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Final Project - Get Up Girly

    Nowadays, most of the young people usually play games, watch videos or check their social media page on smart phones for leisure in scattered time. Therefore, the internet is the most useful source for getting information for the people who prefer staying at home instead of going out to have fun or reading books in weekend and holiday. For a part of the international students who are not social or not familiar with the city they live in like me, I will not go to some places such as Disney Land or Universal Studio to have fun if I am in vacation and my close friends finally finish their whole-term school works, so the internet is the only media I spend on relaxing or gathering information in most of my break time. These kind of information gradually forms my knowledge, aesthetic standard even my personality then influences my preferences or character effect my styles of doing artwork and my daily behaviors. As a result, I will discuss how my favorite three objects which take most of my time on the internet cast the effects indirectly on my art style, as a student in illustration major, which are Takarazuka Revue, Lolita Fashion and my favorite four illustrators.

     Firstly, The Takarazuka Revue is a Japanese all-female musical theater troupe. Women play all roles in lavish, Broadway-style productions of Western-style musicals, and sometimes stories adapted from Manga and Japanese folktales. The Takarazuka Revue was founded in 1913. Ichizo Kobayashi, the founder of Takarazuka Revue, believed that it was the ideal spot to open an attraction that would promote train ticket sales and draw more business to Takarazuka. Since Western song and dance shows were becoming more popular and Kobayashi considered the Kabuki theater to be old and elitist, he decided that an all-female theater group might be well received by the general public. The women play male parts are indicated to otokoyaku (male role) and those who play female parts are referred to as musumeyaku (female role). The Revue performs their first play called “Dongburago” by their initial 16-young-woman-chorus in 1914 then it is divided into two troupes which are Flower and Moon in 1921. Then the other three troupes emerge as time goes by. The company had become popular enough to obtain its own theater in Takarazuka, called “Takarazuka Grand Theater”. Today, the company owns and operates another theater, “Tokyo Takarazuka Theater”.

     The five sub troupes of the Takarazuka Revue Company have their own different styles as well. Each troupe has a leading pair of actors: the "top star" as the best otokoyaku and the "top musumeyaku" playing alongside the top star. The plots of many performances develop around the top pair, who in combination with the alluring characteristics of the other members creates a uniquely captivating theatrical stage. People often say that the fortunes of the Takarazuka Revue follow those of the Flower troupe. Besides to its members' average acting skill, the troupe is popular for its gorgeously colorful presentation--as befits its name. Flower troupe is also well known as the treasury of otokoyaku, plenty of otokoyakus from Flower Troupe become top stars of other groups. For Moon Troupe, it does not only performed the first Japanese revue of "Mon Paris", but also play many representative musicals of Takarazuka first like "The Rose of Versailles" “Me and My Girl” “Ernest in Love” and "Gone with the Wind." Meticulous attention to group performances and exquisite acting are Moon tradition. The Snow troupe was inaugurated in 1924, the year the Takarazuka Grand Theater opened. It is the first to perform "Elisabeth", a musical based on a extremely famous German musical “Elisabeth”, but is also featured by doing Japanese traditional plays and dance. The Star troupe is found when the Tokyo Takarazuka Theater opened in 1933. They perform many works where the otokoyaku is particularly mesmerizing, such as "My Love Lies Over the Mountains" and "War and Peace." The theater company set out to create the Cosmos troupe when it decided to stage productions at the Tokyo Takarazuka Theater year-round. This was 65 years after the birth of the Star troupe and marked the beginning of the current five-troupe configuration. Besides five troupes, there are still a group is consisted with superior members called Senka. They are a group of assistence who appear in any of the troupes' productions as needed. They add a new twist when they join a performance and help to instruct their junior actresses.

