Peer Into
watercolor illustration, photographic/altered alligator eyeball & skin,
digitally-printed and hand-rolled chiffon scarf // 2012
watercolor illustration, photographic/altered alligator eyeball & skin,
digitally-printed and hand-rolled chiffon scarf // 2012
This digital print collaborative project involved swapping personal stories with our partners and creating work about said story to swap as gifts to each other. My partner to swap stories with was Alexandra Avati Caivano.
My story for Alex was about my experience with celebrating Ramadan for the first time with my boyfriend and his family, and reflecting on the Muslim culture. Alex's story focused on late-night high school adventures with friends, old an creepy warehouse, prescription glasses, and "albino alligators."
I’ve taken imagery from Alex’s story (climbing a long ladder, alligator skin, etc.) and incorporated elements from what I feel is Alex’s color palette and artistic mood. The olive green tones and photographic qualities of Alex’s work come through in my scarf gift to her. The border is a never-ending gold ladder leading to the alligator’s eye at each corner of the scarf. The ladder and eye act as a form of soft jewelry as the scarf is worn around your neck and the eye as a jewel pendant with a ladder chain.
Alex designed a scarf for me as well, with a tailored hooded Hijab pattern. Her imagery was taken from the design on a traditional prayer rug, and she altered the image a bit with coloring, vectoring, and adding distinctive arrows or points that face Mecca, an important aspect of the daily Islamic prayer routines.
