{"id":1208,"date":"2019-05-02T10:38:16","date_gmt":"2019-05-02T14:38:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.joshuarosenstock.com\/teaching\/lightart-d19\/?p=1208"},"modified":"2019-05-02T10:48:27","modified_gmt":"2019-05-02T14:48:27","slug":"nathan-dennler-final-documentation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.joshuarosenstock.com\/teaching\/lightart-d19\/nsdennler\/nathan-dennler-final-documentation\/","title":{"rendered":"Nathan Dennler: Final Documentation"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

My work for this term revolved on applying lights to fashion\nto explore the concept of identity. This idea was sparked by my experiences as\nan undergraduate student as I discovered what I valued in life, what I want to\ndo with the rest of my life, and how I personally fit into different social\ngroups. I have learned through my experiences that personal identity is a\ndifficult thing to comprehend and encompasses many different levels of granularities.\nSome aspects of identity can group one with only a handful of other people across\nthe world, whereas some aspects form massive associations with billions of\nother people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The assignment of these identities are essentially based on random chance, as many things are predefined for you, based on where you were born, or who you were born to. Even learned behaviors can be based on this random chance as your actions shape what you enjoy, and what you enjoy shapes your actions. What becomes dangerous, is when identities are used as an exclusion criterion. There is no reason for any social circle to completely shut out any other social circle. Rather, it is from their collaboration that new ideas are formed and humanity as a whole advances.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To explore the idea of a dissolution of inter-group\nboundaries, I wanted to imagine the world as belonging to a single, unified\ngroup. I was reminded of astrological signs, which have a consistent method of\nbeing determined, and celebrate that the fact that they are random, rather than\nusing random chance as a justification for exclusion. For this project, I\nwanted to depict the archetypes of astrological signs as people\u2014diverse and\nvaried, yet still part of the same cosmic unity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since the course is only seven weeks, I chose two signs to design outfits for that are temporally similar, yet radically different in their prescribed personalities: Cancer and Leo. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Leo (left) and Cancer (right)
<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Cancers are born from June 21st<\/sup> to July 22nd<\/sup>\nand they are a water sign, which means that they are mainly focused around\ntheir emotions. Cancers are typically seen as motherly, sentimental, and sympathetic.\nHowever, they tend to put up a \u201cshell\u201d to protect their feelings from being\nseen from the outside.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For the outfit, I wanted to portray a masculine entity that attempts to conceal their emotions. A masculine design was chosen to contrast with the feminine features that are usually assigned to cancers to play into the theme of a dissolution of common human social boundaries. The shirt is made of a blue mesh that shifts in the light like water, and underneath are many fiberoptic cables that are lighted by LEDs. The LEDs are programmed to pulse to imitate a heartbeat, which is a physiological measure common to all living humans, regardless of identity. The jacket is opaque as if Cancer is attempting to hide their true intentions, thoughts, and feelings from the rest of the world. The face is obscured by sunglasses to strip the wearer of many of their physical attributes, allowing the underlying personality to be plainly in view. <\/p>\n\n\n\n