     I begin to be into Takarazuka is after I watch the musical called “Romeo and Juliet” performed by Moon Troupe which adapted by a popular French rock musical base on the same story. I start to be crazy about the actress who plays Romeo in that version called Rio Asumi, the current Top Star of Flower Troupe. She is originated in Moon Troupe and allocated to Flower Troupe in order to be a Top Star. “Romeo and Juliet” is the play when she still performs in Moon Troupe. Actually she is the only Otokoyaku I love while I am usually interested in Musumeyaku. Fans can always see them on the path to the theater with their fair skin color, elegant clothing style with their peaceful aura. However, they show audiences their powerful acting on the stage so I am deeply attracted by the contradictions between the roles they play and themselves and I want to be a person like them too. Base on my impression of Takarazuka and characters in their play, I draw an illustration project named “Rose and Guns”. I portrayed three characters in the real western history that Takarazuka Revue actress used to perform as. Marie Antoinette(1755-1793, from the play “The Rose of Versailles” “1789”),Elizabeth Amalia Engenia von Wittelsbach(1837-1893, from “Elizabeth”) and Josephine de Beauharnais(1763-1614, from “Napoleon, The Man Who Never Sleeps”) They are queens in the revolutionary era. In history they all received different judgments. Some say they have beautiful minds and appearances while some say they do not fulfill their duty as queens. Therefore the three drawings also reflect the theme of the project. By watching Takarazuka Revue, I can learn from their setting of the stage as the references of drawing background, their costume from both of the eastern and western certain period, and study the history and literature without reading boring books.

     Secondly, I love search for the new arrival or the new outfit of different Lolita fashion brand. Lolita is a fashion subculture originating in Japan that is based on Victorian and Edwardian clothing with a Rococo influence. A 2008 New York Times report called Lolita fashion a cross between Alice in Wonderland and the Addams Family whose influences include “Victorian children’s wear, the French Rococo period, goth-inspired darkness and Japanese anime as well. The first known use of the term "Lolita” is in the September 1987 issue of Ryukou Tsushin, a Japanese fashion magazine. However, the origin of the term’s meaning is complex and remains unclear.

    The movement itself grew out of styles created by the Japanese brands Milk and Pink House, established respectively in 1970 and 1973. The styles were worn by the readers of Olive magazine, who were colloquially called “Olive girls”. Designers branching out from Milk further influenced the style so that many other brands like Shirley Temple Cute, Emily Temple Cute, Jane Marple . In 1988, one of Onishi’s designers, Akinori Isobe, opened the Lolita fashion brand Baby the Stars Shine Bright, which is one of the most famous Lolita brand. In the 1990s, this fashion becomes so trendy that it influences in part by the success of early visual kei bands throughout Japan. Some musicians, including Mana of Malice Mizer, founded lolita-inspired magazines, which made the style popular among Japanese youth.

    There are various of lolita styles, with indistinct boundaries between them which are Sweet Lolita, Classic Lolita, Gothic Lolita, Japanese Lolita and also Korean Lolita. In present, Chinese girls in Lolita fashion maybe the most in the world now which cause the appearance of Chinese Lolita. Chinese Lolita is featured by the design looks like traditional clothes in ancient Dynasty and Chinese traditional pattern and fringes. It has another name which is “Qi Lolita” because many Chinese Lolita Designers prefer to use the cut in cheongsam in Chinese Lolita dress, and cheongsam pronounce in “Qi Pao” in Chinese.

     Even though the Lolita Fashion becomes increasingly popular now in China, people can obviously see that there are more and more girls start to wear Lolita dress, more and more Chinese Brand online and a continuous stream of events, Lolita fashion show and tea parties hold in plenty of cities. Especially I can probably see girls in Lolita Fashion every time I take subway when I went to Shanghai last year, the development of Lolita Fashion in China is totally different than Japan. It is regard as a hobby rather than a fashion style. For example, if people see a Lolita girl in the public they may think of her as a cosplayer. The reason of this misunderstanding is cause that the diffusion of Lolita from Japan to China is completely depends on the internet instead of a cradle like Harajuku in Japan. People firstly get to know this fashion from anime or games and associate with people with the same interests all through the internet. Moreover, the places individuals can see Lolita girl are in comic/anime expos. Thereby Lolita lovers announce “Lolita is not cosplay, Lolita is not a subculture of ACG”, it is still hard to change the public perspective.

