The topic I chose to base my work around was mental health issues (specifically depression and anxiety) given that I wanted bring attention to a current and serious that many young people experience and often have trouble coping with. Furthermore, I wanted to communicate with the viewer the hardships that these people face which is not always noticed by those around them. I also want to highlight the stigma attached to mental health in Asian and African communities. Given that I wanted to bring attention to the issue of mental health amongst youth my target audience was young people as well as their families due to the fact that the family members and teachers will be the one who will see the young people (children or students) very often. I thought that this target audience would be appropriate as family member may be able to recognise how someone may be acting to determine if they are having any struggles with their mental health and will then be able to intervene and help. The target audience influenced my final design as a shattering effect as a metaphor to show that someone who has mental health problems may feel emotionally shattered, and by displaying this on the exterior of the person in the image, I was able to successfully communicate my ideas and make the viewer think about the impact mental health has on young people which cannot always be identified. When I was formulating my ideas at the beginning of my project I was inspired by the work of Dawid Planeta, Tsoku Malea, Edward Honaker (who have all previously or are still suffering with depression and/or anxiety) and Christian Sampson who did not personally suffer from any mental illnesses but wanted to create awareness surrounding this topic. I was particularly drawn to Planeta’s work due to the way he used photo manipulation in order to illustrate the fear that comes with depression through the disproportion of the people compared to the animals/ruins. The people are miniature while the animals/ruins are much larger which successfully is able to communicate with the audience the fear that comes with mental illness. Malea’s work and ideas behind his work heavily influenced me as he shone a light on the stigma attached to depression by some people in the black community, showing this in his work through the use of subtle image manipulation. For example, in a piece titled ‘a nest for birds’ he edited in doves to represent lost thought. Moving on Honaker’s work also gave me some inspiration due to the way he manipulated his face in the images, using the liquify effect or making it look like his face has been scratched out. This inspired me as it was an effective way of representing how those who suffer with depression (and/or mood disorders like himself) may feel disassociated at times, and it is sometimes difficult to depict the emotions of someone dealing with mental health issues so through the manipulation of his face, Honaker was able to display this. Sampson’s work inspired me the least due to the fact that his interpretations of mental health issues communicated very cliché images to the viewer and did not accurately represent how a people with mental illnesses feel – I was more inspired by the work of the other 3 artists who use symbolism in their work in order to tell their story about mental health, which was displayed by unique image manipulation.