Touch

 

The Inner Climate

    "In recent sci-fi/horror films like Wolfen or Predator, razor-clawed, blood-lusting monsters live in a world beyond our visual range; but we are exquisitely findable by them because we can sense infrared. The monsters appear without warning, disembowels someone, and vanishes. Something about its heat-seeking ability makes it double horrifying." - Diane Ackerman.

    

    Statement: After reading the Touch chapter, from the book A Natural History of the Senses by Diane Ackerman, I was interested in how temperature played a part in touch. The part I was very interested in was heat receptors and how living things perceived temperatures. In my work, I wanted to portray the monster under the bed cliché, but instead, I wanted to show a different point of view. I believed the point of view in this image is very important because it plays on power and vulnerability. I wanted the monster to be shown as a human because it can take into different forms in life and how humans are the monsters in some situations.   

Tattoos

    "In her book of forty-six almost life-sized Polaroid Reproductions, the Japanese Tatoo Photographer Sansi Fellman explains her attraction to tattoos as an infatuation with Paradox: ' Beauty created through brutal means,'' Power bestowed at the price of submission,' 'the glorification of the flesh as a mean to spirituality."

     Statement: After reading the Touch chapter, from the book A Natural History of the Senses by Diane Ackerman, I was inspired to create a pattern of the same ink block tattoo on a fabric of the cloth. I placed the fabric over a person head to show a form of spirituality. I thought about doing a Mayan tattoo because it is something I grew up learning within my culture of Latin America. I based most of my ink block on the Mayan gods and mythology. The first one I thought of was  Kinich Ahau. He was the Mayan Sun God, he is one of the most important gods of Mayan mythology. Kinich Ahai is also associated with the jaguar. I carved out a jaguar and underneath it, I placed a sun, not only to represent him as a sun god but as light, time, heat, etc... The second one I wanted to show a noticeable pre-Columbian pattern, so I craved a box and some directional lines within it to show energy. The third box is an interpretation of In Lak'ech. In Lak'ech is a symbol of pure love, unity, identification, and the comprehension of the late others and everyone. In Lak'ech translate to, I am the other you, in which they replied Hala Ken, you are my other me.  The last goddess I portrayed is Ix Chel. Ix Chel is the Mayan moon goddess, she is associated with rabbits as a symbol of fertility and a nod to the lunar landscape. I craved a dragonfly because when Ix Chel dies, dragonflies sing/humming over her for 183 days. After craving the dragonfly, I placed the moon cycle next to it and a crescent moon on top.