For my creative project animation, I decided to focus on the theme of social class and hierarchy. In Gogol’s The Nose, Kovaloff awakes one morning without his nose and desperately tries to hide his loss to avoid social humiliation. Throughout the story, it is quiet obvious that Kovaloff deeps cares for his status and ranking in society.

With The Nose in mind, my animation clearly reinforces the importance of social status. My photo collage depicts people fighting to climb to the top of a pyramid. Although obvious, the pyramid symbolizes social hierarchy while the people represent those who yearn for a high social rank. Like Gogol’s emphasis on social class, I made the hierarchy the focal point of my animation by creating a dark background for the orange pyramid to stand out. In addition, since Kovaloff loses his identity after losing his nose, I used plain black figures to represent the people. With no distinctive features, these figures essentially have no identity. Because their identity is derived from their socials status and how society views them, they desperately tries to reach a high social standing.

For the destruction aspect of my animation, I removed each person one by one and then deleted the pyramid replacing it with a nose. Without social status, these people are basically nothing because much of their identity and existence relies on ranking and class. In the end, I replaced the pyramid with a nose to connect back to Gogol’s story with the nose as a symbol of power and rank.