't do the same for me as I did for them and came to the conclusion that no matter what the reason was, it's not like I was able to change that myself. I ended up being closed off as my way of coping with this realization and kept to myself, strayed away from my "friends" and learned to love being in my own personal solitude.
The following years I found that keeping a smaller group of friends that loved and cared for me was better than having all the friends in the world with only a few that cared. I used to value quantity over quality and that was a mistake that many people that I knew at the time reinforced. I learned to think for myself every once in a while and I'm happy with the progress I made these last couple of years.
To this day I still find it difficult to say no to people because of my old habits, but I'm trying to strengthen my well-being by being careful about what I agree to do or who I do things for. I'm more aware of the people that I'm around and I learned to love much harder for the people I care for because I know they care as much now. I don't have to worry about people getting what they want from me anymore and even if I did have to, I'm much more prepared for it. My younger self would be so proud of myself right now and I love it so much.
I didn't know that these actions would form into bad habits. I didn't feel a need to get anything back until I was around 12 and realized that I deserved better since I had spent so much time and energy on all these people. Although I came to this conclusion, I wouldn't act on this opinion until a couple years later. I had spent the next couple months wondering why people wouldn't do the same for me as I did for them and came to the conclusion that no matter what the reason was, it's not like I was able to change that myself. I ended up being closed off as my way of coping with this realization and kept to myself, strayed away from my "friends" and learned to love being in my own personal solitude.
The following years I found that keeping a smaller group of friends that loved and cared for me was better than having all the friends in the world with only a few that cared. I used to value quantity over quality and that was a mistake that many people that I knew at the time reinforced. I learned to think for myself every once in a while and I'm happy with the progress I made these last couple of years.
To this day I still find it difficult to say no to people because of my old habits, but I'm trying to strengthen my well-being by being careful about what I agree to do or who I do things for. I'm more aware of the people that I'm around and I learned to love much harder for the people I care for because I know they care as much now. I don't have to worry about people getting what they want from me anymore and even if I did have to, I'm much more prepared for it. My younger self would be so proud of myself right now and I love it so much.
Inspiration
Artist in Focus: Stefan Czapsky
Stefan Czapsky was the cinematographer for the 1990 film, Edward Scissorhands. His direction with this movie is best compared to German Expressionism with his extreme high and low angles and distortion of setting. I knew I wanted to base this project off of something that looks dreamlike and the first thing I thought of was Edward Scissorhands. The setting is so colorful and beautiful despite the meaning of the film. I wanted to manipulate the setting with a deeper meaning behind the piece that contrasts with the setting's beauty in addition to the composition (to the right). The snapshot of this scene was perfect for what I wanted to connect my essay to and I knew how I was going to use it, although the scene itself is very different from my perception that I was going to make. Manipulation is key in German Expressionism and I was going to do that by making my own perception of this snapshot.
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The setting in Edward Scissorhands is a colorful suburb that's dreamlike in a way because not many neighborhoods look this way. The pastel colors inspired me to make my piece look similar by using the sky as the part that would be pastel. The hues of the pink houses and the purple tint of the film in this snapshot (to the right) captivated me because it was so pleasing to look at. I wanted to make my piece do the same with the aesthetic part of it but also contrast from the setting due to the somewhat graphic nature of the piece and deeper meaning.
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Artist in Focus: Tim Burton
Tim Burton was the director for Edward Scissorhands. Burton, in addition to Czapsky, incorporated elements from the German Expressionist era including expressive face manipulation (using makeup) and deeper connections of fear into this film, which is one of the main ideas of German Expressionism. I knew I wanted to include the expression that Edward has here (to the right) to have the same sense of disbelief as I was in disbelief when I realized what happened to me when I was younger. I also wanted to use makeup to make the expressions more evident and incorporate something that I like doing into my piece, to represent myself in the piece even more. Another reason that I chose Edwards Scissorhands was because the purpose of the film was to serve as a visual autobiography, similar to what this project was about.
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Planning
To start planning for this piece, I knew the composition was going to be the same as Czapsky's work but my own modifications would make it unique. I planned to make the piece mine by connecting my theme of self worth with these modifications. I laid out a planning map of what I could incorporate into my piece to do this. I ended up choosing pearl earrings for the child-like qualities of innocence and being naive, a heart with an exposed rib cage to go with it so that the person behind me would be reaching for my heart, similar to how people would use up my kindness, taking away a piece of my heart. I also knew I was going to have a similar makeup look to express emotions of disbelief and sadness while smiling through it in the collage.
