Should the United States make an effort to adopt the three-day weekend?
Assignment 5B: Artwork
Alex Fish
For Assignment 5B, I chose to create an artwork to represent my thesis topic. I had many ideas to choose from, but I had a good vision of something I would be able to create to really help represent the overall mental struggle that many people around the nation face every week. I decided to create an image that would represent the everyday workers’ struggle to maintain their mental health while living by the five-day workweek schedule. My drawing depicts a man, who represents the typical American employee, carrying a heavy boulder, which represents the mental baggage and struggle that comes with the current five-day workweek. I showed this man struggling to walk down a path which leads to happiness and good mental health. I wanted to create a visual representation of the mental burden which the five-day workweek puts on American workers every week. I also included obstacles on the path such as cracks and puddles representing the downsides of having a shorter weekend. These obstacles on the path represent not having enough time with family, a decrease in productivity, and other problems which would make it even more difficult for the American worker to reach a good mental state.
This scene is taking place in a forest where the trees are also blocking out the sunlight from the path. The trees represent the current structure of the American workweek and the sky above the tree line, that the man cannot see, represents the three day weekend itself. The man is continuously struggling to walk down the path until he can either reach the end, or the economic week is shifted to a three-day weekend, (he finds a clearing in the trees). I also chose to add a three-day weekend scheduled calendar behind the man at the beginning of the path to add symbolism. This shows that the man's grueling journey could have been avoided from the start if The United States had adopted the three-day weekend into society.
