Project #2: Peer to Peer

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Project Description:

“A one on one partnered collaborative project. Final results were two kinds of booklets– one a portrait/profile of the partner with text from questions and images, the other an image/text-based poetic exchange that included both partners.

Process/Goal: Booklet #1 Profile – The project was based on the dual definition of Profile as a literary and visual form producing a profile portrait of the assigned partner. The text came partially from Proust’s Questionnaire introduced in Seminar. Images as content alluded to psychological conditions. Digital or traditional forms were derived from projections, masks, and shadow techniques combined with texts.

Process/Goal: Booklet #2 IntraView Poem- Poems from Seminar blended with images from Studio incorporating both students.”

 

Group Bonding:

Once we were paired off by our professor, we were asked to draw the shadows of ourselves and create a composition that was visually interesting and composing of us. Due to the absence of one student, I was momentarily paired with another group, and the three of us created two different compositions.

After completing this activity we were then asked to write down a minimum of five beliefs and share and discuss them. Mine can be seen below:

I believe that…

1. hard work and intelligence make successful people.
2. femininity and masculinity are compositional attributes that can be found in anyone (male or female). These attributes are not diametrically opposed.
3. family is an important aspect of a person; through them, you can have a better understanding of a person as well.
4. Artist can be bad appropriators. It is important to constantly reflect upon the material you make.
5. Learning and advancement through life come through challenges. Without them, growth is unlikely.
6. compliments only go so far. Critiques are what truly weigh the relevance and worth of a piece/person.
7. when you travel with someone, and it works out, you know if you are truly friends and if you should stay friends.

She believes that…

1. Everything happens for a reason, and eventually, it will all fall into place
2. Home is a feeling; being surrounded by the people you love is what is home.
3. Family is super important; it is the truest form of unconditional love
4. The truth always comes out.
5. Being positive and surrounding yourself with positivity is one of the healthiest and kindest things you can do for yourself.
6. You should always count your blessings.
7. You find out who your real friends are when you are in need of help.
8. Uniqueness should be celebrated.
9. You shouldn’t judge someone so quickly, you never know what they are going through or what has led them to act the way they do.
10. Love is selfless.
11. Compliments pertaining to one’s personality are far more fulfilling than compliments on appearance.
12. Face to face interactions are so important and we shouldn’t move away from that.
13. People should never suppress their creativity and they should use it as the powerful tool that it is.

It was an interesting activity as we were able to get to know each other in a more personal way rather quickly, which was needed due to the nature of our pairing. Quite by surprise, we realized that we had a lot in common due to a number of shared beliefs.

 

Project Proposal:

Inspired by traditional Japanese Orihon book techniques, I am planning on creating a 13-page accordion book. I chose this book form as it will be a challenge for me. I have never created an accordion book before and I find it to be very interesting technically.

The core aspect of the book will be the visualizations of Suzanne’s beliefs as they are supposed to be a reflection of herself. Each page will contain an illustration of one of her beliefs with the accompanying text, resulting in 13 pages of content. Below you can see a sample of one of the pages.

The dimensions of the book will be 8 inches high and 5 inches wide. and be primarily in pastel shades of green, purple, and orange with navy blue and burgundy accents. Below is my sample color palette:

For the front cover, I plan on creating a marbling pattern through old techniques used in Japan and the Middle East. I chose this as I find that it not only represents Suzanne’s personality but also is a small reflection of who I am as well. Here are a few tutorials that I have watched to give me direction and inspiration:

A list of materials that I will need for the project:

• White Heavyweight Paper 75 inches at least in length and at least 8 inches in height.
• Color printer to print on an accordion book (There is one in the design lab).
• Computer with access to Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator
• Glue
• 2 Sheets of Thick White Card.
• A Shallow Tray
• Marbling Inks or Waterproof Inks.
• Water
• Paper Towels

 

An Important Note…..

As the creator of this version of Suzanne, I cannot help but input aspects of myself into the work as I hold the main agency in the piece. My worldview and identity will impact her work it is just a degree of how much it does represent her and how much it does not. I am just outlining the limitations that surround me as the point of this activity is to produce a piece of work that is as close to her as possible.

