Grand Champion
Newcastle High School Art Students
Newcastle, Oklahoma
Oklahoma Politics: Donkeys, Elephants, and Everything In Between -
An Historical Perspective
When it comes to politics, we've learned along the way that it's a subject that usually falls within the top three topics to avoid discussing. Yet, here we are, challenged to portray the Collage 2006 theme of "Oklahoma Politics: Donkeys, Elephants, and Everything In Between." Our political views are as diverse as are the individuals who worked on the collage. The group consisted of nine art students - five girls and four boys - four Freshmen, one Sophomore, two Juniors and two Seniors; having a blend of Black Dutch, Dutch, English, German, Hispanic, Irish, Native American, and Scottish heritages, and having lived in Oklahoma for various periods ranging from between eight months to seventeen years.
So how could such a diverse group agree on a way to portray such a controversial subject? We decided the best approach was one from an historical perspective - not only would it keep calm in the group, but also we would learn about events that occurred in our state's past. What better way to portray this theme, as the whole issue of Oklahoma, its history, and its becoming a state revolved around political issues and their motivations?
But how do you portray this pictorially? What would our design concept be? We worked through several ideas and finally decided to work around a timeline - or should I say, within a timeline? The dates of significant political events in Oklahoma's history surround some key issues we have depicted in our design.
The images we have highlighted with small pieces of color cut from magazine pages - some no larger than one-sixteenth of an inch, start in the upper, left-hand corner with the Louisiana Purchase - which afforded the United States the land that would eventually become eight states - including Oklahoma. Newly discovered lands were considered pawns of peace, spoils of war, or tools to bargain, for the discovering governments. This was the case of the Louisiana Purchase as well. A little less than thirty years later, the United States, through the persuasion of Andrew Jackson, forced the removal of the Five Civilized Tribes from their homelands in southeastern part of the country - forcing them into the land that would eventually become Oklahoma - and thus, the inclusion of "The End of the Trail."
Certainly, there have been many people who deserve to be spotlighted within an historical, politically themed illustration, but narrowing our list, we opted to feature some of Oklahoma's "firsts" -including our state's first governor, Charles Haskell; Kate Barnard, who became the first woman to win a statewide elective office in the United States, holding the office of Commissioner of Charities and Corrections; Henry Bellmon, the first Republican governor elected from our state; Carl Albert, the first and only Oklahoma Representative to attain the position of Speaker of the House; and J.C. Watts, a Black Republican, the first elected from a southern state in over 120 years.
During U.S. national elections, media outlets commonly display election results on a map of U.S. states-with each state assigned a color based on which party's candidate won the state, as nearly all states award the sum of their electoral votes in a winner-take-all contest. Because the United States has a de facto two-party system, the national colors of red and blue came to be reserved for the two major parties. In 2000, for the first time ever, all the major broadcast networks and all the cable news outlets utilized the same color scheme: red for Republicans and blue for Democrats. Although Oklahoma was primarily a Democratic state until the 1960s, it has clearly become a two party state - being rendered a red (Republican) state in these latter years. The red Oklahoma forms a background for the symbolic image of the Land Run - and the Great Seal of the state of Oklahoma, which is a tribute to the state's Indian heritage and its hope for the future.
Last, but not least, is the capitol building, the ultimate symbol of our government - and house to our state's political system. Each of these images has been laid upon a background of scattered newspaper headlines - telling more of our state's political history. |
