For my senior piece I wanted to continue with my previous works in depicting themes using images in a collage style. This is a relatively new concept for me that I feel elevates my works and gives them some more depth which they lacked before. When thinking of themes to depict and work off of, I thought of basing it around fame because I’ve always been fascinated with fame culture as well as moments in time which many dub “iconic”. Pop culture has always been a major influence/ inspiration for my works as well as my creative process; and so with that I decided to make it the central theme for my senior piece. In the painting I decided to have the right side represent more common thoughts of fame and what we as a culture idolize. To me, The City of Oz has always represented a false promise or a smoke and mirror situation (If you know the story you’ll understand what I mean by that), and so I thought that that would be a very fitting focal image to depict. To the left of the painting I wanted to depict much darker elements and imagery such as OJ Simpson, Celebrity mugshots, and Jackie Kennedy at JFK assasination. In pop culture I feel that there are also infamous moments and events that affect us just the same as positive ones do, and to have these both exist in the same realm is something I find really interesting and can draw people to dig deeper into the painting. Overall I’m very pleased with how it turned out, although it’s not finished, and aim to continue making art centered around similar concepts.