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I wanted to make some composition sketches to see what I really wanted to put in this scene and just throw what I had in mind onto a medium, in this case I used Ibis Paint X, an app that I've been using for a few months that I feel somewhat comfortable to use for digital drawing. I also used a stylus similar to an Apple pencil to create my drawings. I've never drawn planning sketches digitally but I think it was a very time effective and good idea that I may use in the future.
In these drawings I drew the composition along with notes for myself on what to add along with the cosmetic aspect of the piece. I wanted to try to show emotion through the makeup so I made sure to change some features of the face like the eyebrows, having them pointing upwards in the front to show disbelief or worry and to add eye bags to show that I was tired. I also decided to add some symbolism with the pearl earrings to show an aspect of innocence and me being naive. I associated the color of the white pearls with innocence and the sense of being naive with being childlike, along with innocence. Apart from the makeup and accessories, I wanted the clothes to tie into German Expressionism as well. I decided to wear one of my favorite shirts that would compliment this project perfectly. |
I then began to sketch a heart that I had in mind for the composition/idea sketch above. I got a reference of an anatomical human heart online but made it my own by coloring and shading it in my own way (left). I did this by using the app, Ibis Paint X.
I also made the sketch of the rib cage to go with the heart (to the right) being inspired by the picture of a lollipop I took. To me, the lollipop looked a bit like a rib cage and a burst of imagination led me to create this sketch. |
Process
To prepare for this project, I started taking pictures of everything that I thought I could manipulate into the collage when I first was introduced to the project. I ended up taking the picture to the right about a week before I put the project together and I thought that it would be good for the sky in the background. I thought it fit the idea of a dreamscape because of the colors and the clouds that look like they were painted. I started a new project in the program I used to finish this collage, Photopea. I added the image to the right as the background.
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Then I began my process with makeup and getting ready to begin shooting the pictures of myself that I'd use in my collage. I used some red and brown eyeshadow to create shadows underneath the eyes to create a tired look and to contour the area around my eyes with brown eyeshadow for the look. Before I could do that, I had to cover up my eyebrows with makeup. I did that by adding 3-4 layers of Elmer’s purple to translucent glue stick, making sure that I brushed them upward and toward the grain of the hairs (left). Then, I packed red eyeshadow onto the dry and glued down eyebrows, and adding translucent powdered and finally foundation that matched my skin tone (middle). I also added eyelashes to the look to make it look a more feminine. This was replicated to exaggerate the emotion of disbelief and sadness.
Next, I went outside to take pictures with the help of my younger sisters. I told and showed one of them the composition I was aiming for and she did her best to replicate it. I chose this picture (under) to use for the collage.
To begin the editing process, I used Photopea and used the picture above to use as the foreground for my collage. I had to use the "refine edge" tool to get the part of the image where it was just me into the foreground, in "front of" the sky. Then, I used the same tool "refine edge" to get the image below similar to the image to the right. I added that cutout of myself to the collage.
To the right, you can see that I couldn't get the cutout of myself to fit the "other me" sitting down. This is when I decided to color in the spots that were left open and draw in some texture for the jeans and a design for the shirt.
At this point I was ready to add the heart and ribs and I did that by making the cutout with the "refine edge" tool as I was using before. Then to make the obviously fake scenario look a little more realistic, I added some shadows to try to make my arm look like it had form. I put the shadows both on my arm itself and on my shirt on the me that was sitting down (to the right). This is when my piece started to resemble the still from Edward Scissorhands and I could start to see the similarities and I was able to have most of my ideas into a manifestation so I considered this a good thing.
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After that, I was ready to start the cutout for the fence (below) using the "magic cut tool". It wasn't until after a while that I finally got the hang of it, but I got it to work for me. It helped speed up the process of making the cutouts and it was much easier to use than I thought. Looking back, I regret not playing with the tool more than I did but now I know what to use for future projects. After I made the cutout, I took out all the spaces in between the fence so I could have a higher level of detail.
The details in the fence are seen to the right. The process for this was so tedious that I had to use one pixel at some point for some areas during the cutout stage with the "refine edge" tool. I tilted the fence at an angle and I was done with the collage.
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Experimentation
For this art piece, my experimentation was found in the process of my work. This included a new medium for me, digital art. This also included the way I experimented with shading in my piece.
