Date of Award
Spring 5-30-2017
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Fine Arts (MFA)
Department
Painting
First Advisor
Kevin Zucker
Second Advisor
Kristina Lee
Third Advisor
Roger White
Abstract
My paintings and drawings use autobiography, fiction, and theatricality to examine biracial-identity formation and the negotiation of different cultural ideologies. The personification of these ideologies in narrative accounts pose questions to which the characters must answer and respond. This leads to humorous, sad, problematic, empowering, and chaotic compositions that become an intimate chronicle of my own endeavor to find those “perfect” answers.
In my practice, painting and drawing are ways to explore a broad range of topics that stem from personal and familial stories. Using allegorical personifications, symbols, and metaphors derived from my family, I see the home as a stage for these characters to live out their lives. Here, the characters are faced with different circumstances and have to navigate them. The protagonist of these works is the two-headed man/conjoined twin. Based on myself, this character embodies opposing ideologies and is in a constant state of negotiation with himself.
Recommended Citation
Lai, Timothy, "A theatrical life : negotiating biracial identity" (2017). Masters Theses. 160.
https://digitalcommons.risd.edu/masterstheses/160
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.