What a funky, clever presentation of a shared experience. I'm very partial to the last image. Are these impressions meant to be your own, or theirs, as they saw Nepal for the first time?
cIt's supposed to be their impressions and observations, but since I made the photos, I could add my own thoughts into the mix :: )
The first is about the inner impressions vs outer appearances, expressed by way of poverty vs wealth. It's curious that the poverty doesn't look like poverty when taken out of context-–the laundry drying on spiked wires next to a road for example, or the kid dangling his feet on the poles. The kid is actually looking out on a busy, dusty, chaotic traffic day, where there is hardly room to breath. Might be pitiful to look at the kid in passing, but once's he's out of context in a picture, suddenly his chubby cheeks and the entertainment he might experience on those poles become apparent. The same comes from the side of wealth, which suddenly became offensive to my parents in context. But looking at the picture, there's an elaborate door and a beautiful mural and you become aware of the artfulness, rather than the golden ink.
I think it comes down to the play between inner impressions and outer appearances in the sense that thoughts color the world as much or more than murals and sun-dried laundry can.
The second uses three different places to represent antiquity (revolving around the stupa's practices), modernity (lived in stress and traffic), and reality of death and dying (through pashupati's burning ghat).
Antiquity has it's illusions of spiritual practices, deities, gods&demons, accumulation of "merit", doing circumbambulation, prostration, mantra recitation and so on. Modernity has jobs, banks, marketing and cardboards, graphic novels, transportation, mass production, etc. Reality, so to speak, is our constant movement toward death. While "old" and "new" have filters to heighten the contrast (the filter of where in history you stand) Pashupati has no filter. It's just there.
The third touches on cycles: old people dreaming back on youth, young people heading toward being old, and then it starts again: old people act like kids, kids try to act like they're old, beginning from their very first wobbly step in life. Who knows.. there might be reincarnation! It also has the beggar topic hidden again--but once out of context, it's difficult to know for sure.
Finally the last one you commented on Sophs, is my dad's inner dilemma about letting me return to Nepal or not.
One one side is pope John Paul II and Christ, my cultural heritage of aztec gods and finally what my dad wants me to consider as my roots: my family (dad's parents together), my nation, my culture, language, religion and so on--my inherited identity.
On the other side is the lure of mysticism, the logical/practical arguments offered by Julio (bfriend), the academic institution (secretly converting people to buddhism, according to my dad) and the Stupa: cultural practices he doesn't understand, and so so far away from home.
The dilemma is letting Maria go to something foreign and incomprehensible which she loves, or making her stay home, stay rooted, stay my little girl.
Really nice collages! In a way, the appearance of these collages really reflects the culture that they depict. They are bright and colorful, like the prayer flags that flutter on their lines. And, actually, out of context, the hanging laundry almost looks like prayer flags. Also, many of these collages are cluttered and busy (e.g. masses of people in the second collage)-- this whole aesthetic reminds me very much of the aesthetic of the artistic murals that are shown in the very first collage. So it's cool to see the culture emerge not just from the images, but even from the way you put the images together.
And thank you for the lengthy description of each one above -- it forced me to revisit these collages with those thoughts in mind and really added new layers of depth behind what I was looking at.
I liked your description of the last collage -- out of curiosity, have you shown it to your dad?
He was amused at seeing his inner turmoil on a piece of paper, but then the contrast spoke out even more, and he thought the answer should be obvious and sighed.
Maria, the last one totally cracked me up! That is exactly how I would imagine your dad's inner turmoil, from what I have heard from you.
I loved the image of antiquity / modernity / and fact of death and the effect of editing or not editing. I didn't think of Nepal in those categories when I was there.
6 comments:
What a funky, clever presentation of a shared experience. I'm very partial to the last image. Are these impressions meant to be your own, or theirs, as they saw Nepal for the first time?
cIt's supposed to be their impressions and observations, but since I made the photos, I could add my own thoughts into the mix :: )
The first is about the inner impressions vs outer appearances, expressed by way of poverty vs wealth. It's curious that the poverty doesn't look like poverty when taken out of context-–the laundry drying on spiked wires next to a road for example, or the kid dangling his feet on the poles.
The kid is actually looking out on a busy, dusty, chaotic traffic day, where there is hardly room to breath. Might be pitiful to look at the kid in passing, but once's he's out of context in a picture, suddenly his chubby cheeks and the entertainment he might experience on those poles become apparent. The same comes from the side of wealth, which suddenly became offensive to my parents in context. But looking at the picture, there's an elaborate door and a beautiful mural and you become aware of the artfulness, rather than the golden ink.
I think it comes down to the play between inner impressions and outer appearances in the sense that thoughts color the world as much or more than murals and sun-dried laundry can.
The second uses three different places to represent antiquity (revolving around the stupa's practices), modernity (lived in stress and traffic), and reality of death and dying (through pashupati's burning ghat).
Antiquity has it's illusions of spiritual practices, deities, gods&demons, accumulation of "merit", doing circumbambulation, prostration, mantra recitation and so on.
Modernity has jobs, banks, marketing and cardboards, graphic novels, transportation, mass production, etc.
Reality, so to speak, is our constant movement toward death. While "old" and "new" have filters to heighten the contrast (the filter of where in history you stand) Pashupati has no filter. It's just there.
The third touches on cycles: old people dreaming back on youth, young people heading toward being old, and then it starts again: old people act like kids, kids try to act like they're old, beginning from their very first wobbly step in life. Who knows.. there might be reincarnation! It also has the beggar topic hidden again--but once out of context, it's difficult to know for sure.
Finally the last one you commented on Sophs, is my dad's inner dilemma about letting me return to Nepal or not.
One one side is pope John Paul II and Christ, my cultural heritage of aztec gods and finally what my dad wants me to consider as my roots: my family (dad's parents together), my nation, my culture, language, religion and so on--my inherited identity.
On the other side is the lure of mysticism, the logical/practical arguments offered by Julio (bfriend), the academic institution (secretly converting people to buddhism, according to my dad) and the Stupa: cultural practices he doesn't understand, and so so far away from home.
The dilemma is letting Maria go to something foreign and incomprehensible which she loves, or making her stay home, stay rooted, stay my little girl.
I'm still waiting on the outcome of that one.
Really nice collages! In a way, the appearance of these collages really reflects the culture that they depict. They are bright and colorful, like the prayer flags that flutter on their lines. And, actually, out of context, the hanging laundry almost looks like prayer flags. Also, many of these collages are cluttered and busy (e.g. masses of people in the second collage)-- this whole aesthetic reminds me very much of the aesthetic of the artistic murals that are shown in the very first collage. So it's cool to see the culture emerge not just from the images, but even from the way you put the images together.
And thank you for the lengthy description of each one above -- it forced me to revisit these collages with those thoughts in mind and really added new layers of depth behind what I was looking at.
I liked your description of the last collage -- out of curiosity, have you shown it to your dad?
Yes :: )
He was amused at seeing his inner turmoil on a piece of paper, but then the contrast spoke out even more, and he thought the answer should be obvious and sighed.
Yai for yumyum!
Woo!
Maria, the last one totally cracked me up! That is exactly how I would imagine your dad's inner turmoil, from what I have heard from you.
I loved the image of antiquity / modernity / and fact of death and the effect of editing or not editing. I didn't think of Nepal in those categories when I was there.
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