Alyssa Diglio
“Beauty is Only Thin Deep,” a senior exhibition and honors thesis by Sarah Green, details the physical and emotional dangers of eating disorders. The show includes oil paintings, watercolors, and sculptures, Green said. It will be up for display in Earl Hall from Nov. 15-19.
Green, an art major, said it all started when she came across a blog on Xanga.com about a girl with an eating disorder.
“Xanga has a lot of blogs and blog rings that support eating disorders as a lifestyle choice,” she said. “There are support groups for girls with eating disorders who want help hiding it from their parents, suggestions for low calorie foods, how to throw up their food in the most efficient way; things like that, that promote an unhealthy lifestyle.”
Green said she knew something had to be done. She said it’s scary that people out there think it’s healthy to live like this.
“People should know about this,” she said. “So that’s where my thesis started.”
She said her position on eating disorders is that they are an overlooked medical problem.
“Insurance companies don’t consider eating disorders an actual disease or physical illness, but I think it’s something they should look at,” she said. “Most girls don’t fully recover; a lot of people die from eating disorders.”
Green has spent the last year and a half working on pieces for her senior exhibition. One of the most challenging things she came across was organizing her ideas and turning them into visuals.
“The hardest part was trying to effectively convey what I was thinking,” she said, “and not be too cheesy or obvious about it.”
Green said she has two favorite pieces in her show. The first, titled “Restricted,” and the second, titled “Dead Weight.”
“I think they came out the most successful, especially ‘Dead Weight.’ That was the first one that I did and it kind of opened the door to painting all these organs,” she said. “It was one of my most successful pieces ever, and I got a lot of good feedback from one of my teachers about it. And I just like the feeling in ‘Restricted.’ I think it ties the physical and emotional problems of eating disorders into one solid painting.”
She said her least favorite piece is the untitled one because it looks like a still life of things floating around in space to her.
“I think that I technically did it well,” she said, “but I don’t think that the message is as clear as some of the other ones.”
Brittany Plummer, an art education major, said Green did an excellent job with her show.
“It came out extremely successful and looks very professional,” she said.
Plummer, a senior, said Green has put a lot of time and effort into each individual piece of art and into the overall show.
“I watched her do her thesis project from the very beginning, so I know how much this project means to her,” she said. “I can’t wait to be at the opening.”
Senior Carl Durazzo said he agrees.
“Her pieces are all very unique and they have their own design yet all of them stay very consistent to her theme,” he said.
Durazzo, a communications major, said Green worked very hard on all her pieces and putting the show together.
“I think they’re great,” he said. “She’s a great artist.”
