It really inspired me to show various pictures by different artists for my still image response. This provides a better idea of how I might formulate my final portfolio still image. Click on images for bigger and better quality.
Let's start off with this picture. It combines all the seven deadly sins together. From left to right you see sloth, wrath, gluttony, lust, pride, greed, and envy. I think it is interesting that the artist chose a gold background for the seven deadly sins, and the fact they are on clouds is too. This almost glamorizes the sins and presents them in a pretty manner. All the girls are pretty, and in a dream-like state. I think it is good though, because it shows how alluring sin can be.
Examples (what could happen to anyone):
Sloth: You're too lazy, you never do anything, and you rarely exercise.
Result: You gain weight, annoy people with your laziness, never truly get out and enjoy life because you're too lazy, and you end up with cardiovascular problems resulting from your lack of exercise. Also, being too lazy is slightly depressing.
Wrath: Wrath = rage. Any kind of rage really... roid rage, road rage, children rage, etc.
Result: Well, this is pretty easy. You get out of control, have too bad or quick of a temper, and no one wants to hang out with you. Also, you could lose your job for lack of ability to hold your tongue, and you get in fights and break your body parts. Rage isn't good. Especially roid rage folks. In Abilene, Texas a few weeks ago, my grandmother told me this story: One man rear-ended another man in his vehicle. The man who got rear-ended backed up into the car and nearly drove the people off a bridge. Then both men got out with guns, and the man who got rear-ended shot the man in the car. Really? Over a bumper bender? This happened in Abilene, Texas? Insanity. Wrath causes insanity!
Gluttony: Now this is something we all have done - eaten too much! This is when we consume too much food, and cannot eat any more. It's that feeling when you have to unbutton your pants before you even have dessert, but you eat dessert anyway.
Result: Add this with sloth, and you have a serious health risk. I think we all know what happens when we eat too much. People feel horrible, they can't move, and sometimes are in pain because of it. Overeating is a serious problem.
Lust: Premarital carnal relations, casual carnal relations, frequent carnal relations, californication.
Result: STD's, AIDS, HIV, basically anything with capital letters that looks really scary and can cause health problems.
Pride/Vanity: Loving to look at yourself in the mirror, basically being vain.
Result: You become selfish, you're self-absorbed, you become shallow, no one wants to wait for you to hang out because you take forever to put your make-up on and you stare into the mirror for just as long to make sure it stays on.
Greed: Definitely selfish, people who only care about anything they want, and they want to keep it all to themselves. They are not big on sharing.
Result: You may not have any friends because you're so greedy with everything, you can also lose sight of important things in life, because you're trying to acquire so many material things, that you forget about people.
Envy: You basically want everything that anyone else has. You covet for things that are not yours, and you're never happy with what you have, you just want more and more. If someone else has it before you, then you're unhappy.
Result: Never being happy with what you have in life, but always wanting more instead. You could also possibly become a thief if you want things bad enough.
Here are works by a different artist, Marta Dahlig, from Poland. My take on each picture is captioned below each one, and each relates to our reading material, Collaborative Consumption. My approach to the topic will be more about awareness of the problems at hand that provide a need for collaborative consumption, rather than the precise actions and ideas of collaborative consumption. I am interested in how these core values are flipped upside down and used in advertising and every day life.
This girl looks totally content, just swinging and blowing bubbles. It reminds me of a housewife. Not real housewives that actually deal with children, cleaning the house, cooking all day, and running errands. This reminds me more of the reality shows on television that portray being a "Real Housewife of Atlanta" as this glamorous lifestyle where women depend on men to make all the money while they spend it and do nothing. This picture emphasizes that tenfold. She's beautiful, obviously not real, but people strive for the look anyway, and is content in blowing her bubbles and swinging, possibly forever. However, it ironic that she is skinny, with her being so lazy and all, right? That's part of the alluring part of the sin. People in marketing use this strategy all the time: ''Come buy this, relax, and you won't feel a thing while you use our product!'' I also associate sloth with being numb, much like the numbing effect that some drugs give people. Drugs are definitely on the market, and people definitely share them. Many people like to feel numb or "zoned out." People sometimes don't want to feel at all, so they buy more drugs, feel more numb, and just lay there. People also want to find jobs and put in the least amount of effort into their work for the highest amount of pay. Society is lazy. Collaborative consumption provides ways of raking in a little more income for people who want it, and reach out and get it. Most people pretend like they are working at their jobs, most of the time. However, there are those that actually work to their fullest, always. We are talking about the majority here though. Also, sloth sheds light on recycling in an abstract way. Corporations are more focused on profit than environmental issues. People are too lazy to find out how to recycle, but merely throw things away because it's faster and easier.
This girl is beautiful, and looks pretty awesome to feel so angry. She has what appears to be a whip in her hand, that she might be planning to beat someone with. Most people, when they get angry, they go do something to get their mind off of the situation. Many people go shopping out of anger to make them feel better, go eat out of anger, or go drink out of anger. Anger helps companies, and companies like when you're angry, because it provides more ammunition for that sale. When people are angry, they do not think clearly, and impulse buy much easier and faster. Anger causes people to want revenge. For instance: a guy cheats on a girl, the girl gets angry and wants revenge, the girl goes out and buys a cute outfit to wear in front of the guy and his new girl. The situation is so cliché, but it happens all the time. Why not borrow an outfit from a friend? Because anger wants a new outfit.