      Not only the masses, some of the Lolita girls set the barrier, lots of strange rules of wearing Lolita, to the girls who are potentially love this kind of fashion other than the high price of Lolita clothes. For instance, girl cannot wear Lolita with naked legs; people wearing jumper skirt must get a blouse inside. Any T-shirts or sneakers is not allowed in Lolita outfit.The ribbon of the bonnet must be tied beneath the jaw. If they want other to consider Lolita as a normal dressing style like other fashion styles, they need to tolerate other dress in the way whatever they want like usual clothes rather than blame them as the people who are not true love of Lolita fashion if they do not dress Lolita “correctly”  

     The last topic I want to discuss is four illustrators I follow on various social media or usually go to their official site from time to time. None of them are such the greatest artists from the history. They just post their works on the Internet, occasionally publish their own art books, and design some products with their illustrations for companies. However, I like their girly and dreamlike styles very much and they always inspire me.  

    The first one is a Japanese artist named Kira Imai. She is a famous illustrator among the girls who love Lolita Fashion because she always does promotion illustrations for a very popular Lolita brand called “Angelic Pretty”. The girls drawn by her usually have sleepy eyes with less expression. Otherwise, I like the way she draws the hair. No matter the hair style is curly hair or straight, long or short, Imai always show her ability to draw hair delicately with layers. Furthermore, the elegant animals, small stuffs or back ground she adds around the main figure make her works much more decorative.

    The second one is an Italian artist called Nicoletta Ceccoli. I cannot find any introductive videos or information of this person and how she does her work. The third one is a Japanese artist called Shikimi. He is popular on the Internet while some costume company will buy the copyright of his design to cr eate real clothes. Also, some publish company or game company invites him to do some illustration of their publications. I really love the content and composition of his every single piece. The reason I talk about Ceccoli and Shikimi together is that both of them are the reference of my “Rose and Guns” project. My instructor of my portfolio introduces these coloring styles from Ceccoli so I use graphite to create this kind of dusty texture which brings a sense of darkness. For the composition, Shikimi always uses different objects or animal to imply something. Although we can see many small floating things they still assemble as an integral shape.

    The last one is a Chinese illustrator called Nicole. I really admire her technique of using water color. She can blend colors into that it is looks like the real moon or fur of animals. She is good at drawing animals, girls and other cute elements which like children’s toys in pastel color or shiny watercolor pigments and combing these elements cleverly. Many stores produce paper stuffs pay for Nicole’s works and print them on masking tapes or cards. I am always encouraged by Nicole’s post of either her drawing or life style. She is older than me but still draws this kind of picture or she is always happy to find some cute things and art materials in very girly pastel color in real life and willing to turn them into her artworks. People may regard me as a strange person since it is simple and easy to live in the style we prefer. However, I heard from adults or friend who have stayed in America that it is weird to wear pastel or pinkish color among American. American professors do not like this girly, cute or Disney styles of drawing. Therefore, when I firstly attend into different classes, I always draw some “cool” and “bloody” image to meet this kind of “American Styles” and I am shy to share the work in cute style. It makes me confuse to design the subject which I am not interested and familiar with for my projects. My outfits for school time are messy as well. This is my first time I can wear my own clothes during the school time because students wear school uniforms all the time in China and I am really used to it so actually I do not have enough clothes to change every day. According to this previous situation, I am not clarify with my own style and buy bunch of the clothes then let the messy first term passes.

