A Piece of Apple Pie

The art piece I chose was "Mountain Sites" by Roger Brown. For those who didn't go or don't remember, it was the one with about 12 mountains that were all in a row and all looked the same (and they all had this strange crazy glow). Tucked in between were houses with silhouettes inside. There was a fence in the foreground with people looking up.

To me, this piece seemed to be saying that people are far apart and separated by important and imposing things. The people by the fence can't see the houses and those in the houses can't see the other houses or those at the fence. However, the viewer can see it all- all the mountains, all the people, and all the houses. This could be taken to symbolize how some people separate themselves. They have mountains and problems and cut themselves off from the world. But since the viewer can see them, they are never alone. Another part I found interesting was that the mountains are all the same. This could be taken to mean that the problems people think are so terrible are actually the same as other's problems and not specific just to them. It relates to America because we tend to isolate ourselves, either in a good way or a bad way, and sometimes we feel that we are the only ones in the world with problems.

If I could ask the artist anything, I would ask why he decided to paint it. What were his intentions? What did he want the people to think of when they looked at it? (if any of you can try to answer, even though you're not the artist, it would be appreciated!)


The voices left out are the voices of race in any way. The people are all just silhouettes. All are painted in black, but that description does not have anything to do with their race. It doesn't matter who you are, your silhouette is black. It's pretty much the definition of a silhouette. Anyway, moving on, in this piece, besides races, it also isn't apparent what the people's ages are. They could be any age at all. The size is all the same for everyone. I'm glad he left out those things because it shows that his theme is universal. It remains unchanging throughout.

This piece relates to The Great Gatsby in several ways. The most important way is that in Gatsby a lot of the rich people complained about little things. In this piece of work, they are not little things, they are mountains, but they are the same thing over and over like in the book. It's also connected because it is about the divides between people. There were divides between Tom and Daisy, then Gatsby and Daisy, then Nick and Jordan, then Myrtle and her husband.

This piece was complex and I'm sure I've only begun to scratch the surface of the meaning behind it. Hopefully I've managed to shed a little light on it for you, though.