• An hourglass with a burning heart in the top bulb with the words "good validation, happiness, perfection" slipping through the narrow middle to the lower bulb, filled with the words "expectations, lost time, stress, sad, pressure, overextend, overdo."
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The Application of Dante's Philosophy to the Modern Lifespan, 2021.

Within Dante’s Divine Comedy, he focuses on one’s future and fate in the afterlife in his description of salvation. Whether the actions executed within our lifetimes are deemed as right or wrong, individuals hope to achieve perfection of the rules set by this divine figure, seeking validation for their dedication toward happiness.

In the present, we are told to seek better since the day we are born, with pre-made expectations set for us before we even leave the safety of the womb. Yet the distinction between right and wrong, good and bad, heaven and hell, happiness and despair are not as easily defined as before within this modern lens of blurred lines. We may be reaching out for a better future for ourselves, but our efforts, expectations, and personal actions to meet these goals may be a hell we experience within our lives in an attempt to gain ‘happiness’ that instead simply makes us suffer.

This project reflects how we drown in the expectations set for us by others and ourselves in our struggle striving towards a fate that may not make us happy in the long run, fighting against time to achieve such a paradise sooner rather than later.
 

Jordan Evans-Polockow
B.A. Architecture, 2023. | UC Berkeley Literature Visual Arts |
Jordan Evans-Polockow is an Architecture Major within the College of CED at the University of California, Berkeley, as a part of the Graduating Class of 2023. She is originally from Santa Cruz, California and currently is a trumpet player within of the Cal Marching Band.