This poor girl is a little more overweight than the rest, but she still manages to dress up and be pretty. Eating disorders are everywhere. Not just for eating too much, but eating too little as well. Many people eat when they are depressed. Everything is better in moderation, but many people do not live by that phrase. Everyone consumes way more than they need: food, drugs, pills, alcohol, products, toys, etc. We are mass consumerism, and businesses love it.
It is no secret to anyone that sex sells. People are always lusting, women and men. People go to movies to see their favorite actors and actresses, and they usually aren't ugly. It is typical that this picture portrays a woman who has long, flowing hair, a slender form, a red dress (a color of passion) with a sleeve hanging off, a waterfall in the background that obviously signifies a rush of temptation, and the fire in little icons surround her that ignite everyone's flame within. Of course it is no surprise she is as tall as a model and resembles one. Lust is a big reason people buy things as well. People lust and long for clothes and material things as they lust for other humans. Businesses rely on lust heavily, and probably use it in advertising above all other sins.
We just talked about how sex sells, and because it sells, people become vain. People want to resemble the people in advertisements, billboards, movies, and television shows. They want to look like celebrities look, only when they are airbrushed. These kinds of looks are not possible, but people become so vain in trying to accomplish the impossible anyway. Some people won't go to the mailbox without make-up on. There is a show on television, My Strange Addiction, about strange addictions people possess. One lady on the show would wake up and take an hour to put on her make up. She had done it all of her life. If you cannot love yourself how you are, how can anyone else? Advertising uses vanity to its advantage as well. Advertisers know people want to look their best, and so they emphasize the signs of aging to sell age-defying creams and lotions.
Diamonds surround this character. She is in a beautiful dress, everything around her is gold, she is sitting on a throne, and she is covered in extravagant, gaudy jewelry. This picture says to me, "she wants it all and has it all." A person may simply take a stroll through the Northpark Mall to witness such greed. People can also drive through the richer parts of dallas and witness seeing luscious, extravagant, elegant homes, with landscaping costs worth half of their house payment. Society now wants bigger, because bigger is better. The more you have and own, the bigger your house, the nicer your car, and the money you have produces a higher social and economical status. People are greedy. Everyone is greedy about something.
The snake wrapped around the woman's neck signifies the serpent in The Holy Bible who envied the people in the Garden of Eden, and God himself. The girl is in a forest type setting, and has two curly horns of hair sticking out from her scalp. It shows the girl in a plain dress, and perhaps she wants something more. She wants everything but what she has. Her glare even says, "I want what you have, give it now." For those who know not the story: God created man and woman and placed them in the Garden of Eden. They could help themselves to whatever they please, except the tree which produced apples - the tree of knowledge. The woman listened to a serpent (the devil in disguise) and ate from the tree. They were then banished from The Garden of Eden and given heavy burdens to carry. They were then knowledgable and went on their ways. This is where all the sins started. In today's society, people pay outrageous mortgages for houses they cannot afford, pay ridiculous credit card debt for items they want, and people can never get enough. Advertising thrives on this.
This picture illustrates what most people see when they are driving down the road, but don't realize it. Turn right, where you can buy some pride, or turn left up ahead for a plate full of food you cannot possibly eat in one sitting, but you can try! The advertising is everywhere.
The media even glamorizes the seven sins. The sins are sexy, sins are a look, wait - sins are a style!. This ad below is from a television show called America's Next Top Model. They used the sins to promote the next "cycle" of the show. The girls are actually in coffins, as seen in a close up of "greed" below this photo. I'm pretty sure being in a coffin would freak me out in general, but to be representing a sin in a boisterous way would set me off my rocker. Of course, models don't care and do anything to get fame or paid, so here it is folks - the fourth cycle of ANTM! Feel free to commit with us!
There is even a line of wine now, with individual bottles and tastes for each sin. Pick which sin you're going to commit today, and drink up folks. Do you feel angry, lazy, or lustful? We have a wine for that.
And don't forget to buy a mug with your favorite sin on it, you won't need a wine glass for that wine. Then, instead of having to tell people what wine you're drinking, just show them your cup! Drink up society, take a big gulp.
Works cited:
Image sources from top to bottom:
1. http://apple-in.deviantart.com/art/Seven-Deadly-Sins-49964356
2. All Marta Dahlig art from: http://blackeri.deviantart.com/gallery/
3. http://www.wendybriggs.com/USERIMAGES/Seven%20Deadly%20Sins%20%20120x90cm.jpg
4. ANTM: http://www.misslopez.se/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/ANTM-america-27s-next-top-model-40987_900_675.jpg
Greed ANTM: http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2091/2434642125_40fd90ffd8.jpg
5. http://www.thecoolist.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/Seven-Deadly-Sins-Wines.jpg
6. http://www.exoticexcess.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/09/seven-deadly-sins-coffee-and-tea-set.jpg