    This “Rocking Bunny” is one page of my final viscomm 1 book which is kind of a study that I want to learn from Nicole’s and Kira Imai’s style and create my own style. Imai usually combine any animals with merry go round which is a very creative and lovely way for me so that I combine the bunny and rocking horse together. On the other hand, I have written that Nicole is talented at group different elements together. As a result, I try to change bunny’s ear into toe shoes, add plenty of ribbons with different patterns, and I also learn her brushstroke of watercoloring in digital drawing.

    As time goes by, I am not only inspired by my favorite illustrators but also classmates have the same aesthetic with me. I wear the clothes I like in kind of Japanese pinkish style. For the assignment, maybe most of my male professor may only think my illustrations are sexual but I can get positive comments from the female classmates and figure models. It is a little bit like my previous life, I am not a girl that beloved by many boys but I can have a relationship with a girl friend I will cherish forever in different stages of my life. My works or my outfit may not be appreciated by most of the people under this society but I will keep living and drawing in this girly way I love in the future.

Work Cited

1. Takarazuka Official Website, http://kageki.hankyu.co.jp/english/troupe/index.html

2. Takarazuka Revue Introduction Movie, Youtube, February 26th, 2016, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-8fS4LCnkY

3. Takarazuka Revue Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Takarazuka_Revue

4. Lolita Fashion Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lolita_fashion

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The Cover Sheet Worksheet Guidelines

1.What is your chosen topic? (Identity, Entertainment, Technology – or a combination of the three)- Identity.

2.Give your Project a Title

Get Up Girly

3.Purpose/Aim/Goal of the Project. What is the purpose of your Project? What are you trying to find out?

The purpose of my final project is trying to deeply and systenmatically analyze that how the information I scroll through social media and video forms my knowledge, aesthetic standard even my personality mostly based on the three aspects I show on the playlists. Moreover, how this information influences my preferences or character effect my styles of doing artwork or my daily behaviors.

4.Indicate some of the research questions you’ve been asking of your topic. How will the project attempt to answer these questions?

I will discuss how these three aspects of information I am usually involved in my daily life in detailed.

For the “Takarazuka Revue”

It boarder my view as a person who are not interested in reading, let alone do I gain knowledge from articles by the story based on western history and literature and the costume from certain period.

The reason of that I keep being crazy about Takarazuka from both the beauty of their plays and actress themselves, because I have not been such into one thing for long time since I went to high school.

For the “Lolita”

A brief introduction of Lolita Fashion.

For the identity aspect, I want to discuss the standard and behavior of the girl who love Lolita fashion like me under the present society through the transformation from hobby to a fashion style in modern Chinese view.

For the “My Favorite Illustrator”

Explore their styles in my unofficial view;

Not only their works but also their posts of their daily life influences my style and way to create artworks even behave in real life.

5.Write a short paragraph about the relationship of this project to your own work

I will take the studio works I post in my last assignment as examples in the passage below. However, I will not use all of them or maybe add something new in my final paper.

This “Rocking Bunny” is one page of my final viscomm 1 book which is kind of a study that I want to learn from Nicole’s and Kira Imai’s style and create my own style. Imai usually combine any animals with merry go round which is a very creative and lovely way for me so that I combine the bunny and rocking horse together. On the other hand, I have written that Nicole is talented at group different elements together. As a result, I try to change bunny’s ear into toe shoes, add plenty of ribbons with different patterns, and I also learn her brushstroke of watercoloring in digital drawing.

This is one of my color scheme of my motif project from Design 1 Final. I learn this rococo underwear styles firstly when I see prostitute in Takarazuka musical. The girls in my work who help each other to tie the corses on their back is inspired by one sense in a movie called “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies”. In that scene the Bennet help each other to wear their underwear. This scene blow my mind and make me want to create a motif in a atmosphere which feel like a girls’ bedroom. Additionally, I am given a sense to add Ragdolls on each corner by getting in touch and research the motifs on Lolita dresses for long time.

