"Odyssey"
TVMB ART EXHIBITION
Halie Won- "Tentacles"
Stella Chae- "Untitled"
This artwork depicts my mind in a visual way by showing all the different kinds of thoughts and feelings I feel in my head. It shows stress, disorganization, fear, relief, suffocation through metaphorical visual representations of the swirling pool, trains with plants coming out, all kinds of objects shoved into one area, and more. With this artwork, I wanted to represent how teenagers' mental health is unstable and how they have diverse emotions and thoughts that affect our mental health.
Continuously disbelieving in myself, I suffocated the continuous cycle of attempting to be independent of my parents’ aid due to their absence in my childhood, represented by the infinity shape. This caused mental pain of anxiety, causing the needles stabbing the tentacles of the octopus leg.
Cherry Kim - "Untitled"
A unique balance of liveliness.
Amy Cha- "We don’t have to hide it"
In South Korea, an environment where mental illnesses are mostly viewed to be taboo, many people struggling with mental health issues are ashamed of getting professional help. These people recognize the negative stigma associated with having a mental illness and fear being labeled as “different”. Through this piece, I wanted to express how having a mental illness is something one should never be ashamed of. The main focus of this piece shows someone deliberately hiding their medicine, embarrassed to eat it in front of her peers with “normal” snacks such as jelly and crisps. The contrast between the background filled with bright colors and the reserved pose of the girl, emphasizes her desire to keep her medicine a secret. We have to reframe the way we view mental illnesses and enforce a new and positive stigma around mental illnesses.
Through this piece, the artist is representing the mental health effects of the ongoing covid19 pandemic. Due to Covid19, she could not return to her country and personally struggled with a negative mindset, nearly falling through depression at the very beginning of the pandemic. There are elements that represent the recollection of her memory from Shanghai.
Aileen Chen - "Untitled"
Through this piece, the artist is representing the mental health effects of the ongoing covid19 pandemic. Due to Covid19, she could not return to her country and personally struggled with a negative mindset, nearly falling through depression at the very beginning of the pandemic. There are elements that represent the recollection of her memory from Shanghai.
Alexis Choi- "Instability"
These work Instability, on which I used acrylic paint and glitter, depict my mental stability. The circle in the middle represents stability and the drawings surrounding the circle represent impediments. The flow of the line and change of color shows the instability I feel as I grow up and some obstacles I face in my everyday life.
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Ashley Suh- "Untitled"
My painting depicts the struggles in body image and focuses on finding your true self. Body dysmorphia is a common mental health issue many teenagers struggle with because of our constant connection with social media and its standards. In this piece, I created a portrait painting to portray a perspective in which we see ourselves. The dull colors represent the way you can perceive yourself differently from how you actually look, while the brighter colors show our true self. In layers, my painting is meant to depict the progression of learning to appreciate your flaws and accept your appearance for what they are.
Juna Hong- "Sentiment"
'Sentiment' is an allegory to the phenomena of being infatuated with the idea of youth. ”青春/청춘”. Figuratively and metaphorically, it encompasses the meaning of “the spring of one’s lifetime”. Especially in East Asia, the experience is coined as fleeting. One could say this experience feels forced as there are pressures to conform to this spectacular youth stereotype however monotonous our youth may be. It's a reminder that our “best” years are always fleeting.
The “corpse-like” colour scheme of the face in addition to the use of string and needle all take on symbolic elements to display the suffocating experience teenagers undergo.
Juna Hong- "Bounded"
The concept of 'Youth' shrouds mass media and institutionalized religion. Media shows this adolescence in the aspect of rebellion and emotional confusion while religion reinforces the unadulterated aspect these years. However, both agree upon its fleeting nature. When in high tension, string holds a connotation of control and restriction while its relaxed form connotes freedom. The outstretched hand personifies the string into a being, whether this is a hand of comfort or domination is up to the thoughts of the viewer. But both aspects showcase the way media and religion tie teenagers down to conformation.