'Lay Me Down' is a self-portrait composition portraying contour vectors embedded into the intersecting layers of water, sky, city, and surrounding nature of Puget Sound, WA. It was designed with the intention to emit feelings of serenity and separation from the chaos of urban dwelling.
The composition was designed in Illustrator and features seven layers of laser-cut maple and cast acrylic. Wood layers stained and polished. The installation involved three directional light sources to cast shadow on the wall behind the hand-built stand and podium.
This project was a response to the prompt for a wood-based self-portrait. I built off of the themes and styles of two past self-portraits (left digital illustration, right painting) from the prior five years. This composition features Puget Sound, viewed from the north and inspired by photos taken from Bainbridge Island, incorporating the intersection of land, water, and the city in the distance.
This project was completed over the course of several months (along with others) and involved numerous stages of materials and concept proposals. There were iterations of hand sketches digital renderings before lasercutting the final Illustrator files.
After lasercutting the seven layers of wood and acrylic, each layer was hand sanded and stained before being assembled. A podium and simplistic wooden stand were constructed for the installation.