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Studio Works

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Playlist #3 Introduction of My Favorite Illustrators

This week I want to introduce four illustrator I follow on various social media or usually go to their official site from time to time. None of them are such the greatest artists from the history.They just post their works on the Internet, occasionally publish their own art books, and design some products with their illustrations for companies. However, I like their girly and dreamlike styles very much and they always inspire me.  

The first one is a Japanese artist named Kira Imai. She is a famous illustrator among the girls who love Lolita Fashion because she always does promotion illustrations for a very popular Lolita brand called “Angelic Pretty”. The girls drawn by her usually have sleepy eyes with less expression. Otherwise, I like the way she draws the hair. No matter the hair style is curly hair or straight, long or short, Imai always show her ability to draw hair delicately with layers. Furthermore, the elegant animals, small stuffs or back ground she adds around the main figure make her works much more decorative.

The second one is a Chinese illustrator called Nicole. I really admire her technique of using water color. She can blend colors into that it is looks like the real moon or fur of animals. She is good at drawing animals, girls and other cute elements which like children’s toys in pastel color or shiny watercolor pigments and combing these elements cleverly. Many stores produce paper stuffs pay for Nicole’s works and print them on masking tapes or cards.  

The third one is an Italian artist called Nicoletta Ceccoli. I cannot find any introductive videos or information of this person and how she does her work. I only know she usually uses acrylic for coloring. Since my instructor of my portfolio introduces these kinds of dusty color she draws as my reference so we guess that she may uses charcoal or graphite to create this kind of dusty texture which brings a sense of darkness into her work. 

The last one is a Japanese artist called Shikimi. He is popular on the Internet while some costume company will buy the copyright of his design to create real clothes. Also, some publish company or game company invites him to do some illustration of their publications. I really love the content and composition of his every single piece. He always uses different objects or animal to imply something. Although we can see many small floating things they still assemble as an integral shape.

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Playlist #2 Lolita Fashion

Lolita is a fashion subculture originating in Japan that is based on Victorian and Edwardian clothing with a Rococo influence.

A 2008 New York Times report called lolita fashion a cross between Alice in Wonderland and the Addams Family  whose influences include "Victorian children’s wear, the French Rococo period, goth-inspired darkness and Japanese anime.

The first known use of the term "lolita" as a Japanese subculture was in the September 1987 issue of Ryukou Tsushin, a Japanese fashion magazine. However, the origin of the term's meaning is complex and remains unclear.

The movement itself grew out of styles created by the Japanese brands Milk and Pink House, established respectively in 1970 and 1973. The styles were worn by the readers of Olive magazine, who were colloquially called "Olive girls".

Designers branching out from Milk further influenced the style. In 1974, Rei Yanagikawa left Milk to start a children's clothing brand, Shirley Temple Cute, which would later expand to include a matching adult's otome fashion line under the name Emily Temple Cute. In 1985, Megumi Murano opened the otome fashion brand Jane Marple. In 1984, Atuski Onishi founded a self-named brand that also sold feminine, otome styled clothing. In 1988, one of Onishi's designers, Akinori Isobe, opened the Lolita fashion brand Baby the Stars Shine Bright.

In the 1990s, brands such as Princess Princess grew more popular, influenced in part by the success of early visual kei bands throughout Japan. Some musicians, including Mana of Malice Mizer, founded lolita-inspired magazines, which made the style popular among Japanese youth.

There are various of lolita styles, with indistinct boundaries between them. For example, a single lolita design could simultaneously reflect both sweet and classic styles.

Sweet Lolita focuses on pastel or primary colors, and cute motifs.

Classic Lolita focuses on muted or darker colors, antique motifs, and florals.

Gothic Lolita focuses on black and dark colors, with gothic motifs.

Japanese Lolita is featured by traditional Japanese pattern and huge sleeves.

Chinese Lolita is featured by the cut like cheongsam or the traditional clothes in Tang Dynasty and Chinese traditional pattern and fringes. Since Chinese girls in Lolita fashion maybe the most in the world now, this situation promote the formation of their own styles of Lolita.

