Digital Design: Where Do I Go?

After understanding the basics of creating a collage on Photoshop, I decided to create something that acts not only as homage but as an idea involving imagery. As many people know, art often contains imagery through the use of symbols, body gestures, or color. For this artwork, I have referenced a masterpiece painting as a source for the human figure while creating the rest of the design with unique intent. The human figure comes from Michelangelo's The Creation of Adam seen within the Sistine Chapel, as Adam was who I used. The Creation of Adam is known for its fantastic utilization of positive and negative space alongside the elements within the painting. Knowing this, I decided to recreate Adam's body through the use of appropriated images and fragments. Once his body was completed, this is where the inspiration for my collage came in: create something unexpected and logically impossible.

Where Do I Go? (2022)

The rest of the collage is composed of quite a unique assortment of imagery. You can see the use of typography, texture, and the shaping of images to match the body parts. Nothing of Adam's original body is present, but the arrangement of fragments recreates his form. Below him is a ground created by more fragments of unusual scenery. Some of the textures used include photographs of dirt, magazine pages, and somebody's brain. In the collage, the figure is attempting to reach out to some kind of circular object, possibly referring to where he needs to go? Is it a projection of where his next destination is, or perhaps a portal? The title of the collage even suggests that the viewer could question what happens next.

This was definitely one of the more experimental, yet fun pieces I've made so far. Compared to some other digital collages in the past, this one focused more on layer blending and trimming to make the most out of the artwork. One thing that helped was the organization of layers in Photoshop, and how I could easily turn them off and on when necessary. While creating Adam's body with the layers, I took a reference photo of the original painting by Michelangelo and pasted in two layers. The first layer acted as a base where I could put the images on top, while another layer was used on top with low opacity. Think of this as the lights used for tracing practice (the collage isn't a direct trace of the original). Speaking of original work, has anybody been influenced by a piece of work or something similar that they model their own after the original? Sometimes, the original piece could play a big role in a project or goal, and people use it as inspiration. Most of the time, they get creative and turn it into their own idea while paying homage to their inspiration.