I started the project during Trump's election.
“ Everything is gonna be OK ” is a series of three prints including lithograph , silkscreen, collage and salt prints. Print media has a long history as an informational and propagandistic art form. I am showing the history of the media response to contemporary propaganda. In this series, the images reveal the processing of their making, leaving the traces of making process in the image, as well as the originality of the each press print .
This work responds to the presidency of Donald Trump, whose speech and policy is not the same as any previous President. The world will get into a whirlpool with the unclear future. The work allowed for multiply reading, criticizing the current political situation and at the same time creating a absurd and amusing experience for the viewer.
American Flag
Silkscreen
The first print “American Flag” is the U.S. flag with the stars replaced by Donald Trump’s hand gestures, pulled from his repetitive gestures during the inaugural address. Trump’s speeches instigate to the public, for he always gives specific hand gestures to emphasize social issues, reinforce his authority and emphasizes his political performance. By parallel the performance of the American flag and Trump, the image questions the authority of Trump.
Sweet Home America
The second art work, “Sweet Home America,” depicts an American home on fire, with Donald Trump’s hair levitating on the sky, like a drifting cloud or smoke, OK Hand gesture flowers bloom in the foreground and reinforce his positive feedback to the public. The ambiguity of the image created by the unfamiliar arrangement of familiar object, the work allows multiple readings. America is on fire, is Donald Trump going to be the raining cloud or the smoke on the air? Did the fire happened before his presidency or after? Will the blooming flower get burned?
The Great Party
The last art work, The Great Party, refers to Donald Trump’s political policy to the country. He pictured an ideal American society, with medical care, available education, jobs and peace. It reminds me of the promise that Chinese Communist Party in the 1970s made to the public. Although their slogans were everywhere, but their promise was Utopian instead of practical. We cannot know what Trump is going to bring to America, but we can predict his performance in comparison to historic leaders. The image depict a Chinese 1970s printmaking style, with Trump’s hand gesture in the middle ground referring to the slogan “ Together, We Will Make America Great Again,: comparing it to with the Chinese slogan “ The great communism party will lead China forward! ” in the 70s. In the foreground are Trumps’ election posters and biographie, which can be seen to imitate the Chinese little red books as well. There are American flags on each side of the image , reminding us of the Chinese party’s meeting scene.
The image questions how audiences depict old style art in contemporary art world, in comparing with how Trump’s old-fashioned ways of contemporary function in contemporary society.
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