Language and Society

Every society has a story to tell.

BACKGROUND

As mentioned in my process post, it all started with a strip of Chinese characters. After consultation with Joy, she encouraged me to go on with this idea and I should develop this into a diversity of languages instead. After much researching, I realised that many languages are linked to the society they reside in, therefore, I decided to go with the theme of LANGUAGE AND SOCIETY.

CHALLENGES

As I embarked on a journey to retell the stories of different societies and cultures, I faced difficulties in curating the stories in a life form. How do you even artsify something that is intangible like cultures and norms? And to find out how I managed to overcome these obstacles, you will have to read on. (smirk)

STORY

With every strip made, there is a deeper meaning behind it.

Originally, I wanted to split the board into two segment(this suggests why there is 2 A2 boards)- one board for Chinese language (due to my love for it) and the other for other languages, however, after my group consultation, Joy and my classmates suggested that I should combine both boards and explore more languages and societies. Therefore, my finally product is an A1 board. Also, I mainly used normal print paper as I want to focus on the story behind in, however, for some strips, I felt that using a different textured paper will enhance and highlight the story that I am going to tell.

Affection

Italians are thought to be the most affectionate people on earth. To prove this point, I have wrote several Italian love expressions like “vita mia”, “cuore mio” and “tesoro” which means my life, my dear/ heart and treasure respectively. Also, the words are written in italics to further express my point of Italian language and out of the strip to express the uncontainable emotion.

Passion

Passion is the strong feeling/ emotion towards someone or something. The flower language of rose is love. By filling the whole strip with roses, I want to express the overflowing love and hence, this translate into passion.

Infatuation

When I think of infatuation, the first thought that comes into my mind was “心花怒放”, which literally means heart blossoming. How else can I convey this message perfectly other than drawing blossoming flowers?

To create realistic flower patterns, I utilised the one stroke technique of combining both black and white paint on my brush and painting both colours at the same time. I found this technique especially hard to prevent both paint from mixing together, however, I guess it is similar to the feeling of infatuation whereby you are unable to to control your heart.

Bliss

“山高路遠魂飛苦，夢云不到關山難“

This is a poem about missing someone. Personally, I feel that when you are missing someone, you might feel that you are walking on this ice, the feeling of uncertainty, however, to be able to miss someone is actually a bliss in disguise. Many people in this world do not have the luxury of missing someone. Therefore, I used wax paper whereby is resembles that of a Chinese calligraphy paper to bring out the meaning of the poem but at the same time, though the paper might seem fragile but its actually not in reality (it is able to tolerate high heat) which resembles the feeling of missing someone.

Happiness

The Bhutanese are thought to be the happiest people on earth. They are the perfect example to express the feeling of happiness. Originally, I wanted to draw the mountain view of Bhutan, however, it did not turned out well as shown below.

After putting in some thoughts, I’ve decided to incorporate clouds which signify cloud 9 and the bhutan flag into my markmaking. And voila, piece completed. 😉

Contentment 

For this, I decided to go with child language. As we all know, children like to do scribblings and doodles. Putting a black background is to signify that in times when the situation is not to their own favour, unlike adults, children make do with what they have and can still create their own doodles (fun and joy) out of it.

Astonishment

Astonishment is the feeling of strong surprise. The use of Singlish has always seem crude to me for some reason due to the tone and way we say it. Also, due to its strong and crisp expression, this leaves a strong impact and a sense of bafflement when one uses it. Hence, I decided to use Singlish like “SIA LA”, “KIASU” and “LIDDAT ALSO CAN” to express the feeling of astonishment.

Surprise

Athena and Ares are siblings in greek mythology. Ares is the god of war and Athena is the god of wisdom and intelligence. The surprise emotion I want to get across here is that they actually went on war against each other during the Trojan war with Athena being on the Greek side while Ares being on the Trojan. In the end, Athena won against Ares. Hence, in the strip, I have put both Ares’s and Athena’s names together to show that they are siblings but the irony/ surprising thing is that you can see both of them in fighting stance against each other.

