What's In A Name?

I was so nervous on the first day of this semester I thought I'd throw up; it was my first day back in studio. I took a selfie just to document the occasion. It turns out everything was fine [of course] and I had nothing to worry about. The theme of our assignments this spring will revolve around the concept of Culture- what it means to ourselves, how it defines a society, and how it can be incorporated into our designs. Assignment One was to reflect on our own background and translate it into a 2D design. The elements we were asked to incorporate were: a current self-portrait, a childhood image, and information concerning our family lineage. I chose to focus on a specific moment in my family history. Though my bloodline has ties to many cultures [Dutch, German, English, Cherokee...] I take pride in who I am today... a Shelton. Independent, hardworking and determined. In my image I included the drawing of the selfie I took on that first day. The assignment asked us to really look at ourselves and I thought that that picture was a perfect reflection of the current emotions I face in my path to better myself. I included an image of North Carolina and filled it with cities that are important to my family's story. Similarly, I drew the shape of England filled with cities from where Sheltons historically originated. The tree that I drew was meant to reflect the passage that I wrote on the image, but I'm not sure it translates well as a tree. My first iteration was done completely with chalk pastels, which was nice, but didn't capture some of the detail I wanted. I decided for my final piece to use a combination of chalk pastels and watercolors and I'm proud of how well it came out. I had never before used either media in a serious project, so I had to really pay attention to every stroke. I received a lot of positive feedback from this piece, however a critique that I agree with is that I could still go back and add some more contrast in places to give more depth.