In all, I believe that I have made a good attempt at constructing an aesthetic based off of Suzanne’s persona. I hope to meet with her soon to better understand her and the way she thinks. It will only better the piece.

 

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Further Group Bonding:

To get to know my partner better, within the condensed time frame, we decided to hang out and talk about ourselves, our goals, and our likes/dislikes. One major connection we found was our relationship with music. Although very different, our love for music was a connection that we could base our dialogue on. I came up with the idea of creating playlists of songs that mean something to us. Of those songs, we could send each other particular lyrics that speak to us on a deeper level. This proved to be a wonderful idea as I could get to know Suzanne on a level that I might not have otherwise.

The songs I chose for the playlist were a mix of Arabic and English songs that mean a lot to me. Some have lyrics that motivated me through tougher times (Gotta Get Up – Kali Uchis) and others reminded me of good times (The Grief of The South – Dina El Wedidi):

The lyrics I sent to Suzanne include:

1. Kali Uchis – Gotta Get Up:

   “But I gotta get up, gotta get up

   Gotta get up
   Gotta get up and get me something
   Gotta get up, gotta get up”

2. Ravyn Lenae – The Night Song
   “People like to stare
   I don’t really care what you think
   Oo, I like my hair today
   I look to the clouds, and they waving hey”

Fitting an entire life’s worth of experiences into a five-song playlist proved to be quite the challenge. I left a lot out from my childhood and culture, but in turn, I think I was able to synthesize a collection of songs that represent me as a human in the present. Suzanne followed suit and sent me her playlist.

She also sent me some lyrics that are very important to her, they are:

1. Running- Nicotines Famous Honey
   “And everybody swear they gotta know
     everything
    But all I know is that life is a tricky game
    I rolled the dice, played my cards
    Flicked the spinner and
    Here I am
    Back at one trying to start again”
2. Violet- Daniel Caesar
   “Just chill, you’re made to sing
    On anything, you golden child”
3. Love Yourz- J. Cole
   ” No such thing as a life that’s better than yours (Love yours)
     No such thing than a life that’s better than yours
     No such thing, No such thing”
4. Love Yourz- J. Cole
   “Its beauty in the struggle, ugliness in the success
    Hear my words and listen to my final of distress”

What I get from her playlist is that Suzanne is similar to me in that much of the music she listens to is inspirational; the fact that she gave me 13 songs instead of five, all of which are inspirational, supports that claim.

 

Potential Design Elements to Include:

In addition to the lyrics, Suzanne also gave me her Pinterest information so that I could get to know her on more of an aesthetic level. This proved to be very useful as I could better understand how to place her in terms of design and color.

After viewing this, I decided to adjust the color palette in order to better represent her board as well as give myself more to work with.

The colors are delicate, moody, and soft. Do they represent Suzanne as a person? I’m not entirely sure. From my talks with her, she does not seem to be those things but she definitely has a calm personality, However, this could just be the fact that things are still serious and professional. I showed her the initial palette and the new palette both of which she likes and says match her aesthetic. As a result, I feel that I am headed in the right direction. After finalizing the color palette, I felt it necessary to revisit the initial design and solidify what exactly the content was going to be. Considering that I wanted to illustrate the entire book, I realized that I needed to be realistic with how much I did. Therefore, I cut down the number of pages to eight.

 

Accordion Book Construction Research:

On Google, I found a tutorial on how to make an accordion book. This method was simpler than what I imagined as I was planning on printing on a long piece of paper instead of connecting the pages together. The finished product looks very clean, and it is simple to construct, allowing me to focus more on the front cover of the book and the overall pages.

 

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Marbling Experimentation:

Firstly, I have done some practice with the marbling technique. After last class, I went to Blicks and found out that they did have marbling inks. With this in mind, I thought it would be better to purchase this for its ease. I took a metal pan used for baking and filled it with water. Then I used each the dropper of each bottle of ink (red, blue, and yellow) and plopped a drop of the ink. I layered them only a few times to keep from wasting.

