2D Illustration Workshop

Making Visible the Invisible

Our fist activity extended on the essence of my project, where in pairs we were tasked to convey two given words without the use of text or representational illustration.

We tell the volatile story of both electricity and excitement through texture, colour, form and gesture; from quiet beginnings, with energies steadied and calmed by imposed order, channelled and focused into a thin, straight line.

Perfectly white,

perfectly perpendicular. But when that focus

breaks

AN ERUPTION OF UNCONTROLLABLE FRENZY SPITS SPARKS OF EXUBERANCE, JOY, TERROR AND RAGE;

BREAKING FREE OF THE CONFINES OF THE LINE, THE SCISSORS AND THE AXIS ITSELF, WARPING, TWISTING AND CONTORTING

UNTil tHIs FIt oF ShEer viTaLity iS dissipated.

Pandora’s Book

The second activity involved illustrating a book cover for a well-known story of our choice. I chose Pandora’s Box, in which the titular character unknowingly unleashes all known evils into the world when she opens a forbidden jar, often mistranslated as ‘box’ given to her by Zeus.

I chose this story as It gives me the opportunity to explore the depiction of these evils as well as consider the relationship between book and reader in the creation of the narrative.

I introduce the physical book as the ‘box’ itself; where the reader becomes Pandora in their desire to open its contents, encouraging temptation by offering a glimpse into its pages through a ripped cover, rejecting a title on the page with the aim of creating inquisition in the reader as they open the book in search of this information.

Utilising my research over the course of this series, I reference gestural motifs and colour associations related to negative emotions such as those found for fear, anger, shame and sadness to illustrate the evils waiting to be unleashed by the reader.