Using the digital medium was new for me since I had so little experience with it and using it was difficult at first since I was so used to drawing my sketches traditionally. One differing aspect of digital art from traditional was the different kinds of "brushes"
I experimented with a couple of different brush types on Ibis Paint X and I used the brushes called "Textured Pen", "Dip Pen (Hard)", and "Airbrush (Particle). I found interest in these three brush types because they contrasted with each other. One is very smooth meanwhile the other is, as its name suggests, is textured. One seems to be a mix of the other two, Airbrush. I decided to compare them to see which ones I wanted to use for the final piece. After comparing them, I realized that the textured brush was going to benefit me and the intentions I had for the heart. The intention with the heart was to make it look realistic but in a cartoonish way. The texture of the Textured Pen brush would help me best due to the fact that I could layer the brush over itself a layer more than the airbrush and overall I liked the look of the Textured Pen more than the Airbrush Pen. The textured brush was used for most of the heart, meanwhile the smoother dip pen was used for highlights in the veins. I also experimented with colors and value in the colors I was choosing. I had to decide whether a color had a darker or lighter value from one another. I started this process by starting with a base color numbered as 6 for the inner most part of the heart. Then, I chose a few colors that were both darker, then lighter in value. Colors 1-3 were used for the shadows and outer most colors of the heart. Colors 4-7 were used for highlights and a transition color (5) in between colors 6 and 3. |
In addition to the medium being something I experimented with, I experimented with shading in my collage in Photopea. I wanted to make my piece look a little more put together by adding a sense of form to it, and my solution to that was shading. At first, I mapped out the spaces that I wanted to have shading by marking it with a couple of browns that I would change the opacity of (to the right), in order to make it resemble shadows more. I played with the opacity and made it 50% visible at first (bottom right). Then I thought that it was still a bit much and changed it to 35% (below). This is where I ended up keeping it for the final collage.
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Critique
To compare, my piece has the visual components from both Czapsky and Burton. Czapsky's influence is seen with the composition and angle, specifically the fences, in both pieces. The fence is at an angle and so is mine. The composition of the pieces are the same, as I appropriated the still to make my collage.The components of the setting are also similar. This is seen with the fence and sky, the collage looks like it's taking place outside, such as the still on the right. Burton's influence is seen with the makeup and clothes that I'm wearing. I didn't bring up this aspect before but he dark clothes are a tie to German Expressionism. Edward wears a black leather costume underneath his collared shirt and I wanted to represent a small connection to that by adding what I think could be seen as the feminine equivalent. A black shirt with puffy sleeves but a pearl in the middle for that aspect of innocence.
To contrast, the version of me in makeup didn't have the same facial expression as Edward in the image to the left but the makeup made up for it in a way because it still has a look of being worried or upset. A difference from Burton is that my makeup, although very similar, I added a bit more contour to my face than the character Edward had on. Another difference in my piece and the inspiration is that I have hand drawn images used in my collage and the film doesn't include that. My collage is made up of different images and the film isn't, and is a still from a video, meanwhile I used a collection of images to form one image. The colors in my collage reflect the setting of suburbs in the film instead of the blue sky in the still to the right. A difference from Czapsky's still is that my fence is placed a bit higher than his was. This was due to the fact that my pictures didn't get to the same angle as his film did, so I didn't want to make the background look disproportionate to the angle. My fence was angled a bit more harshly than that of Czapsky.
To contrast, the version of me in makeup didn't have the same facial expression as Edward in the image to the left but the makeup made up for it in a way because it still has a look of being worried or upset. A difference from Burton is that my makeup, although very similar, I added a bit more contour to my face than the character Edward had on. Another difference in my piece and the inspiration is that I have hand drawn images used in my collage and the film doesn't include that. My collage is made up of different images and the film isn't, and is a still from a video, meanwhile I used a collection of images to form one image. The colors in my collage reflect the setting of suburbs in the film instead of the blue sky in the still to the right. A difference from Czapsky's still is that my fence is placed a bit higher than his was. This was due to the fact that my pictures didn't get to the same angle as his film did, so I didn't want to make the background look disproportionate to the angle. My fence was angled a bit more harshly than that of Czapsky.
Reflection
Overall, my final piece does connect with the inspiration visually. Czapsky's angles and composition were shown and Burton's exaggeration of expression did reflect onto my piece. Burton's underlying theme of fear also was incorporated into the meaning of my piece and while this project was different and fun for me to do, I did experience some difficulties. This included my inability to figure out the "magic cut" tool until the very end so I wasted a lot of time trying to use just the "refine edge" tool. Even though I did waste some time doing it, it made my project look a little cleaner and I had a better understanding of the "refine edge" tool. Another difficulty was the cutout of me reaching for the heart not fitting correctly and at first I was worried and I thought I had to take more pictures, but luckily I thought of just coloring in the missing areas. This helped me pay attention to detail and texture making my piece look more put together. Although my piece did come out looking alright, I did have some other ideas for my background to use instead of the fence. I wanted to have different people hold tiny pieces of my heart and make the heart look unfinished due to the people taking it apart. This would've made the meaning more apparent but I definitely do see myself recreating this piece on my own time, perhaps for senior year to make up for this.
