We were given a prompt to express ourselves with the given materials. The only requirement was that we had to implement the maps. We were then shown examples of collages made of maps. The one that stood out to me most was a silhouette of two heads merging into one on a black background, which inspired me to do something similar.
When thinking of maps, I instantly thought of my heritage. Although I was born and raised in NYC, Hong Kong is a second home to me. My parents grew up in Hong Kong, so we would speak Cantonese at home and watched a lot of Hong Kong TV Shows. I go to Hong Kong at least once a year, so I feel really close to my Chinese roots. I cut the character for “home” out using the map of China. The character for “home” has two branch like strokes coming out of the right side, which I made out of a map of NYC. I then painted two birds, one with the Hong Kong flag colors and the further one from is with the American flag colors.
Although this can be interpreted as me leaving China to America, I think the collage symbolizes my family more than myself. My parents left their home country, but I grew up feeling very attached to both.
I didn’t have time to finish, which is why the American bird looks fat.