1st Crit Sesh + More thumbs.

My direction of argument progressed further down the path of the flag change being a waste of time / money that could easily be better spent on more important things. Below are some further visual developments I came up with regarding my direction of argument, including the ideas I had at the point of the first interim critique.

In these sketches I used strong imagery and color to evoke a strong wehi. The texture of medium and sparce use of color draw attention, the red of the union jack has become blood for the rather serious topics of domestic abuse and suicide.

This one was even more graphic, which some might find a bit distasteful or serious. If some people found the idea of a noose disturbing... I can only imagine what they would think of this idea haha!

I used watercolor pencils in this, the watercolor really adds an emotive quality and nice texture for things like blood.. I have to say, lol

In the above concept, the bruises from abuse form a new zealand flag. But the message from this ia bit mixed - one could interpret this as saying the current flag has a chokehold over us, rather than the intended meaning of a violent society -- regardless of our flag.

I drew up a page of very quick thumbs to further explore ideas of 'problems' in our society, and other issues the flag change is distracting us from. Some were metaphorical, others used juxtaposition, pastiche of particular poster styles I had in mind, etc.

For some of the thumbs, I looked at homage / pastiche of exiting images, and subverting them by adding in elements of 'issues' within our society.