Mandi
Arcomano
Artist Statement
At the beginning of the first draft of
my poem, I had a firm plan on exactly what kind of a regular poem I wanted, but
as the time passed my poem became more and more its own bizarre and unique
creature. I was mainly inspired by two different things, one directly related
to this class and one not. My poem implies brutal government control, which was
my inspiration and came from what I've learned about such dictators as Hitler
and Stalin. However, the characters in my poem: revolutionaries, a beggar, and
an assassin were inspired by something I read outside of school. Right before I
began this poem, I finished reading Victor Hugo's "Les Miserables" a
story that brings in the ideas of poverty and revolution very strongly. Those
two aspects found themselves in my poem without me really thinking about it,
and I took them and ran.
I had absolutely no form inspiration; my
web design is very off the wall and was something that I came up with on my
own. I had the idea when someone else in the class asked if they could do a
haiku, and then being told "no" they asked if they could do multiple
haiku, which they could. I'm pretty good at writing haiku, and I didn't know
what to do otherwise, so I decided to tell my story in a series of haiku.
Haikus are actually my favorite form of poem because of their simplicity, which
I think comes across unique in the common conception that the more you have the
better it is. I first decided that I wanted to start with a nature haiku, which
is more traditional before I went into story haiku. I had written my first
couple of haiku about the assassin when I started my other story lines, and I
had a difficult time keeping track of which character was which. I started
drawing lines between the story lines to keep them straight, it ended up being
really aesthetically interesting so I decided to keep it. I also used a lot of
metaphor in my poem; this is both a writing form that I enjoy and one that is
commonly used in haiku. Metaphors are a way of saying something poetically while
using very few words, which is important in this writing style. This usage both
allowed me to get my story across in minimal syllables and to add a feeling of
mystique to my writing, which helps to create the mood of uneasiness.
I decided to make my poem into a diorama, the inspiration for this came
from the tech director of a show that I’m currently doing. Before he builds the
sets he makes these little foam board models of them with printout paper
covers. I came up with this because I knew I needed a format that was
conceivable for me to do (i.e. not drawing) but that would also have a visual
aspect, as my poem doesn't have a particular way that you can read it from
start to finish. My poem is also very character and setting run, and with a
diorama I could show characters, setting and where things are in relation to
each other. At first I tried to make a movie, but because of my afterschool
activities I didn’t have time to make that happen, so I switched. Most simply,
I chose to do a diorama because I knew it was something I could do, as I have a
lot of ability to build small models and other such things with my hands.
