Assignment 3: Statement About Vessel

My vessel contains hand held video game cartridges the my boyfriend and I collect.  The games range from the original Japanese formats from 1996 to the newest English formats from 2011.  The are from the Pokemon series on Nintendo handheld systems.  These are important to me because I have played the games my whole life and something I can always find fun through.  It also symbolizes a sort of childhood for me because playing them was what my brother and I did when we were little (and still do).  

The contents influence the structure off my vessel through the story line of the games and a timeline of childhood.  The story line influences the vessel shape in a timeline way.  The story would begin where the lid is lowest on the box and more right.  As the shape goes from left to right, the height becomes greater, and box becomes wider, and the bottom touches back down to the ground.  The height rising symbolizes the challenges the player faces through the game.  The higher the box gets, the tougher the challenges become.  The main point of the game is to interact with all the Pokemon (small monster like creatures) throughout the game.  The width represents this because is starts narrow, showing that the player has not met many Pokemon, and then at the end of the game, the player has met all the Pokemon, represented by the widening of the right end.  The bottom edge represents the game on a personal level; it shows my understanding of the games through the storyline.  The left base is to the ground, showing that I know what I am doing because each game starts pretty much the same.  Then, the base leaves the ground, showing that I have no idea what I am doing in the game.  Then, as I continue to play, the game flow becomes readable and I understand what to do, which is symbolized by the base touching down to the ground again.  

The concept of childhood also influences the structure of my vessel.  For the childhood timeline, the box is meant to be read right to left.  During childhood, the imagination is endless and playing is all the time, but as a person grows older, an imagination starts to be limited and playing declines.  The right section of the box is childhood, large and full of imagination and play, and the left section is adulthood, small without as much imagination or play.  But, the box touches down again at the end, showing that as one grows older, they sometimes go back to playing again.  For example, I played the games and other things all the time when I was a child, and then I started to grow up and out of them.  Then, I realized how much I loved the games and other childish things, and have brought them back into my life. 

My vessel symbolizes both concepts of the storyline of the games, and the overall concept of my childhood.