Dain Observational Work

For my Dain observational work, I chose the them of Women vs. Society, documenting how society is breaking down strong characters because they don't look 'perfect' which is a lie anyway. After researching Dain's work, I saw that he frequently used the them of women's rights so decided to follow that idea. To begin with, I did a backwash of yellow and orange because those are colours that are related to happiness and summer; contrasting to the symbolism in the collage. I started off my collage by using a bare face with no make up or hair done.

I then incorporated the history of women's fashion into the piece by adding a clipping of 50's women's shoes and then a magazine clip of the modern day shoe fashion. This symbolises how fashions and expectations have changed in 60 years and how now women are expected to rely on their looks even more so then the 1950's.

I then added a cut out of some hair onto the collage to begin to the show the expectations of women. I purposely used a cut out that was black and white to show the fear that lots of women are fearful of, growing old. To continue the comparisons from the 50's to the modern day, I stuck down a photo of a 1950's housewife to represent the stereotype that have been stuck with women for centuries. To add modern influences into my Dain research, I used photos of pills as (metaphorical) tears. To show the pain some women go through to ensure they fit society's idea of 'perfect, sexy, attractive) this false image can rule some women's lives and make them very self conscious that can lead to all sorts of disorders; hence the use of the pill images.

 In the final stages of the making of the collage, it began to look quite full and almost claustrophobic due to the face being covered by so many things. This could symbolise how some women are trapped in a war with themselves when trying to change their appearance. I stuck down words from newspaper articles because women are often exposed as these sexual creatures that are just for male entertainment, such as page 3 models and adult comic strips. I chose the word 'memories' because some women who are emotionally and mentally broken from trying to reach expectations may miss the days when they didn't care what others said and could be there own person. the quote ' Beauty, it hurt like hell' can be taken quite literal since some women have become that obsessed about looking 'perfect' they have operations and Botox to change their physical appearance. I also used it because I thought it was metaphorical in the sense it's emotionally painful for someone to feel not good enough or for them to be pulled down on their physical appearance and sex appeal. And when that happens and someone loses themselves in society's false advertisement, it is truly heart-breaking to see.

To complete the collage, I created my own Dain trademark by circling the eye with a iro instead of paint.