CONTENT WARNING: This piece contains criticism of socioeconomic status and class, obsessed love and stalking, self-harm, mental illness, and neglect.
Caroline, Caroline, Caroline
Zine composed of Digital Art and Text.
Description
This is a digital Zine that incorporates elements of collage and prose to tell a story about an ambitious young woman who wants to pursue a creative career, despite the misgivings of her traditional family. This piece is meant to question the limitations of socioeconomic status, class, and ambition, while also acknowledging the struggle many artists face between creating and being financially independent.
Biography
Kayla Wikaryasz is a Senior in Interdisciplinary Humanities Major (Professional & Public Writing, Graphic Design, and Creative Writing) with a Russian Minor.
Reflection
I have fully appreciated the financial support to create this project. The grant I received helped mitigate the costs of subscriptions to Adobe Photoshop and Adobe InDesign which I used to create my Zine. If it weren’t for this opportunity, this project would most likely never have come into fruition.
Anticipating an audience for this project also helped me self-motivate to develop this into a full-fledged story, rather than leaving it as a discarded draft that lived solely in my Google Drive. Moreover, I have gained a significant amount of confidence of having been accepted into this program, and I have established a real love for this genre of storytelling. It is also motivating to see my work exhibited somewhere beyond the classroom, which will help bolster my portfolio and resume. For students that are financially burdened, this is a wonderful opportunity to encourage them to create without having to be stressed about not making money from it in their free time. My personal experience proved this to be true, and I learned valuable skills through the duration of this creating process.
Additionally, I learned how art, expression, and creativity can withstand any circumstance that we endure as a community. Though the world is much more “normal” as it was before COVID, this semester has proved to be one of my most difficult spent at Michigan State University. It has felt as if our community has fully come out of hibernation and I have been reintroduced to the overstimulation of life. Though this transition has always been inevitable, the process of creating this project was more difficult than I anticipated in the beginning; however, it was a worthwhile endeavor, nonetheless.
Further, I hope that more students get to have this same opportunity. I learned a lot about myself as a creator and the kind of aesthetics that I enjoy. I think when moving into the next phase of my life, beyond MSU, I will remember the time that I got to spend working on this piece. I will also hold it dear to my heart, because it was a project that I have wanted to develop for a long time now. I can also leave MSU confidently saying that I made a Zine each semester and they will live forever on my portfolio.