Reagan
Gallardo

Phenomenal Distortion

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Phenomenology is the philosophical study of structures of experience. I applied this concept to this creative body of work with the following question: How do individuals interpret experiences, ideas, and life differently? I explored this question by distorting the portraits of women and objects. All ten portraits are of women who are my friends, roommates or members of my family. I have also paired each portrait with an object which I selected based on how it connects with the person. The purpose of the distortion is to explore recognition and visual representation of a person. There are a multitude of ways to represent someone, through photography, realistic portraiture, cartoon interpretation. For example, I paired my mother with her piano because every time I see that specific piano it makes me think of her. The question I ask myself and my audience is the following: Is this still a portrait? Is this still my mother represented even though her face slides down to the left of the illustration? Do I determine if the illustration is my mother or not? Or is that dependent on another person’s ability to recognize her? I partner the portraits with the objects because of a realization I had earlier in this project. When I distorted a human face or figure, I would have a more emotionally driven reaction to the distortion. My mother’s face being distorted makes me wonder if she is sick or even sad, because her eye distorts downwards like a tear. But the object exists more as a compositional reaction. I can relate to how the colors look and the placement of the distortion captivates me. At the same time, I do not react or wonder about the piano’s emotional well being. I find this interesting: Both the portrait and the object are distorted in a similar way, yet they do not hold the same value. Because of my interpretation, I hold more significance in the person, which causes me to relate to the portrait on a more emotional level.