This drawing depicts a jewelry
box. The cloth lining is blood stained. The blood is seeping from a circular
metal necklace. The necklace, as opposed to having fine filigree, depicts the
physical atrocities of the Vietnam War. These depictions include tanks,
soldiers, and planes firing at people and villages. As a Vietnamese cultural
artifact, the depictions of war on the necklace expresses how ingrained the
tragedies of the American war in Vietnam have had on the culture of Vietnam.
Within the ring of the necklace lies a baby on an American flag. The baby is
placed so in order to express the cultural struggle that the future generation
of Vietnamese individuals in America must face. They lie on a bed that is
(supposed) American safety and freedom, while also being surrounded by the
legacy of the American war in Vietnam and its impact on the Vietnamese
identity. Tired eyes of the older generation watch from above as the Vietnamese
orphans in America is molded by and navigates the world with the looming
narrative of freedom and war.
By Marcus H.
I think that your drawing depicts the themes you explained really well. I liked that you included the eyes as a representation of the older generation versus the younger generation depicted in the form of an infant. The collection shows many of the themes that you've included here, and I think that your illustration captures those themes very succinctly. The inclusion of the necklace as an expression of the brutal effects of the war is very effective as well. The visual of the eyes is definitely very haunting because like you said, they are representative of a generation that knows the horrors of war and deal with different types of fallout than the future generation, who may have been born during the war and knows, intellectually, what happened during the war, but experiences the aftermath in a completely different way than the older generation.
ReplyDeleteBy Kelsey C.
I like the symbolism of the infant on the American flag. Taken at face value, one would assume that the infant in now in the Land of the Free, and will be nurtured and grow into being a successful, happy individual in the U.S. Much like the face value of Operation Babylift, where the U.S. felt like they were saving these orphans and bringing them to freedom. As we know, in the context of We Should Never Meet, the orphans instead grew to feel alienated, abandoned by their country and people, and without a place to belong.
ReplyDeleteBy Chris T.
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ReplyDeleteThe parallelism between the baby and the jewelry box portrayed similar meanings of life because of the Vietnam War. It showed that the war can change people and affect the future, where they can take it away from others. The image here provided the importance, regarding the life of others, which can also become taken away because the circumstances causes them to try hard to survive when life, as precious as a jewelry box, becomes the main reason to live. Metaphorically, the jewelry box portrayed the value of life, similar to the value of jewelry in the box.
ReplyDeleteBy Kevin L.
This image created such a huge and fantastic scenario of not just a story but the whole collections of the stories, which are being represented. The idea of filling the jewelry box in several items that occurred reminded me of a capsule. Someday someone will write the story as it was being told. It’s a reminder of the mess that everyone created by being part of the war. The jewelry being bloody is a fantastic representation of Bac’s dead wife. It demonstrates the representation of the life that we created after the war and the representation of those who survived by arriving to the United States. It remarks a great successful accomplishment of life and death.
ReplyDeleteBy Cory P.