Poetic Metamorphosis
Assignment: 
Read The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka 

(A link to the reading appears here on the class blog, see below)

Compose a vocabulary list from the reading.  Post words and definitions on your blog.

Write a personal response to the reading.  Post on your blog.

Using only white copy paper (do not use card stock) make three paper sculptures that visually narrate The Metamorphosis. Employ elements and principles of design to visually communicate your intentions.

This assignment uses limited materials and does not allow the use of tape, glue or any other form of adhesive. 

The three paper sculptures are to represent the setting discussed in The Metamorphosis and will be miniature.  The three sculptures are: 
1.) A bed (must contain a mattress, a box spring, a bed frame, a headboard and at least one pillow and one blanket)
2.) Gregor
3.) Your Choice

Do not use card stock.
If white is part of your design, white ink must be used.  Do not rely on the white copy paper.
All forms are to be three-dimensional.  Address all planes on all forms. Example, a mattress has six sides (planes).
Mattress and box spring are two separate forms.
Bed frame and headboard are two separate forms.
All forms do not have to attach.
You may use water to deconstruct paper and activate glue embedded in paper.

Reflection and Vocabulary Words:

Outline for The Metamorphosis:

  The Metamorphosis is a short story written by Kafka, of a dream scape where a young man named Gregor has suddenly woken up one morning to find himself transformed into a giant bug (roach). He finds that his body is hard due to armored plates in bow-like sections, he has many tiny legs, and it is hard for him to get out of bed because of this. Since he is a traveling salesperson who is currently living at his parents house helping his parents financially, he has to get out of bed and get on a train to work. Because of his absence and stubbornness to open the door, both his family and superior go to his door and beg him to come out or he will lose his job.  Gregor was finally able to get the door open using his mouth after he told them he would be out soon. Everyone was in shock and Mr. Manager left in a hurry do to his disgust. Gregor's already, heavy breathing mother was in shock and Gregor was confined to his room. He slowly lost his human instincts and lost the ability to speak. His sister was the only one who saw him and took care of him till his mother said she wanted to help out. There he had frightened her to the point where his father threw apples at him, lodging one into his side. After that, they rented out a room in the house as well as getting a new maid as each of them had a job since their financial issues grew. Gregor hated them at this point because of how he was neglected. One night his sister played the violin for the men renting the room and Gregor was drawn to it and moved closer to the point where the men saw him and threatened not to pay rent. At this point, the apple in his side hurt more and more each day until one day Gregor thought of the happy memories with his family and passed on. This allowed the father to kick the men and the maid out of their house where they said their final goodbyes, and lived on a happier life where the discussion took place where Gregor's sister is to be married.

Vocabulary Words:

1. Verminous-

     a. of the nature of or resembling vermin.

     b. of, pertaining to, or caused by vermin: verminous diseases.

     c. infested with vermin, especially parasitic vermin: verminous shacks.

2. Irrepressible- 

     a. incapable of being repressed or restrained; uncontrollable: irrepressible laughter.

3. Reverberation-

     a. a reechoed sound.

     b. the fact of being reverberated or reflected.

     c. something that is reverberated: Reverberations from the explosion were felt within a six-mile radius.

     d. an act or instance of reverberating.

     e. Physics. the persistence of a sound after its source has stopped, caused by multiple reflection of the sound within a closed space.

4. Arbitrary- 

     a. subject to individual will or judgment without restriction; contingent solely upon one's discretion: an arbitrary decision.

     b. decided by a judge or arbiter rather than by a law or statute.

     c. having unlimited power; uncontrolled or unrestricted by law; despotic; tyrannical: an arbitrary government.

     d. capricious; unreasonable; unsupported: an arbitrary demand for payment.

     e. Mathematics . undetermined; not assigned a specific value: an arbitrary constant.

5. Diminutive-

     a. small; little; tiny: a diminutive building for a model-train layout.

     b. Grammar . pertaining to or productive of a form denoting smallness, familiarity, affection, or triviality, as the suffix -let,  in droplet  from drop.

noun

     c. a small thing or person.

     d. Grammar . a diminutive element or formation.

     e. Heraldry. a charge, as an ordinary, smaller in length or breadth than the usual.

 6. Premonition-

     a. a feeling of anticipation of or anxiety over a future event; presentiment: He had a vague premonition of danger.

     b. a forewarning.

7. Amelioration- 

     a. an act or instance of ameliorating; the state of being ameliorated.

     b. something that ameliorates; an improvement.

8. Asphyxiation- 

     a. to cause to die or lose consciousness by impairing normal breathing, as by gas or other noxious agents; choke; suffocate; smother.

9. Scrupulous- 

     a. having scruples; having or showing a strict regard for what one considers right; principled.

     b. punctiliously or minutely careful, precise, or exact: a scrupulous performance.

10. Unequivocally- 

     a. in a way that is clear and unambiguous: The theme is unequivocally religious.

     b. in a way that is not subject to conditions or exceptions: He offered his forgiveness unequivocally.

11. Corrosive- 

     a. having the quality of corroding or eating away; erosive.

     b. harmful or destructive; deleterious: the corrosive effect of poverty on their marriage.

     c. sharply sarcastic; caustic: corrosive comments on the speaker's integrity.

12. Admonitions-  

     a. an act of  admonishing.

     b. counsel, advice, or caution.

     c. a gentle reproof.

     d. a warning or reproof given by an ecclesiastical authority.

My Take on the story

Reading this story for the fifth time really opened my eyes a bit more. I imagined it through Gregor's point of view. This allowed me to see and old normal room and house that shared a "grandma" type of look. This included colors that bled together as well as an old trunk, doily's, and an old wooden bed that could fall apart easily from Gregor's weight when he was a bug. This was expressed through the content, color, and ways I built my structures in this project. 

In Process Photos

Finished Project

Here the bed is expressed to be a wooden structure that is easily moveable and is occupied by a mattress, sheet, and pillow on top.The sheet is washed up and has coffee spills all over it to give it an older look while the black pillow compliments the bed frame.

The mattress itself was made out of woven paper that was soaked in coffee. I was woven strips through slits cut into two rectangular papers. After weaving, I took black strips and wove them through the paper and tied them off at the ends and stuffed soft paper into the middle of the mattress in order to give it both a soft and rough look which resembles a real mattress especially while touching it.

I imagined the big dresser, not as a dresser, but as a sort of chest?box that lied on the ground. I made an origami box out of paper and painted it black and white, matching the sheets and bed. Then I wove in black strips, tying it together like the mattress again. Next I soaked more paper in coffee and stained them as well as using the other parts of mattresses that failed, and stuffed them into the box messily.

I pictured Gregor huge and as a sort of "Bug under a rug" and so I wanted to show him by doing just that. Gregor is the rug/ doily itself. I carved out many images that struck out to me during the story. In the very middle I carved out two cockroach figures which mirror each other. Then on the shorter sides I carved out key holes since I saw the story through the door frame. Then on the opposite, I carved out apples since they were a big part of the story and Gregor's downfall. Surrounding it, I carved out little patterns to make it "grandma" like and doily like. Then I put a big brown paper underneath the middle to give it that sort of "Bug under rug" look. 

Sketches