Discover: For Project 1, I chose the song “A Hip-Hop Lullaby” by Ukrainian born, Brooklyn raised rapper, Your Old Droog. This song is very sentimental to me as I find it to be insanely cathartic and soothing. Reminiscent of the title, the beat is very comforting and its slow rhythm is consoling like a lullaby. The song depicts Droog’s memories of growing up in New York City and his inner struggle with his personal changes as he ages. The melody aids the listener into following the story Droog tells of the dismal result of being exposed to the crime, pollution, substance abuse, and violence that takes place in the city. I grew up in NYC, and this song is very relatable to me. I used to hang out in delis with my friends ordering cream cheese and jelly bagels. We would gossip, make fun of each other, and laugh about nonsense. Certain parts of the song are very relatable, such as taking the riding public transportation with my mother, sitting in Popeyes, and wanting a north face jacket are very niche New York City themes. I think I chose an abstract approach to the song because I wanted to create patterns that were reflective of the physical sensations and visions I had while listening to the song.
Define: When I think about the general mood of the song, I visualize it as being Droog’s bittersweet reminiscence of his past. Even though he depicts the jovial, carefree nature of his childhood, as the song progresses, the narrative takes a nosedive into his anarchical descent to chaos, addiction and violence. I really liked using the brush pens specifically in my fifth pattern square, where I depict frequencies. I found it very interesting to experiment with the width of the stroke and be able to see how that shows up physically, especially as I learn about strokes and fill in my raster and vectors class . Despite the two dimensional simplicity of some of my patterns, I feel like they tell stories, and that’s more fulfilling and personal to me. Rather than trying to do something super intricate and impressive, I wanted to be able to resonate with my patterns.
Develop: My first two patterns on the top row, reflect what I pictured to look like smoke, and the many, many apartment buildings scattered throughout New York City. In the song the rapper sings “…Then came the time when the seller became the user…” and, “The same parks that we used to play ball in became spots where the blunt sparked..” The second two patterns in the middle row are the most sentimental to me, and they are a pair I designed in conjunction with each other depicting one’s struggle with substance abuse, and the internal deterioration that occurs within. My fourth pattern, depicts, a hand, surrounded by lines and circles. The lines are supposed to represent pins, and the dots are the pinpricks of needles. I wanted to depict the bodily sensations one may experience while under the influence of drugs that Droog references indulging in. I feel like in New York City, there’s a prominent “Dog Eat Dog” mindset that exists. As you grow up, the rose tinted glasses are removed, you mature, more responsibility gets added to your life, coupled with the unpredictability of life, and your conflicts compound. Morality, making end’s meet, motivation, and monotony can compile into a sinister sense of dread and decay. My last two patterns, depict the frequencies of all of the voices and sound I hear when I’m on the train. The last pattern on the bottom right, is supposed to be depicting all of those individual lines are all of the people in New York City. What they don’t realize is that at any given moment, they are at the mercy of being squashed by the metaphorical boot AKA life. Unbeknownst to millions of people that are within such close proximity of the overwhelming reality of spontaneity, tragedy, and miracles.
Deliver: In the end, I really enjoyed this project because it gave me the space to express myself without any constraint. I don’t doodle or sketch that much nonetheless without any reference. At first, I found it extremely challenging to envision/create patterns based off of the melodies I was hearing. Eventually, I found it simple to resonate with the sensations and concepts that came to mind when listening to the song, and just visualizing them. Moving forward, I think I would try to be a little bit more precise with my shading I’m my drafting phase, and try to choose patterns that are easily able to be done in black-and-white without using graphite. The graphic pencils gave me a lot more freedom to experiment with depth, whereas, when using the Sakura Pigma markers, I was limited. I am proud of my project, and I look forward to challenging myself later on in the semester, with more work like this.
