Collage Analysis

At the center of it all is a black hole. The two light orange shapes are like arrows, pointing to the black hole, the void in my life. Four other arrows point away from the hole saying, “Look away.” The hole is like a fan or a vacuum, blowing the other pieces around into a mess. And yet the collage is symmetrical, as if I am trying to give order and meaning to the pieces.

Four orange quarter-circles surround the black hole and dominate in four corners. Each quarter-circle has jagged, pointed edges and something bubbling from it, as if it is trying to escape and form a new shape and a life of its own while still holding a piece of the original shape. But it hasn’t broken free yet.

Across the top and bottom of the collage are two arms reaching for the only tiny bits of love they can find. The love is right at the fingertips, but not in the grasp of the arms. One long vein runs through each arm, giving it the strength to keep reaching for the elusive love. The arms show cuts and scars--the imperfect “crazy person” arms. The cuts closest to the fingers are more numerous, as if to say, “Go away, I’m crazy.” But as you look deeper, the cuts are actually broken pieces, broken dreams, broken trust. Underlying all this is jealousy and frustration.

All of this activity nearly masks the broken and chaotic mess underneath. Half sadness and half fear, the pieces merge in the middle with no distinct boundaries. The dark and light tones are a contrast, showing the darker and lighter moods that are still based in the same emotions. The transparent pieces show my intermittent inability to hide. The purple flowered pieces are my attempts to mask my fear with something more acceptable and beautiful. The mixture of shapes are the different forms I take and many masks I wear--some pleasing and bright, others disturbing and dark.

The gray diamonds in the background blend in and hardly show. They have no meaning, no worth, and add no value. They are just placed at random, floating through the existence and escaping from view. They were put there for something, but I don’t know what.