Ad Buster

As opposed to its kids-friendly image shown on many advertisements, McDonald’s has caused many of children’s health problems. Also, the corporation is the main reason for the world’s mass beef production that has brought up many issues such as inhumane animal slaughtering, overgrazing, and neo-imperialism that has affected many third-world countries. Furthermore, There was an incident in 2010 where a local McDonald’s franchise in Ohio sent a letter to its employees. The letter was a request to vote for Republican candidates for the election. The letter even stated that the employees wouldn’t be able to receive raises and benefits above the present levels if others were elected.

The bumper sticker, “I raise my kids RIGHT” supports raising children with conservative values. Conservative values have often led to condoning malicious social impact caused by corporations like McDonald’s. Conservative values that indirectly support feeding children with unhealthy foods from McDonald’s clearly contradicts raising kids “right.”  Thus, The image is an ironic juxtaposition that sarcastically criticizes the corporation’s heavy promotion of its happy image targeting children which hides its true ramification on our society. Furthermore, the use of the elephant symbols on Ronald McDonald along with the bumper sticker points out the corporation’s political connection with the Republican Party.

http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2010/10/29/127240/ohio-mcdonalds-republican/

Here is the link to the article about the letter from a local McDonald's restaurant in Ohio.

Personal Photography Project

This project was very personal to me mainly because of my experience of chemotherapy followed by a bone marrow transplant in order to battle leukemia in the year 2009. In the abyss of hardship and fear of death, my sister’s full matching bone marrow saved my life from the fatal disease. After 2 years of survival, I started to look back the history of my personal relationship with my sister. I eventually realized that she not only physically saved my life, but also has been my greatest mentor who taught me how to have positive attitude in life.

In this project, I wanted to explore my own personal relationship with my elder sister through using both old and new pictures. Overall, The whole sequence is basically a short visual letter to my sister. First I decided to give each image the Polaroid effect in order to instill sense of nostalgia. On each Polaroid image, I put a memo that supports the idea of each image.  Also, I used a stock background of wooden pattern, which gives retrospective sensibility. This chronological sequence of images also shows short notes. I wanted to keep notes on images as compact and effective as possible because I mainly wanted the images to tell the story.

The idea of ‘Punctum’ is prevalent in this project. For example, the third image, which shows us smiling in the hospital, delivers something beyond our physical state. Even in times like this, our smiles deliver the essence of our shared personality:  positivity. The last image also a good example of Punctum, for its honest portrayal of my sister and me. This simple and casual image doesn’t really stand out on its own. However, the context provided by the previous images helps viewers have more insights about my closer relationship with my sister. My use of Punctum was mainly inspired by Carrie Mae Weems’ series of personal photographs shown in the class material. Her use of casual images, through which she provides subtexts in her family history, really interested me.