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Playlist #1 Takarazuka Revue

The Takarazuka Revue is a Japanese all-female musical theater troupe. Women play all roles in lavish, Broadway-style productions of Western-style musicals, and sometimes stories adapted from Manga and Japanese folktales.

The Takarazuka Revue was founded by Ichizo Kobayashi, an industrialist-turned-politician and president of Hankyu Railways, in Takarazuka Japan in 1913. The city was the terminus of a Hankyu line from Osaka and already a popular tourist destination because of its hot springs. Kobayashi believed that it was the ideal spot to open an attraction of some kind that would boost train ticket sales and draw more business to Takarazuka. Since Western song and dance shows were becoming more popular and Kobayashi considered the Kabuki theater to be old and elitist, he decided that an all-female theater group might be well received by the general public.

The Revue had its first performance in 1914. Ten years later, the company had become popular enough to obtain its own theater in Takarazuka, called “Takarazuka Grand Theater”. Today, the company owns and operates another theater, “Tokyo Takarazuka Theater”. Currently Takarazuka performs for 2.5 million people each year and the majority of its fans are women.

The women who play male parts are referred to as otokoyaku (Literally "male role") and those who play female parts are called musumeyaku (Literally "daughter's role"). The costumes, set designs and lighting are lavish, the performances melodramatic. Side pathways extend the already wide proscenium, accommodating elaborate processions and choreography.

Regardless of the era of the musical presented, period accuracy is relaxed for costumes during extravagant finales which include scores of glittering performers parading down an enormous stage-wide staircase and a Rockette-style kick line. Lead performers portraying both male and female roles appear in the finale wearing huge circular feathered back-pieces reminiscent of Las Vegas or Paris costuming.

Before becoming a member of the troupe, a young woman must train for two years in the Takarazuka Music School, one of the most competitive of its kind in the world. Each year, thousands from all over Japan audition. The 40 to 50 who are accepted are trained in music, dance, and acting, and are given seven-year contracts. The school is famous for its strict discipline and its custom of having first-year students clean the premises each morning. The first year, all women train together before being divided by the faculty and the current troupe members into otokoyaku and musumeyaku at the end of the year. Those playing otokoyaku cut their hair short, take on a more masculine role in the classroom, and speak in the masculine form.

The company has five main troupes: Flower, Moon, Snow, Star, and Cosmos; as well as superior members, a collection for senior actresses no longer part of a regular troupe who still wish to maintain their association with the revue and perform from time to time. Flower and Moon are the original troupes, founded in 1921. Snow Troupe began in 1924. Star Troupe was founded in 1931, disbanded in 1939, and reestablished in 1948. Cosmos, founded in 1998, is the newest troupe.

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Monster Culture

The “Monster Culture” by Jeffery Jerome Cohen is a fiction that specifies desires by applying those features on monsters and describes them in seven aspects.

“The monster’s body is a cultural body”. in the beginning of the fiction, Cohen starts with that monsters are embodiments of certain cultural moment so that they represent diverse cultures in certain time period. The monsters always escape. Since monster always return after they got caught or something is always left over, people will never catch the monsters or destroyed them which like that monsters’ footprints or a small glimpse of monsters; on some levels, monsters are seemed as fear, and it can never be killed.

“Monsters are Harbinger of Category Crisis”. Monsters don’t belong to neither human being nor animals. According to all of its characteristics, monsters are crossing above all categories of animals or human being. Sometimes, monsters can be both human and animal, or neither human nor animal, or half human being and half animal at the same time.

“Monsters dwells at the gates of difference.”

In the story monsters have different cultures, races, genders, economies, religions, appearances, social positions and political positions. They are perceived outsiders. Even among monsters they are different as outsiders, because of the different aspects listed above. Also, the monsters always violate conformity, which means that the monsters always takes opposite side of what majority of people believed is the truth.

