For my final project, I created a modernize beauty theme vanitas inspired by Audrey Flack’s paintings. The main idea of vanitas is inevitability. I decided to take items common in today’s media world and adapt it to the style of the still-life paintings.
The bust represents immortal beauty, similar to classical statues. As I posted in the module, Kylie Jenner is one of my model/reference for this final project. The image used to create the bust is an old photo of her (≈2013) and for me it captures the youthfulness that I found in classical statues. I wanted to add skulls in the piece without using the actual human size skull that is commonly seen in vanitas paintings. With that, there is an x-ray placed over the bust to symbolize death. No matter how much one may do to themselves, death is inevitable —hence the rotten fruits in the background. The smoke /skull holder ties in with death as well as influence. For instance, actress/model Marilyn Monroe, who is still an influential figure today, was often photographed with cigarettes. The bust/skull looks as if it’s exhaling smoke. In reality, cigarettes can do more harm than help. The clock and locket stands for the continuity of life. The locket says “forever young” illustrating that as time moves, so will age.
The different shades of makeup products, Botox bottle, and the bag of features (containing lips, eye shapes and colors) represent how accessible just about everything is in today’s society. Technology is also a factor to this. The phone has a list of surgical procedures that the owner has planned for as quickly as “tomorrow”. Technology is present in the electronic candles placed in the center. Candles are another staple in vanitas. Also, the iPad that is placed on old books, now turned into a stand, with the eBook app on screen.
The lanyard of goals is based on what I have found “important” to those on social media. Having the perfect body, hair, fashion, specific facial features and getting recognition/praised from the viewers for these reasons. Sometimes meaning to be just like someone else (i.e., mannequin with the same hairstyle as Kylie Jenner in the fourth polaroid photo). The second polaroid image is a screenshot of actress Lea Michele Sarfati in the television show “Scream Queens” eating cotton. The purpose of this was to prevent weight gain, which brings the cotton and flat tummy tea (Kylie Jenner and other celebs promote FTT) on the vanity table.
The programs that I used were Photoshop and Pixlr Express. I created the wall, polaroid frame and table in Photoshop, but all other images were found on Google and manipulated. One of the ideas I presented in the first module for the final was to include gifs and decided to mimic some characteristics of social medias with this technique. The tags are from Instagram and two popular filters from Snapchat. On Pixlr, I combined different overlay filters to add color and the flies surrounding the rotting fruits.
I am very satisfied with the outcome of the work. I spent MANY hours to complete this final piece the best way I knew how to, but to further this project I would create a series…. maybe a male version.