Love And Loss Through The Study Of Hands

It is through our hands that we are able to assess the physical world. They serve a tactical role in our lives, allowing us to explore shapes, texture, and temperature. They are often used to aid verbal communication. Hand gestures are an aspect of culture, and they change drastically depending on the anthropological background of a region or group of people. These hand gestures are full of symbolism that can be used to affirm or offend someone. Hands are also extremely important in relationships. At birth, it is common for babies to grasp the finger of their parents, a deal can be made by shaking hands, or holding hands with someone can be seen as a sign of love. It is by wearing a ring on our left ring finger that we symbolize marriage, one of the most important milestones in a romantic relationship. Hands are used to produce and create goods, food, and art, and they are a fundamental element of our human experience. Hands are also the vehicle by which we experience human contact and physical touch. This touch can demonstrate love, passion, anger, sadness, and so on. For all of these reasons, I have always admired hands. In my work as an artist, I gravitated towards the idea of portraying hands and the emotions that they can convey. My fascination with hands has led me to make them the focus of my senior thesis. I will explore this subject matter in the context of love and loss. Experiencing love and loss is an intense and complex part of being human. It manifests differently to each person, and it has its nuances. However, it is not hard to relate to a story of love and loss, because of its universality. We all experience it, in some way, shape, or form; and there are similarities in the way we experience these feelings. Love and loss manifest themselves in our relationships with friends, family, and love interests. They are fundamental parts of the emotional journey that we go through in life, and that is why it is the story I chose to portray in my body of work. I am eager to show that human hands are more than just the tools that allow us to discover the physical world, they are also powerful storytellers, full of symbolism and expressiveness. It is through the study of hands in a screen print collection that I will tell a story about love and loss that takes the viewer into the universal human experience of falling in and out of love. The choice of medium complements the study because printmaking is a hand-heavy art form that requires precision and muscle memory. This medium allows for abstraction to occur as it simplifies the hands. They have no gender, skin color, or age, allowing viewers from different walks of life to relate to the story that is being told by the artist. The abstraction of my body of work will force the viewer to look beyond the anatomy of the hands, and pay attention to the story that these hands tell. The composition of each print will explore more than just the literal relationship of hands, but also the relationship between two people experiencing the intensiveness of love and loss.