Amazement

Egyptian hieroglyphics were first found on the rosetta stone. I can imagine the amazement of the people when they first found this revolutionary language on the rosetta stone. Hence, I have copied a small stanza of the hieroglyphics on the stone onto my strip. Also, the use of chalk on black background is to mimic the degrading process of the carvings over time and hence, giving the whole strip an ancient finish.

Ferocity

Thai Khon is a common character in Thai plays and it is about a monkey warrior going on a journey to fight demons. I have used the word “ข้างหน้า” in the strip which means forward to represent the ferocity of this being in completing his journey against the evil. I have used newsprint due to its rustic feeling which can depict the traditional khon play which was passed through several generations.

Bitterness

Inspired by joy, I was set on expressing how japanese like to keep their emotions within themselves even when they are angry. Won’t this create bitterness for them? Hence, I decided to make patterns out the word “怒り” which means anger. Kept within the circles, this represent the kept emotions. With the neat repetitive patterns, this suggest one characteristics we often identify the japanese- systematic.

Torment

“Dozens die in suicide bombings across Syrian cities held by Assad forces”

This is the arabic words written in the strip. This is the latest news about the syrian situation currently. Despite Bashar al Assad being the president of Syria, we see little effort done by the president to control the current situation in Syria. With this, I feel that it must be such a torment for the people to be ruled under poor leadership and corrupted government.

Also, I have crushed the strip before mark making the background of the strip so show the ruined state of the country currently.

Defeat

To explain the whole arab spring situation will take days or even weeks. However, the main gist of arab spring is that people are fighting in wars now in the name of peace. The word in the strip, “سلام”, means peace. This is an irony as people are not gaining any more peace but chaos instead. Hence, the main aim of the arab spring failed and this translate into a sense of defeat. Therefore, I have mark made a chaotic background behind the peace which means chaos in the name of peace, this defeats the original purpose of arab spring.

Suffering

This strip is to document the process of freeing sufferings. I have drawn out different segments of the American states during the American Civil War. With the greyed zone signifying the Union states, slashed zone representing the Confederate states and greyed and slashed zone representing the border states where fightings mainly take place at. This is a war about freeing the slaves whom were shipped from different countries in Africa. At that time, slaves were legalised in the confederate states and hence, when the banning of slaves was introduced, this sparked of disagreement in the confederate states and this escalated into a civil war. In the end, the union states won and the slaves were freed off their sufferings.

Insecurity

If you look carefully, there are Russian words behind the mark make. It means people are wanting the communist state to be back. After the fall of the Berlin wall, we see fall of the USSR and Russia being increasingly democratic. However, behind this facade, there are actually many Russians that want the resurrection of the communist era again. This is because after World War II, Russia was left in a pile of huge debt, the country isn’t prospering very well even till today. Hence, this led to insecurity among people which blossom into thoughts of gaining back their communist state in hope for better living despite the “democratic” facade (mark make).

Fear

The mayans are known for their prophecies about the world. They have made a few prophecies on the mayan calendar whereby some really did came true, hence, whenever a prophecy arise, this invokes fear among people. Therefore, i used the several symbols on the mayan calendar that are that similar to horoscopes to represent their prophecies. Also, the use of water patterns is to explain the moodiness nature of water which further substantiates the feeling of fear. I have used news print due to its rustic nature to depict the ancient society.

Anxiety

“Let me speak now please”

I used sign language in this strip to represent the anxiety when one is unable to convey their message effectively and they are constantly trapped (which explains the fuzzy lines around the sign languages) in an endless cycle of not being understood.

Distress

We all know that Koreans are mindful about their respect. With just one word “hello”, this can be branched out into the informal, formal, more formal and even when you pick up a phone call. The emotion I want to convey is the distress about when to use what form of “hello”. Isn’t there going to be blurred lines about which forms to use?

CONCLUSION

Markmaking has been a tough yet fun process for me and I have learnt alot about patience through this project due to me not choosing to use monoprinting. Also, I have learnt about how I can convey a story through simple depiction of lines and the characteristics of the story.