In my first attempt when I started this class, I had the vision of doing diorama-style sculptures representing an over fantasized model of a luscious natural landscape. I wanted to make the connection that nature or the idea of nature, that we as a generation constantly claim to "yearn" for or have an interest in, is very much a world widely thought about in our imaginations and fantasies more than anything. It's become a fantasy because we have such a disconnect from it in our daily lives and thus the idea lives in an area of our mind along with the other mysteries of life. You see the evidence of this strong connection to and canonization of natural environments in stories we've grown up with and media all around us today: Lord of the Rings, Narnia, Bambi, Avatar. This is also a constantly reoccurring theme in art, explored by many different artists: Mucha, N.C. Wyeth, Maxfield Parrish, Walton Ford, Tiffany etc.
As I began to play with the materials most commonly used in diorama nature scenes I began to realize that this particular project was not the concepts calling and would not do nature the justice it deserved. The representation was pretty juvenile and couldn't take humans out of a context they were already familiar with (hobby shop model making, and 3rd grade history projects).
So in order to stay away from the expected and the common I need to change scale, material, context and composition of my project. Back to the drawing board--new project plan.
