Digital art and political consciousness in the classroom

Photo Credit: Topps Company/Collage by Matt Frederick

Former Senator George Mitchell's nearly two-year investigation into baseball's drug scandal is generating a lot of concern in the media and with the public. The 1990s, it is turning out, seems to be one of baseball's darkest eras -- greed, self-interest, and deceit.

People are responding to Mitchell's report very differently, but for students, the opportunity to find a voice through the power of digital art means the message is getting through.

Study this collage by Southern Oregon University's Digital Media Foundations student Matt Frederick. The visual metaphor resides in the progression of images illustrating Barry Bonds's presence as a public figure and role model to millions of young people. 

The story begins with a normal healthy-looking Barry Bonds the Younger, moves through to the pumped-up fleshy steroid-induced era of the 1990s, and finally rests in the irony of esmaculation and destitution. In this final scene of the triptych, Bonds' face is juxtaposed onto the withered frame of a Sudanese refugee. The message comes full circle here in all its simplicity. Digital art, in all its immediacy, takes license with reality so that people will notice the complexities and ironies of their day to day existence.

As an educator working with digital media, it is important to recognize the limitless potential new technologies afford us. With very little training, students can express themselves in new and powerful ways. I believe that part of our jobs, as educators, is to allow people to experiment with these new technologies so that they can find their voice in the world. And one of the best ways to do this is to engage students in learning the skill-sets and then just stepping out of their way as quickly as possible.