Generations of passed down hair
BASED
IN LOS ANGELES
HAYLEY SANCHEZ
Sustainable Fashion
Self-Portrait
American Youth
Mental Health decline amongst teens
Covid-19
This new generation has experienced a decline in mental health, which comes with the consequence of prescribed drugs to help them cope. What contributed to their mental health decline? A rise in academic stress? Social media’s standards? Parents that don’t understand the new societal changes we have to endure? Through this photo series, I wanted to show how now in many teen's lives, taking prescribed drugs has become part of their daily routine. More attention should be made to youth’s mental health.
These are photos I took at the beginning of the Covid-19 outbreak in Los Angeles when a mandatory quarantine was just placed. The location in which these photos were taken at is downtown Culver City, where before Covid-19 was extremely packed daily with restaurant customers and tourists. These photos depict the emptiest I’ve ever seen it. Now that businesses in Los Angeles have been open for a while Covid-19 cases are the highest they’ve ever been. Downtown Culver City is back to being packed with people on a daily basis. It seems like soon we’ll go back to when stores were closed and these eerie photos will become a reality again. The art piece included in this photo series reminded me of all the essential workers at the moment working out of necessity, exposing themselves daily to potential harm. Thank you, all essential workers! Secondly, the diptychs are photos taken blocks away from my house. One location is a bakery’s trash bin, the other location being under a freeway bridge, both only a block away from each other. I discovered that the nearby bakery was throwing out loads and loads of freshly baked bread. This fresh bread could have easily been donated to the homeless encampments just a block away, but instead, it was thrown out. Not only is this bakery contributing to food waste but it is also contributing to poverty because especially during these times of COVID-19 people are in need of necessities such as food due to the rising rates of unemployment and evictions. Lastly, the last 3 photos in this photo series are photos I’ve taken while quarantining in my home. The silhouette is meant to symbolize our isolation and our phone being the only way to connect with other people. The lamp illuminating light is meant to symbolize our hope and is supposed to be an homage to the light at the end of the tunnel. The shaking ladder is meant to symbolize how we feel at the moment, unsafe and insecure.
"Go back to your country" is a phrase often said to Latinos all over the United States, but what people don't seem to understand is that this is what an "American" youth looks like. If people's perception of what an "American" Youth looked like was expanded, would people still be yelling "go back to your country?"
Generations of generations of passed down hair. I inherited the curliness texture of my hair from my mom. She inherited her curly hair from her mom and so on, until we reach the point of our African descendant whose hair began the curly hair gene in our family. My mom has always taught me to treat my hair with respect, to not be ashamed of its texture, instead to embrace all it has to offer. In a way when I respect my hair I feel as though I am respecting my past ancestors who have endured inhumane torture because of their features. The Latino community has struggled to embrace the African features in themselves and their culture and that comes from generations of generations of passed down hate. In order to improve this mentality the Latino community has to first acknowledge the African influence found in our physical features and cultures, secondly, we have to respect them, thirdly once we’ve learned to respect them we have to love and embrace them. As members of the Latinx community we have to take these steps in order to acknowledge, respect, and embrace our indigenous features and culture as well. When I look at my mother’s hair and my hair I look at a part of my family’s history apart from being DNA, it is also a physical reminder of generations of generations of passed down history.
When you think of fashion, high-end fashion with hefty price tags may come to mind, or on the contrary cheap trendy clothing from fast fashion stores may also come to mind. What people don’t seem to realize is that through thrift shopping a sense of personal fashion identity is achieved all while making an environmentally better choice. Fast fashion contributes to pollution by having past trendy items sent to landfills. High-end fashion is not an affordable option for everyone. This photo series features young environmental activists posing in thrift clothes at a local thrift store. The new generation's fight for sustainability can be seen in many ways, this is just one of them.
This series of self-portraits symbolize different aspects of myself. The first picture symbolizes my innocence, hence I am in a baby pose. While I am a young adult, I know I still have much to learn. The second picture symbolizes the protective shield I hold for myself, hence why I am making an X. The third picture symbolizes my passion for peace and social justice, hence the gun’s bullets being flowers. The fourth picture symbolizes my hidden true self, hidden by the flowers being the outer shield I put up. The fifth picture symbolizes my true self, which is why I wanted to wear the flowers, in a way reclaiming them.
Lo que no debe ser hablado
Lo que no debe ser visto
Lo que no debe ser tocado o probado por otros
Tiene la potencia de creer nueva vida mientras me ruina la mía
