welcome to fosterland
fosterland. Various mediums; primarily ceramics. 2012
My first major exhibit back in college (spring 2012 — oh how the years have passed!) was an attempt to “translate” my observations of the foster care system into a visual article, if you will.
I am not a former foster youth. In fact, I had never really thought about the foster care system until I learned more about it in 2009. That is when I joined a student-run organization dedicated to raising awareness over the hardships of foster care teens.
I observed systematic issues that left me feeling frustrated and confused. I think this experience is what sparked me onto the path to my MPH.
From 2009 - 2012, I had the opportunity to meet many different foster youth, with many different walks of life. What struck me the most was the fact that many of these youth were my peers, my age, my generation.
And although I definitely had my fair share of hardships, there was a key difference between us: the presence of some form of stability and support.
So, for my final senior project (I was a visual arts/art history major), I decided to communicate with art.
I aimed to visually represent a summarized version of my observations, resulting in fosterland — a game that you can only play involuntarily.
To me, the foster care system was like a bizarre game of chance, playing with vulnerable children’s lives.
Ineffective policies, inadequate funding, in combination with an overburdened workforce and overstretched resources, all culminated into the landscape that was our foster care system at the local, state, and national level.
My thesis focused on using color theory, textures, and balance (regarding size and proportions) to translate my observations into art, primarily using elements of surrealism and abstraction.
My final exhibit consisted of two main components:
the gameboard and
the playing pieces.
My intent: engage the viewers in a dialogue via the game. I wanted viewers to experience the tension and bizarre circumstances that I had observed.
The Gameboard
Sixty-four cardboard squares, 12 in. x 12 in. attached to a canvas dropcloth (12 ft. by 15 ft.).
Acrylic paint on canvas.
Cardboard squares utilized mixed media (including epoxy resin, ink, paper, and color pencils).
The Gameboard of fosterland is a combination of the following: chess, a board game that uses dice, and a maze. This combination represents the haphazard system that results from the interplay of national, state, and local agencies and policies.
The gameboard is strewn with actual paperwork from my internship at a local foster care agency in Atlanta, GA.
The light squares of the board also serve as playing cards; along with the dice, these represent random chance and uncertainty within the foster care system.
The goal of this game is to be the first to win, to get out as fast as possible.
Because, the longer you stay in the system, the harder it is to get out and away from the negative outcomes of being in foster care.
The dark squares of the board are the only directions given to the viewer; they are the only form of guidance in this game.
Rather than helpful, these directions only serve as obstacles and sources of confusion, hindering the player’s path to escape from fosterland.
The Playing Pieces
For the visual-arts part of my major, my concentration was in ceramics. There are many qualities of clay that easily lend themselves to the art-making process (from technique to symbolism).
For my final exhibit, there was one particular quality of ceramics that was especially fitting: the permanent but fragile state of hardened clay; careless handling leads to broken pieces.
Ceramics: permanent, but fragile
There are two sets of player-pieces.
The first set is based on the hierarchy of chess pieces. In chess, each piece is assigned a point value that is directly tied to its strength (i.e., range of mobility).
The king chess piece is the most important piece in the game--checkmate ends the game. And yet, even though the game is centered around protecting and capturing the king, it is the only piece that has no point value.
It is not the strongest piece in chess; the queen is (there is no queen piece in fosterland).
The King Eye Piece
The Pawned Children
The Overburdened Beast
The Refuge and The Shattered
The second set of player-pieces are based on miscellaneous games and serve as representations of secondary players within the game.
