EVIL VS. REDEMPTION

The picture that I chose is one of the representations of how Cindy Sherman intends to change the stereotype that deep down in people's mind. According to John Currin, "Cindy is someone who can create a new kind of scary clown that is not a cliché. Her work is very straightforwardly put together, but it is incredibly mysterious and magical." Cindy Sherman is capable to convey the idea that a scary clown that wearing in a weird suit and laugh in a strange way could bring happiness too. To look closer, people can discover the weird makeup for the clowns in order to symbolize there stereotype thinking by the other people -- which is scary. However, by digging deep into the colors that she deployed, it is not difficult to discover her intention of the image, which brings up the idea that those scary clowns can also be those people who make you laugh and produce happiness. Let's look at the selfie that I inspired by Cindy Sherman's untitled#425. I turned off all the light in my apartment, in order to build up a horror atmosphere, which also builds up my character as a stalker. Apparently,  I am a stalker that intends to hide myself up by the darkness, and the little light exposes me, which bring people a sense of horror by discovering there is someone watching them in the darkness. People usually be afraid of such a situation, due to the darkness and the identity of that person, therefore form a concept that someone who hides in dark must come with a evil thoughts. However, everything has its different aspects, and people are normally constraint by those traditional thinking of one particular thing. The message that I truly want to convey to the audiences is actually redemption. Instead of viewing me as a horrible person, I want people think it as this way when the candle became the path toward brightness, and the people who hide in the dark is actually those who intend to walk out from the darkness. Just as some of Cindy Sherman's work, my selfie can somehow be mysterious because of the color that I utilized was all black, and I even changed my clothes and cap into all black too, therefore people might mistake me as a creepy person who about to commit something evil or bad things. Nevertheless, just as how Sherman has done for the clown, she painted out the laugh on the clown's face, and I put a candle as an indication to the viewers that there could be another aspect or perspective of the whole picture, therefore help them breakthrough one perspective. Go back to the clown picture, Clowns has changed from funny to scary for a long time, and the thinking of Clowns are all dangerous emerged, especially when people use it as a topic of a movie, like IT. So for my picture, I kindly utilized the idea of what people normally think of darkness, then exhibit a sharp contrast by letting the candle in front of me, so just like light up the darkness.