| Previous Rosa Parks and Cesar Chavez Scholarship Recipients |
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| 2008 Winners | 2008 Rosa Parks Winner |
Melissa Nugin "A Way With Words" (video) Cheri Soulia "Light of Diversity" (painting) |
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| <<< back | 2008 Cesar Chavez Winner |
| Kevin Johnson "A Critical Passing: On the Fiction of Mrs. Parker" Sarah Cyr "Rosa Parks: Not an Accidental Activist" Vanessa Wall "A Multicultural Approach to Psychological Teaching & Practice in the United States" |
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Light of Diversity
I got this idea from my Humanities class I was taking in the Fall Semester which covered the colonization of India and Mexico. I really wanted to touch on the issue of differences between cultures and different countries mixing because it is such a complex issue and is highly debatable. Although the painting is about this issue, it does not support one side or the other on what we should do about transculturation. It is however, to make others aware that transculturation is still as much an issue as it was during the colonization of Mexico by the Spanish as it is in today's society.
The painting is to invoke feelings inside the viewer about the problems that everyday people face when cultures mix such as hate, sadness, confusion, and oppression. This work is intended to hit the viewer on a personal level.
The viewer should be affected by the visual appeal of the work. I wanted the painting itself to portray the style of the famous Rembrandt which most of his works are heavily darker in value with lighter points of interest. I think I accomplished this and I still have my own creative style because of the overall composition. The composition of the painting is to make the eye follow the surface in a circular motion, going up the sombrero down the beam of light to the face, and down to the American flag cloak, and back up again.