Month / May 2020

by Robert Gerst

Literary Traditions: “I Decided to depict Gregor’s New Form as a Cockroach”

Writes Alex Blaisdell (’22):

For my final art piece for Professor Norrie Epstein’s Literary Traditions  I chose to make an edition of eight relief prints inspired by Kafka’s The Metamorphosis. I am primarily an oil painter, but I felt like oil paint wouldn’t be the right medium to use for a piece about The Metamorphosis. I liked the smaller medium of relief prints because The Metamorphosis is a shorter novella, as opposed to a long, epic novel. I also like the idea of the image repeated. I feel that repeating one image, such as street art does, has a humorous quality, and The Metamorphosis is an absurd and humorous book. I also like the simplicity of relief printing where there are only two values used. This simplicity seemed to fit well with the Metamorphosis and its somewhat simple plot.

For my image, I chose to depict Gregor’s shadow because Kafka had said that he didn’t want Gregor’s “monstrous vermin” self to be illustrated. I decided to depict Gregor’s new form as a cockroach anyways, but I only drew his silhouette as a nod to the ambiguity of Gregor’s new form. I also chose to include Gregor’s poster of the woman in furs because it’s the only thing in Gregor’s room that is specifically described and this says a lot about Gregor and his psyche. The woman in furs felt like a character in the novella; she’s Gregor’s only true ally through his transformation and brings him a sense of normalcy and stability.

by Robert Gerst

Literary Traditions: “Draw Every Female Character in Every Story Our Class Has Read This Semester”

Writes Sinclaire Thomas (’22):

It took me a long time to figure out what I wanted to do for my final project for Professor Norrie Epstein’s Literary Traditions. For a while, I wanted to focus on Medea because it was my favorite story of the semester. But, after I started seeing everyone else’s finals and how many were based around Medea, I admit I got a little self-conscious. I started thinking about how I could go above and beyond. Think outside of the box. Get creative.

That’s when I thought up the project that would take up the next 140 hours of my life: draw every female character in every story our class has read this semester.

The first day or so was spent sketching and doing research. All of these women existed during specific eras and places. I wanted to make sure that I could be as historically accurate as possible. Characters like Grete Smasa from The Metamorphosis and the Wife from The Wife of Bath’s Tale were easy to figure out. There’s no shortage of art from the time period as well as extant garments for me to be inspired by. But women like Shamhat from The Epic of Gilgamesh and Eve from Genesis have very little or very inaccurate references.

All of the artwork dedicated to Adam and Eve tend to depict a white couple. However, we know that the first humans lived on the African continent and the first Hebrew people lived in the Middle East. For these women, I had to rely more on my own personal interpretation. After I found photo references and came up with sketches I liked, it was just a matter of spending my every waking moment drawing, coloring, and shading.!

In all seriousness, it was a lot of hard work. But it was a lot of fun, too. I love history, so coming up with the costumes was great. And thinking about these women’s personalities and how I could convey them through their poses made the creative process more interesting. At the end of the day, I’m proud of what I turned in… And it only took me four days!