My final piece expresses the idea of being inbetween childhood and adulthood. Coming of age is a troubled time in a persons life, trapped in a state of confusion and despair. My garment is based on the concept of the catcher in the rye, the green fabric represents the scenery, the "rye" where  the adolescent wander in a sense turmoil expressed by their anxious facial expressions embroided on the fabric, I used ripped plastic to symbolize the crualty and "phonyness" of the adult world, the flowers deteriorating represent childhood innocence slowly fading away. I used pages of an authentic old edition Catcher in the rye book to link all the different elements together in a poetic narrative portraying the melancholia generated by the voyage that is coming of age. 

In coming of age one important imagery I used is the idea of the catcher in the rye from the eponym book by J.D Sallinger. In the book the narrator Holden Caulfield imagine himself as the guardian of children playing in a rye catching them before they jump from the edge of the precipice. The rye represents  innocence where as the precipice symbolizes the entry in adulthood. By catching the children before they jump, Holden stopps the process of coming of age and keeps childrens innocent preventing they become "phony" like all the adults he knows. 

"I thought it was 'If a body catch a body,'" I said. "Anyway, I keep picturing all these little kids playing some game in this big field of rye and all. Thousands of little kids, and nobody's around – nobody big, I mean – except me. And I'm standing on the edge of some crazy cliff. What I have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff – I mean if they're running and they don't look where they're going I have to come out from somewhere and catch them. That's all I'd do all day. I'd just be the catcher in the rye and all. I know it's crazy, but that's the only thing I'd really like to be. I know it's crazy." (22.51-55)

Coming of age is a difficult period, where you can feel confused and troubled. leaving childhood behind is scary and can create mixed emotions and mental health issues. Anxiety becomes predominant and the whole act of growing up can feel overwhelming. Becoming a adult is innevitable but it can be incredibly hard, feeling unsure about yourself others and the world in general can result in complex emotional turmoil during this specific age of ones life.

A contrast between the innocence of childhood and the confusion created by coming of age.

Reference : Tate britain

Reference : Tate britain

Reference : Chimera short film from dazed magazine.

Reference : Chimera short film image from dazed magazine.

Reference : Chimera short film image from dazed magazine.

Reference : Chimera short film image from dazed magazine.

Reference : Chimera short film image from dazed magazine.

This town is all shit, I’ve been here forever. All people do is work, watch TV, go to church. It doesn’t matter though. Kids still die every day.” These are the words which open Chimera, a new short film by Sam Guest and Julia Baylis. Set in the liminal spaces that make up the lives of teenagers – bedrooms still full of childish things, empty car parks, stretches of suburban road – the narrative follows a group who are stuck between the safety of youth and having to grow up fast. Filmed over two years, Guest and Baylis set out to capture the desolation and destructive energy that brews out of adolescent boredom.

What I liked about this short film is that it portrays the shift between childhood and adulthood, by bringing in the same photography colorful childish patterns and laid back scruffy homewear typically worn by teenagers and young adults. The theme of the movie renforces the aesthetic, the idea of grieving after the death of two teenage boys as a subject and as a metaphor of the idea of coming of age. The whole film is based on this contrast between innocence and its loss ligthened within the scenery of a small common town like there is a thousand in America.