Is it Just a Dream
Artist Statement
Why I am competing for the Wonderland AwardsI am always intrigued by Alice in Wonderland, or just any ideas of whimsy.
As a child growing up in China, my first encounter and earlier understanding of Alice in Wonderland mainly comes from the 2 films Alice in Wonderland and Alice Through the Looking Glass. At that time, either the uniquely weird characters, the fanciful visual world constructed in the movie, or the sense of whimsy embedded in the plot and every line in it has intrigued me with Alice’s story. In my high school drama club, we did a musical version of the Alice in Wonderland movie, actually bringing the world of Wonderland and all the characters on stage, which has therefore connected me further to the story. As a super Disney fan, I also loved the animated version of Alice in Wonderland, for the strange yet magical sense of whimsicality it showcased. However, I didn’t really get to know everything behind the adapted movie version before getting to know about the Wonderland Award.
I first learned about the Wonderland Award around late February, and was, to be honest, surprised at why there’s a whole competition around children's literature. With a strong sense of curiosity, I took a flier from the shelf of Leavey Library and opened the website. I browsed over collections of past submissions and was amazed by how creative they are and how each of them displayed a sense of whimsy that I adored; I started to read the original book version of Alice in Wonderland, and everything about Lewis Carroll, his background, his playful use of language, and the whimsical ideas across multiple subjects that he intertwined in the story of Alice in Wonderland. As an idealist myself, I loved random imaginations, whimsical ideas, and works of fantasy; I am just passionate about the fantasy, unreal world that nobody around me understands, and the nonsensical thoughts in my head would sometimes converge into pictures in my imagination. Therefore, I was determined that the Wonderland Award would be a great opportunity for me to organize all my random bursts of imagination and express the whimsical ideas in my wonderland. That’s why I am competing for the Wonderland Award, or to say, participating in this Celebration of Lewis Carroll and his creative works of Alice in Wonderland.
How my work relates to Lewis Carroll and How I am inspired by the G. Edward Cassady, M.D., and Margaret Elizabeth Cassady, R.N., Lewis Carroll Collection
As I came to know more about Lewis Carroll, I was amazed by his uniquely wild imagination to build Alice in Wonderland. He balanced the fantastical and imaginative elements with the nonsensical, illogical qualities that placed the final creations on an uncanny yet miraculously harmonious point. As G.K. Chesterton asserts, “Carroll’s ‘genius’ lay in his ability to use nonsense as a means to invert commonly held logical assumptions”. This is demonstrated through many details like Alice’s transformations, the tea party with “unbirthday” and the literal “half” cup of tea, or the use of flamingos and hedgehogs as tools to play croquet games——they all contradict the assumptions and rules of our conscious lives. This quality of fantastical nonsense that “invert commonly held logical assumptions'' has therefore inspired my initial imaginative process to include many details of illogical nonsense, as a way to honor Lewis Carroll’s whimsical creativity, and to present the nonsensical essence of Alice in Wonderland, to break all the shackles and routines and to think freely outside the box.
I browsed over the G. Edward Cassady, M.D., and Margaret Elizabeth Cassady, R.N., Lewis Carroll Collection and was amazed by the broad and extensive content of work that is inspired by Lewis Carroll and his works. I get to learn more about Lewis and how he was inspired by Alice Liddell to write Alice in Wonderland. I spent hours visiting Doheny Library’s Special Collections Repository as well and saw the actual objects of many past submissions and books from the Lewis Carroll collection. Among all the articles and paintings about Alice that I saw in the collection, I read through the book The Annotated Alice, in which the illustrator introduced how Carroll had an interest in mirror reflections: Lewis has one shoulder higher than the other, his smile was slightly skewed, and he was afflicted with one deaf ear, etc. This has inspired him to include the elements of symmetry and asymmetry in his works, which also inspired me to create my painting based on a diagonally-mirrored world with “asymmetrical” content in each world.
My Creative Process
At the end of Alice in Wonderland, Alice wakes up in her sister’s lap to find that her strange and nonsense adventure is just “ a curious dream” from her imagination. Throughout Alice’s adventure, she is trying to find her way out of the dream and back home. But, Is It Just A Dream? What if her adventure is real? How do we know which world is real and which one is an illusion? In fact, What is reality? What if dreams are what people are doing in parallel universes? Therefore, I want to explore the theme of “Dream versus Reality” in my creation through a juxtaposition of the two worlds that Alice had been through.
As illustrated above, Lewis Carroll’s obsession with mirror reflections and symmetrical elements has inspired me to create the two contradicting worlds of “reality” and “wonderland” with two
Alice in both worlds, implying that the two worlds are asymmetrically mirrored against each other. The two worlds are separated by a huge tree, which is also the entrance and boundary of the wonderland. For the world of “reality”, I drew a rather simple scene to make it look as “normal” as possible. I illustrate the background with bigger blocks of color and few details, in a unified texture of brushes. This is to show a plain, unattractive, and somewhat inauthentic sense of the world that lacks imagination and fantasy——something that belongs to Alice. In comparison, I created the “wonderland” world with a wide variety of brushes and details in its background, which I intend to show a sense of substantiality, making it look more “real” than its counterpart. For this world, my drawing process was much more based on spontaneous bursts of imagination, using whatever elements I can come up with to highlight the abundance and nonsensical qualities of the world. In the wonderland world, I also drew a mirror with an upside-down reflection of Alice to highlight the theme of symmetry that Lewis has in the book.
It is apparent that both Alice is sleeping, signifying the uncertainty and vague definition of which world is the reality and which one is the illusion, thus presenting the “Dream vs. Reality” theme. The one in wonderland has a part of her dress in the “real” world, as a way to show fluidity between the two worlds. I also included many small details in the wonderland world, like the talking flower background, the Cheshire cat putting the hat on its chin, the little bat plant (as well as ducks) on the glowing tree trunk, the “half” cup of tea pouring water into the teapot, and even a pocket watch with reversed time markers and three-dimensional hands… all to experience and explore Lewis’s way of inverting commonly held logical assumptions and incorporate nonsensical qualities in imagination.
I am very grateful for this wonderful opportunity that USC and Dr. George Cassady, M.D have given me to explore everything behind the story of Alice in Wonderland and to learn about what an amazing work that Lewis Carroll has brought to the world, and thus honor his creation and contribution to the world of literature——and many more. In the future, I will continue to explore works in the Lewis Carroll Collection, learning about the amazing legacies that Lewis and many talented creators have brought to us, in the hope that I can be continuously inspired by his work, staying curious, creative, and whimsical at all times, just like the Alice in Wonderland.