Eerie and Haunting: Expressing Dark Thoughts Through Other People's Images on Pinterest
Follow Deborah's board Eerie III: Surreal Dream I on Pinterest.
Lately I've become hooked on Pinterest. At first, I avoided the site. Everyone kept inviting me, but I thought it was a waste of time. I do waste lots of time on it; but something about collecting images, and getting to be the one who edits collections to present to the world, is just addicting. I started with vintage and retro images ~ they're always fun. I quickly added Fine Arts, Faces, Favorite Scenes, and Beautiful Dresses. I have lots of boards.
One series of boards, in particular, became my obsession. It started as one board, called "Some Haunting Quality." Every now and then, I would come across an image that seemed disturbing. The quality that made it so wasn't always readily apparent. It might be a tone, a shadowy look, a mood that was provoked by a picture. Pretty soon, I had a small collection of dark images, but I was still just re-pinning them as I happened across them in my news feed.
One day, while looking at these haunting images as a group, I suddenly had the desire to seek out dark, eerie images specifically to fill my board. I went at it with a will, and found that I enjoyed discovering images to present on my boards. Over time, I collected four hundred images. That seemed excessive for one board, since I hate scrolling and waiting for images to load. I decided to split the images across several boards, each with a distinct theme: surreal dreams, dark thoughts, night fears... The boards were haunting, all right, and they appealed to me on several levels. I realized that the theme itself, and the boards to which I had pinned the images, had become an artistic statement. Through them, I could express something of my dark side, something that I often choose to hide. Sometimes, a mood is invoked through a juxtaposition of several images, though that's not always easy to do on Pinterest ~ the arrangement is somewhat random as the stack expands to receive new images; the view is dependent upon each viewer's device, and can't be controlled. But I do try to keep images of certain moods and other qualities in close proximity to each other.
In the same vein, but in a less dark mood, are my "Dreamy" boards ~ images that are soft, misty, and dreamy. They, too, say something of a mood or feeling I'd like to express. Most of my other boards are still just collections: art that I like, interesting old photos, mod clothes. Still, they are of my own choosing; I get to be the editor, the presenter of the folio. But my dark-themed boards are a deep expression of something I want to say, something I can't easily express in words, and maybe am too lazy or too much at a loss to paint. They may even inspire me to paint ~ I've been thinking along those lines...
After that first obsessive spate of filling the boards, of furiously searching for surreal images to pin, my pinning tapered off a bit. I do still pin dark images, but not at that earlier pace. I break them up and form a new board at about 125 images. The boards of the "Eerie" series are still among my favorite boards.
Eerie I: Haunting Quality
Eerie II: Haunted Psyche I
Eerie II: Haunted Psyche II
Eerie III: Surreal Dream I
Eerie III: Surreal Dream II
Eerie III: Surreal Dream III
Eerie IV: Dark Thoughts I
Eerie IV: Dark Thoughts II
Eerie V: Strange and Haunting
Eerie VI
Eerie VII: Night Fears
Dreamy I
Dreamy II
Dreamy III
Lately I've become hooked on Pinterest. At first, I avoided the site. Everyone kept inviting me, but I thought it was a waste of time. I do waste lots of time on it; but something about collecting images, and getting to be the one who edits collections to present to the world, is just addicting. I started with vintage and retro images ~ they're always fun. I quickly added Fine Arts, Faces, Favorite Scenes, and Beautiful Dresses. I have lots of boards.
One series of boards, in particular, became my obsession. It started as one board, called "Some Haunting Quality." Every now and then, I would come across an image that seemed disturbing. The quality that made it so wasn't always readily apparent. It might be a tone, a shadowy look, a mood that was provoked by a picture. Pretty soon, I had a small collection of dark images, but I was still just re-pinning them as I happened across them in my news feed.
One day, while looking at these haunting images as a group, I suddenly had the desire to seek out dark, eerie images specifically to fill my board. I went at it with a will, and found that I enjoyed discovering images to present on my boards. Over time, I collected four hundred images. That seemed excessive for one board, since I hate scrolling and waiting for images to load. I decided to split the images across several boards, each with a distinct theme: surreal dreams, dark thoughts, night fears... The boards were haunting, all right, and they appealed to me on several levels. I realized that the theme itself, and the boards to which I had pinned the images, had become an artistic statement. Through them, I could express something of my dark side, something that I often choose to hide. Sometimes, a mood is invoked through a juxtaposition of several images, though that's not always easy to do on Pinterest ~ the arrangement is somewhat random as the stack expands to receive new images; the view is dependent upon each viewer's device, and can't be controlled. But I do try to keep images of certain moods and other qualities in close proximity to each other.
In the same vein, but in a less dark mood, are my "Dreamy" boards ~ images that are soft, misty, and dreamy. They, too, say something of a mood or feeling I'd like to express. Most of my other boards are still just collections: art that I like, interesting old photos, mod clothes. Still, they are of my own choosing; I get to be the editor, the presenter of the folio. But my dark-themed boards are a deep expression of something I want to say, something I can't easily express in words, and maybe am too lazy or too much at a loss to paint. They may even inspire me to paint ~ I've been thinking along those lines...
After that first obsessive spate of filling the boards, of furiously searching for surreal images to pin, my pinning tapered off a bit. I do still pin dark images, but not at that earlier pace. I break them up and form a new board at about 125 images. The boards of the "Eerie" series are still among my favorite boards.
Eerie I: Haunting Quality
Eerie II: Haunted Psyche I
Eerie II: Haunted Psyche II
Eerie III: Surreal Dream I
Eerie III: Surreal Dream II
Eerie III: Surreal Dream III
Eerie IV: Dark Thoughts I
Eerie IV: Dark Thoughts II
Eerie V: Strange and Haunting
Eerie VI
Eerie VII: Night Fears
Dreamy I
Dreamy II
Dreamy III
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