Monsters are the symbol of unknown, mysteries and possibilities. Monsters ensure human beings are following the rules, stay what people usually do, and not try to probe more about them by scaring people. They limit people’s curiosity, which proves what people usually say, “Curiosity killed the cat.” After certain thing being explored, monsters warned people do not reach further than their understanding, and they keep people away from these unknown fields.

Monsters attract people’s desire. For instance, the fear of the monster is a type of addiction. On other hands, monsters symbol attraction and fear ate the same time because monsters show human’s potential desires. People create monsters because they can find out about what would be a taboo. The monsters indicate different and weird gender, sex, aggression, location or domination, since they are dangerous and harmful, and not being guilted or punished by the government and authorities. Monsters made people to act like the role of different identity, such as people dresses up like ghost or demons on Halloween.

Finally, “Monsters stands at the threshold.” They brings out flaws in people’s society, so that people will test their culture power and have thoughts about the assumptions people usually have about other people.That really made people thing about the deep, real purpose of creating these monsters, and the monsters also helps people understand more about their thinkings and what they are really believing for.

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The Matrix

“This is your last chance. After this, there is no turning back. You take the blue pill -the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill -you stay in Wonderland and I show you how deep the rabbit-hole goes.”

The Matrix is a 1999 science fiction movie created and directed by The Wachowskis and played by Keanu Reeves, Laurence Fishburne, Carrie-Anne Moss, Hugo Weaving and Joe Pantoliano.  The story happens a dystopian future in which reality as perceived by most humans is actually a simulated reality called "the Matrix”.

The quote I pick maybe the most famous one as a representative of the series of “The Matrix”which said by Morpheus to Neo. This is the first dialogue between them. Neo was recommended Morpheus by hacker Trinity. Morpheus explains to Neo that what the Matrix is and let Neo make decisions either take the blue pill(falsehood and security) or red pill(knowledge and freedom) . Neo eventually chose the red pill but the result was made up by the architect and prophet at the first time. In other words, this was not the choice Morpheus gave Neo. It was Neo’s destiny. I find that the Matrix and the destiny were very similar. Neo did not believe the fate and wanted to control it. In fact, he was still not able to get rid of the arrangement of destiny/Matrix. We can dates back the concept about the understanding about destiny in western culture from Greek myth. The destiny dominates the whole world including gods. Gods can only get the oracle to know their future but they can not avoid it. The war to attack the Matrix is to fight with the fortune to Neo.

However, there is no destiny in most people’s perspective in modern. People know that the fortune is. Controlled by theirselves through every single important decision. Therefore, the decision of choosing the blue pill or red pill doesn’t just appear in this film, but also in the real world. We face choices like the red pill or the blue pill everyday. The blue pill and red pill questions comes up very commonly in our daily lives, and making the each choice defines who we are.

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Reading Response of “Simulacra & Simulation”

In Baudrillard’s perspective, Capitalist society in late period is a Simulacra times. The conflict of true and false are taken place by symbols in one dimension, the truth is not reality. By the way, Baudrllard provides may examples in modern capitalist society to analyze the emerge, characteristics and strategy of Simulacra.

The story of Borges which is mentioned in this essay tells us that the differences between truth and model disappears after the happen of Simulacra, so the simulation becomes truth and lead to surrealistic. The symbol of reality replaces the truth itself. Such as people chase B in a period A, chase for C in the period B, chase for D in the period C. As a result, people will never achieve the truth in this situation because they eliminate the change of truth and destroy the space for the existence of truth.

In the paragraph of “The divine irreference of images”, Baudrillard refers that Simulation is originated from the irreference of images. People can find plenty of phenomenon in Simulacra in surrealist field. For instance, doctor can not figure whether patients are ill through exterior information; military psychologist can not determine whether a person gets crazy or not; divinities disappear after the appearance of god in religion aspects. This is a strategy that people figure out and recur the image. This is a new truth in surrealistic.

