I am not sure what the right word for the critique for my Ordinary/Extrordinary drawing would be...the piece had more of a personal concept that maybe everyone did not see at first. The idea of feeling trapped and not having much freedom seemed to be quite recognizable, which is good since that was the main message.
However, I think there was too much of a personal idea in it for people to truly see it. The icon man and woman spray painting graffiti appeared to be well-liked and fit the idea of the piece. The background and pipes on the other hand, did not go over well. Some people thought that the boxed-in idea of adding the pipe outline was over-doing the idea, however that was my intent. Comments on the brick background were also mixed, which I agreed with as well. I was not sure what I was going to do with the background when I started, but I thought the brick might work well with the graffiti idea. I do agree with the comments I received on the background and pipe areas, but I am not sure what I would have done differently with them. But yes, they could have been done differently to make the piece stronger.
The idea of my drawing came after I had chosen the images and started sketching a few out. I had all these images of the place I have begun to come sick of, so that is where the images took me. I started with the slide picture, taken from a small playground by my house that I pass every day. I always seem to think about the contrasting ideas of the playground...the intended 'fun', childish aspect, combined with the abandoned, lonely feeling that the playground has. I then added the rest of the Stout images, the 'Polytechnic' lightpole flag, the iconic male/female symbols, the light socket, the bland brick, etc. I tried to sketch out a composition with all the chosen images, but it did not seem to be working, so the final drawing is simply a collage of my thoughts.
