Resilient in the Pandemic

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Description

I was born here in Greenville, North Carolina. I am currently a senior here at East Carolina University. I will be graduating this December. When I first started at East Carolina University in 2017, I thought I had it all figured out. I started out with a major in Nursing, but later changed it to Elementary Education. I’ve always had a passion for working with children and helping them reach their full potential. Immediately after I changed my major, I was so happy, and my grades flourished to the point where I made Honor Roll every semester. Along with working with children, I love to dance, sing, and do anything related to art. In regard to art, I love how broad the term “art” is. In my opinion art comes in various expressions and forms. I solely believe that dancing and singing are related to the concept of art. Growing up, I enjoyed drawing and painting on canvases. As time progressed, I developed a desire for abstract paintings and historic paintings.
For this project, I had a plain black mask and used stencil iron on letters from Walmart to put on my mask. I printed the picture off and after the picture was dry, I ironed it onto the mask. Overall, the materials included two apples, sunflower, blow dryer, name tag & bed covers. I knew right away that I wanted to share my triumph over pandemic. The mask was a picture of my grandfather, who passed away last year in November. My grandpa was my best friend and my overall hero. I saw him battle with his health for a long time, but I didn’t think it would come to that point. After my grandpa passed, I was very broken and depressed. I didn’t want to finish school nor get out of bed. It got to the point where I stopped eating for some days. Ultimately, I recalled my grandpa’s encouraging words within myself “Destiny keep going, you’re stronger than this”. I realized that my grandpa wouldn’t want me to keep living in defeat. In honor of me only having one semester left of college, I used the two apples to represent me becoming a Teacher one day. In April of 2021, I enrolled in Hair School to obtain my Natural Hair Care licenses which explains the name tag and the hair dryer. I somedays still hide behind things and want to shy away from everything, but I know that I can’t. I used to hide behind the sunflower to express this thought. Throughout my share of COVID, I used my past experience to push and mutative me through this trying time. Every step I took during the pandemic, I felt like my grandpa was right there holding my hand.
I would definitely wear this mask in public because it is who I am. Not only do it show where I been, but it shows where I’m going. I used my grandpa “The mask” to hide my true self. When I was able to stop hiding from the things, I was able to prosper and be happy again. Many times, we hide behind different things because we’re fearful, scared, and depressed. When I took off the mask, blessing and favor started following to me. Overall, I think my project was creative and aesthetical because I opened up and shared a personal part of me. I implicated different materials within my selfie picture, with deep analysis. My mask first was hindering me from being happy, but when I removed the mask mentally, I achieved so many things. Doing this project has taught me a lot about myself and the people around me. I’m just blessed that I am still able to be strong and live the life that my grandpa would want me to have. This was created as an assignment for ART 1910 instructed by Susan Luddeke.

Coverage

Greenville, North Carolina

Creator

Anonymous

Date

2021-06-20

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