Mexican gang art

This was the final piece for my A level art exam. I was heavily influenced by artists like Julian Mendoza and Frieda Kahlo. Here I wanted to focus on the gang lifestyle which is strongly linked to hip hop. the two sides of the painting represent the two worlds of hip hop and gang life and the skull is the thing that links them together. On the left side you've got the red roses, marijuana(soft drugs) and a microphone, on the right you've got black roses representing death, a gun and a needle and syringe representing hard drugs. the skull in the middle is covered in MS-13 gang tattoos, i really wanted to show this as for me it puts out that even when your dead, the things evil things you did in your life will stain you forever, the rosarys show the irony in gangs, who have such a strong religious belief but still kill and rape etc. for me this piece has a lot of messages and subtle, non obvious morals.