The Yellow Wallpaper Collage
I have more elements here than I initially expected to integrate but after toying with GIMP more, I realized how much I could do. The Yellow Wallpaper is about a woman who is assumed to be suffering from postpartum depression and I really wasn't sure if I should include the image of the baby or not but I figured that it also integrated the idea that the room with the yellow wallpaper where the woman is staying used to be a nursery. I like the pattern I found, mainly because I felt as though it had a lack of repetition which the story points out about the paper many times. The blurred woman in the corner represents the woman that seems to be hidden beneath the wallpaper. I added the eyes because in the end of the story, the woman that was trying to get out the wallpaper was the main character and I almost felt as though the eyes gave a sort of mirror effect or showed that it was the main character trying to get out. My personal favorite element of the collage is the hand scraping away at the wallpaper. It was probably the portion that took the most time and I really like the way it turned out. The main character is continually ripping at the wallpaper in the story so this seemed like an important element to me. I had a lot of fun making this project and I think there is definitely room for improvement!
The elements:
Background- http://www.lucasvaneeghen.com/Images/red%20vs%20yellow.jpg
Woman silhouette- http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/articulations/wp-content/files/2008/01/w...
Background pattern- http://images-3.redbubble.net/img/art/size:large/view:main/855766-2-flor...
Torn wallpaper- http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://everystockphoto.s3.amazona...
Eyes- http://s202.photobucket.com/albums/aa26/xxxredcherrysxxx/?action=view&cu...
Baby- http://www.photographybyskotti.com/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderpicture...
Hand- http://www.r3sm.org/images/hand.jpg
Syndicate
Comments
I am a huge fan of this short
I am a huge fan of this short story, and I think your collage does a really good job of conveying it. I especially love the eyes and the torn wallpaper at the bottom (and how you put it in the same place and manner that I imagined the woman in the story tearing the paper off the wall). I don't know how I feel about the image of the baby; I understand its inclusion but it seems kind of random and disconnected from the rest of the collage, which is otherwise very well organized and put together. You did a great job of blending, which is something I am personally having a lot of trouble with on my collage, so I might be using this as a model for how my edge-blending needs to look. Nice work!
great effects
I really like the scraping away aspect of the wallpaper and think you did a great job! I have a copy of this story and have never gotten around to reading it, but this really inspired me to do so!
My collage...
I added some of the explanations above for the elements, but I do agree that some things seem out of place. I don't know if I should include the baby or not. I feel like it is kind of an important element but there is probably a much better way to integrate it in the collage. (Suggestions definitely welcome!) Also, the red was supposed to give a sense of madness creeping into the woman's mind without her knowing it which is why I placed it on the side she's not looking towards. This may not really get the point across though. I really meant for the woman hidden in the paper to be the portion being scraped away and since she's not sure it's there, I blurred her. I think I should lighten the pattern around the eyes so they show up more. Any other ideas? Especially about the baby...
I really like the sense of
I really like the sense of motion created by the patterns in the main images. I'm wondering about the eyes--if maybe some masking of the pattern there to just give them a bit more presence might be played with. I also like the motif in the lower right to get at the scraping. Is it worth making that gesture even bolder? The baby I'm less sure about. I get the motif re the story, but don't feel like it is integrated into the image. Could it become an element revealed in the space that is scrapped away? I'm not 100% sure what the touch of red is doing, but it might also offer some possibilities for amplification.