Measuring Histories Project

For my project, I wanted to create something that represented my family's long time spent in California. My dad's side has been here for six generations, and came out to California in wagons and settled around Riverside. Ever since, we've all stayed close to the South Bay, where I live now, by the ocean. I wanted to use poppies, the state flower, to represent each generation that has lived here. For the petals, I used watercolor since my family has a history rooted in the ocean (lifeguards, swim coaches, surfboard shapers, surfers, paddlers, divers, fishermen, etc.). I allowed them to be messy and rough, since poppies grow wild and since each person in my family is different. I wanted the poppies gathered in a can to show the unity of our family and because we always have flowers at home stuck in a vase somewhere. I wanted to photograph the piece on our living room table at home because of this reason as well, so I can have a reminder of my family in my new apartment, and to show it in the context for which it was created.

I enjoyed this assignment and the idea behind it, but the execution was difficult. It was hard to pick one thing to quantify-- my family is not big on tradition or lineage and so it took me a while to think of something. However I think this piece is fitting for that- flowers are simple but beautiful-- and I think my family is too.

Professor Huff brought up a good point in the critique, how poppies are fragile and so putting them in the can seems incongruous with their context. I think it would be cool to try sitting with them in a different context, like stuck in the ground as if they were growing. I really enjoyed them this way. I put them in front of my porch, and it was nice to have representations of my family right outside my home, as if they were with me. I ended up leaving them in this position.