Connection to the ACT
1.) Clearly explain how you are able to identify the cause effect relationship between your inspiration and its effect on your work:
The composition of Czapsky and the facial manipulation of expression of Burton inspired my work. I applied their aspects with my own meaning to create the final piece.
2.) What is the overall approach the author has regarding the topic of your inspiration?
Tim Burton's work is connected to German Expressionism because of the elements of fear and manipulation of expression in his film Edward Scissorhands. The topic of self worth is also explored in Edward Scissorhands with Kim Boggs played by Winona Ryder showing Edward how he can be loved.
3.) What kind of generalization and conclusions have you discovered about people, ideas, cultures, etc. while you researched your inspiration?
Some directors like to make movies based upon their own past experiences and cover it up with a fictional story to exaggerate the purpose of their film.
4.) What is the central theme around your inspirational piece?
Self-worth is something that many people struggle with and my journey with it was difficult but it paid off in the end.
5.) What kind of inferences did you make while reading your research?
I assumed that Tim Burton wrote Edwards Scissorhands as a story rather than an autobiography. I also thought that it would be more difficult than it was to relate German Expressionism with Edward Scissorhands, but after researching about the qualities of a German Expressionist inspired film, that it really was most similar to that genre of art.
The composition of Czapsky and the facial manipulation of expression of Burton inspired my work. I applied their aspects with my own meaning to create the final piece.
2.) What is the overall approach the author has regarding the topic of your inspiration?
Tim Burton's work is connected to German Expressionism because of the elements of fear and manipulation of expression in his film Edward Scissorhands. The topic of self worth is also explored in Edward Scissorhands with Kim Boggs played by Winona Ryder showing Edward how he can be loved.
3.) What kind of generalization and conclusions have you discovered about people, ideas, cultures, etc. while you researched your inspiration?
Some directors like to make movies based upon their own past experiences and cover it up with a fictional story to exaggerate the purpose of their film.
4.) What is the central theme around your inspirational piece?
Self-worth is something that many people struggle with and my journey with it was difficult but it paid off in the end.
5.) What kind of inferences did you make while reading your research?
I assumed that Tim Burton wrote Edwards Scissorhands as a story rather than an autobiography. I also thought that it would be more difficult than it was to relate German Expressionism with Edward Scissorhands, but after researching about the qualities of a German Expressionist inspired film, that it really was most similar to that genre of art.
MLA Citations
Taylor, Trey. “The Secret History of Edward Scissorhands.” Dazed, 16 Dec. 2015, www.dazeddigital.com/artsandculture/article/28715/1/the-secret-history-of-edward-scissorhands.
“What Is German Expressionism? A Beginner’s Guide.” Movements in Film, www.movementsinfilm.com/german-expressionism. Accessed 7 Oct. 2022.
StudioBinder. “What Is German Expressionism in Film? Defining the Style.” StudioBinder, 25 Aug. 2020, www.studiobinder.com/blog/german-expressionism-film.
“Creating the Castle and Colorful Houses for ‘Edward Scissorhands.’” Hooked on Houses, 1 Apr. 2022, hookedonhouses.net/2020/08/25/edward-scissorhands-filming-locations-florida-houses.
lib.guides.umd.edu/c.php?g=326833. University Libraries: University of Maryland. Accessed 7 Oct. 2022.
“What Is German Expressionism? A Beginner’s Guide.” Movements in Film, www.movementsinfilm.com/german-expressionism. Accessed 7 Oct. 2022.
StudioBinder. “What Is German Expressionism in Film? Defining the Style.” StudioBinder, 25 Aug. 2020, www.studiobinder.com/blog/german-expressionism-film.
“Creating the Castle and Colorful Houses for ‘Edward Scissorhands.’” Hooked on Houses, 1 Apr. 2022, hookedonhouses.net/2020/08/25/edward-scissorhands-filming-locations-florida-houses.
lib.guides.umd.edu/c.php?g=326833. University Libraries: University of Maryland. Accessed 7 Oct. 2022.