AP Portfolio Statement

Inquiry question: Why do people see human features in animals and vice versa?

Throughout my project, I found I connected people and animals in two ways: facial features / structure and how the person was posed / dressed.

In trying to decide how to emulate animal features in facial features, I realized it was more complicated than expected. Simply giving a woman a longer nose to make her birdlike wasn’t enough. I viewed connections between animals and people less physically and more emotionally- for example, while drawing the dove, I based the woman’s features off of how I viewed doves emotionally. They are beautiful, soft creatures that represent freedom and hope, so I gave the woman gentle eyes and a soft smile. In some aspects I incorporated physical features of doves, for example her white hair, but in general I view her as dove-like because of how she is portrayed emotionally.

When deciding how to portray animals emotionally through people, I enjoyed the snake the most. Plenty of people see snakes as dangerous, scary animals, but they are only dangerous when they feel threatened. I hope to one day get a pet snake because I think they are beautiful animals that are very misunderstood. The snake I chose as my reference lives in desert areas, including the Middle East, so I chose to use a Middle Eastern woman as the focus of the portrait. I believe, similar to snakes, people from the Middle East are misunderstood- America has a habit of viewing those outside of the US as dangerous, when this is truly not the case. The majority of terrorism in the US comes from Americans, yet the majority of fear of terrorism is aimed toward Middle Eastern people. The woman in my drawing is gentle yet powerful and incredibly beautiful. I chose not to include snake-like features, like a smaller nose and high cheekbones, as I wanted to portray the woman as like a snake in an emotional, not a physical way.

I believe the portrait most similar to her animal reference is the frog. Frogs are generally seen as cute, harmless creatures, which I think is why this portrait has been so well received. Everyone who has seen this drawing agrees that the girl matches frogs, both physically and emotionally. Her big dark eyes, chubby cheeks, curious look, and iridescent clothes are very frog-like. This portrait unarguably matches the reference animal, unlike the snake. This is what I have found so interesting about this project. The accuracy of my portraits depends completely on my audience. Someone scared of snakes would see my snake woman as inaccurate as she doesn’t portray the danger some people see in snakes, while the frog girl is generally seen as accurate as people generally agree on the character of frogs.

Along with facial features, I also focused on the pose / clothes of the woman in portraying her as an animal. Similar to the frog, the clothes I chose were generally agreed upon. A dove should be dressed in all white, flowy clothes, a crane should have a feathery yet dramatic, slim outfit, a peacock should be decked out in over-the-top jewelry and iridescent, beautiful fabrics… Clothing carries less weight than facial expressions and features, which I think is why the majority of my audience agreed on my choices. In one case, however, the clothes I chose were less agreed upon: the raven. As one of my favorite animals, I see ravens in a very emotional way; their intelligence and grace overpowers their dark colors in my eyes. The raven woman is decked out in pearls, a black flapper dress, and sleek black gloves. She is grasping a decorated walking stick and has her short hair in black, tightly wound curls. This portrayal is based entirely on how I see ravens. When I asked others about what they pictured a raven wearing, it was different from my outfit choice, as most pictured ravens in a threatening way, which a flapper dress and pearls didn’t quite match. A flock of ravens is called an “unkindness" or a "conspiracy," which feeds into how many see ravens.

Another thing I realized while working on this project was how many birds I painted. For some reason, birds carry enough emotional weight that they are seen as very human. I found the same thing in dogs. Each different dog breed and bird species has its own character that follows the animal’s personality and appearance. I only chose to paint so many birds instead of dogs because birds are such beautiful animals (that a pug can’t quite compete with).