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Fight Club & Postmodernism

Fight Club is an American movie based on the novel with the same name composed by Chunk Palahniuk which is completed in 1999 by director, David Fincher. The main characters are played by Edward Norton, Brad Pitt and Helena Bonham Carter. Norton plays the unnamed protagonist, referred to the narrator. He is unsatisfied with his white-collar job. He forms a "fight club" with soap maker Tyler Durden, played by Pitt, and they are joined by men who also want to fight recreationally. The narrator becomes embroiled in a relationship with Durden and a dissolute woman, Marla Singer, played by Bonham Carter.

Related to Postmodernism, this movie is kind of “a copy of a copy of a copy” without certain purpose. They even fight and destroy buildings, computers, cafes and modernism statues with no excuse. No one questions about the reason and maybe Taylor does not know it neither. They just live entirely by spiritual values. As the fight club developed increasingly bigger, members dress same and chanted the same slogan with no name in Project Mayhem. Everyone seems they lost their own personalities and they are copies of each other. After Bob dies, every members yell that “In death, a member of Project Mayhem has a name. His name is Robert Paulsen.” It sounds ridiculous to us while it becomes the faith to the people just follow the step of this empty life.

Fight Club was completed in 1996 and widespread because of its unique edge. The narrator is suffering from the schizophrenia. His live is empty and has blurred gender identity. His life is representative of present society. The movie focuses on describing the brutal and bloody fighting scenes and the mix of time and space. The hero's experience suggests that the growth of Fight Club is a profound social causes. In addition, the disorder of editing different scenes provide a prediction of Jack’s schizophrenia. He lives a life like fragments and his personality is separated onto two fragments as well. Fight Club lights up the dark corners of the distorted character in this modern society. Everyone should reconstruct our thoughts and find the significance of life. What we can do under this material world is to confirm our existences and how to make our life happier. What we can do to find the value of life between the reason and madness.

[kasumikana-blog]

Remix Assignment #1

Although I was born and raised in Beijing, the capital of China, I have a potential gene of eating very spicy food which is inherited by my father. He is from Hubei, where is a province nearby the Yangtze and is famous for its fresh and tasty food with a little bit spicy flavor. As a result, I like eating spicy food very much and I want to regard hot pot especially Hai Di Lao Hot Pot as a motif of me.

Hai Di Lao, in terms of fish out from the sea in English, maybe the most popular hot pot restaurant in Beijing but featured with Si Chuan hot pot. Additionally, hot pot is originated in Si Chuan, where the most spicy dishes all over the China in there. I firstly had a dinner at Hai Di Lao last year then I would not go to any other restaurant when I wanted to eat hot pot. The reason I only go to this restaurant is not only that they cook pepper deliciously in seasonings so that the seasoning is not too salty but also that all three kinds of food I must order with hot pot are in this restaurant, potato, frozen tofu and shrimp paste.

Probably shrimp paste sounds strange. It is the shrimp mashed by blender and customers make it into plenty of shrimp balls then put them into hot pot. Since shrimp paste is made by real shrimp, it tastes much more delicious and springy than the shrimp made by starch what people can buy at market. Otherwise, frozen tofu is not same as the normal tofu as well. The texture of it is just like sponge so when it soaked in hot pot seasoning it can absorb the soup and explode in our mouth when we bite it. I always order hot pot seasoning duo which the pot is divided in two parts and one side is spicy seasoning and another is mild seasoning. I prefer to boil food in spicy sides and drink the mild sides but the frozen tofu taste well in both seasonings.

Although I come to America for college, I can still find Hai Di Lao restaurant in Arcadia. However, there are only mini hot pot with single flavor seasoning instead of seasonings duo. It is much more pricey in America though it is expensive enough in China. Nevertheless, I can seldom go to eat it with my friend and share different seasonings for celebration, such as the end of one term~