What was it?
We learned about the Harlem Reanissance in class and were tasked with making a mash up of an artist or writer we liked form the period and our own art. I chose to make an interpritation drawing of the poem Dreams By Langston Hughes.
Poem |
Analysis |
Dreams by Langston Hughes
Hold fast to dreams For if dreams die Life is a broken winged bird that cannot fly. Hold fast to dreams For when dreams go Life is a barren field Frozen with snow. |
In the short poem “Dreams,” Langston Hughes reminds readers that dreams are what give us a purpose for living. He starts off with the line “Hold fast to dreams,” implying that dreams are very important and something that we all should keep close. When he states “for if dreams die,” he means that if a dream dies, it didn't come true because it wasn’t pursued strongly enough for it to happen. The next two lines state that “life is broken winged bird / that cannot fly.” This shows how he believes that life is pointless without dreams to strive for. He compares man to a broken winged bird because a bird's main purpose is to fly, and if it can't do that, it has lost its purpose. In the second stanza, he repeats for us to hold on to our dreams, because if we don't, then man won’t see the beauty in the world. It’s nothing but a wasteland. The snow represents the absence of life and beauty because during winter, life dies During the Harlem Renaissance, many African Americans wanted to be see as equal. He may have been saying that the dream of equality is something to “hold fast to” or things will never improve. Their dreams were worth fighting for.
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Drawing
Artist Statement
I based my image off the poem Dreams by Langston Hughes. In the poem it makes a comparison between a broken dream and a bird falling from the sky with a broken wing. I took this as a symbolic way that was supposed to represent life being pointless without dreams. Because a bird's main purpose is to fly and if it can't fly then it has lost its purpose. I made the bird in the center of my drawing small with more delicate beautiful futures because the bird is supposed to represent a dream and to me dreams are a delicate beautiful thing. Langston Hughes also talked about how a world without dreams is a frozen wasteland covered in snow. This made me think of an apocalyptic world or a sort of frozen desert landscape. I them wanted to make branches of plants that would be reaching out towards the falling bird almost in a sinister way. To make the branches look almost evel I made them very jagged and added thorns on them so that it gave that desired look. Additionally I added icicles on the ends of the branches to show that the landscape was frozen like the poem said.