After placing the drops of ink in, I went on to use a leftover straw to create the marbled shape. After happy with the results, I took a piece of paper from my sketchbook and placed it on top of the water. Two interesting things occurred. The first was that the paper immediately began to curl as I put it inside. The second was that the ink did not adhere to the paper as much as it should have. According to my knowledge, the ink is supposed to be instantly sucked into the paper leaving only a little to run off. However, the ink on my test paper stayed relatively on the surface.

I was not sure why this could be so I went online to investigate. Luckily, not only did I find a tutorial on the technique by Blicks but the same tutorial was using the exact inks I had. In the video, each step was explained and when it came to the type of paper to use the hostess of the tutorial stated that the paper should not have sizing. Sizing is essentially a solution that incorporated during the manufacturing of paper to prevent it from absorbing too much water. In all, sizing in the paper would be counterproductive for this technique.

To remedy this, I need to purchase paper that has no sizing. One that the hostess recommends is copper pressed paper.

 

Beginning of Book #2 – Intraview:

I began working on was the second book. After taking a laser lab orientation for another class, I was inspired to use this new skill to create the front cover. One example that the orientation leader had to show us was a piece of wood with a dynamic geometric pattern carved in the middle. I had the idea of doing something similar but with words and on museum board. After doing some brief internet research I found a font and style of composition words that was very aesthetically pleasing, in Arabic.

The font I found was called El Messri and the icon used for it had the letters arranged in a rectangular shape. I found this to be visually interesting as it made you read the text for longer than you may have to. It makes you carefully read the text. For my front cover, I have designed the following.

The front cover is slightly different from how I want it to eventually look. Ideally, the front cover would be black with the writing in the center cut through exposing the first white page. I believe this will give the book an interesting feature that many might not have.

 

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Final – Book #1 Profile:

The first book is supposed to be an amalgam of my partner, Suzanne. It is supposed to include most, if not everything, I got to learn about her. For example, what she fears most, what she looks for in friends, but above all, her beliefs. I chose to stick close to her beliefs as I felt that it was the best way to capture her personality.

Therefore, I chose to include the following:

1. Love is selfless.
2. Uniqueness should be celebrated.
3. Face to face interactions are so important and we shouldn’t move away from that.
4. The truth always comes out.
5. People should never suppress their creativity and they should use it as the powerful tool that it is.
6. You find out who your real friends are when you are in need of help.

Although I initially wanted to complete 13 pages, I found it to be too much and decided to crop down eight, six of which are the beliefs listed above. With the six beliefs, I went and illustrated them such as the two pages you see below….

Book #1 Profile – Page Three

Book #1 Profile – Page Four

To explain the illustrations and why I decided to express the beliefs in this way, I will say that it takes root in the words themselves. As communicating with my partner proved to be inconsistent and one-sided, I decided that I would pull from the words; that being said it is important to mention that these are my interpretations of her words. Therefore, it is in its own way a fusion between my partner and me as well.

Moreover, in terms of the color palette, it was one of the elements that had more of my partner included. I created the color palette and luckily she resonated with it. With this in mind, I made a few adjustments just give me some more room to work. I felt a little restricted and so I decided to stick with the same base hue but subtly change the value and tone.

Furthermore, the cover I wanted to created worked out! Following the instruction video from Blicks, I went and picked up some paper with limited to no sizing. I was advised to choose rice paper as it was thin and it would soak up the ink very well. It did just that as all the details showed up wonderfully.

Shot of Book #1 

Once I created the marbling on the water I then slowly placed the paper on top, then I submerged it. Afterward, I placed the paper between sheets of paper towel and placed a heavy book on top to prevent warping. This proved to be effective. Lastly, I glued the paper to sheets of illustration board to make sure that the marbled pages could gain strength and durability.

As for the construction of the book, I utilized the video on how to create an accordion book. Instead of printing on one long page of paper I printed each on 8.5″ x 11″ sheets of photo paper. Then I cut each page out leaving about 1 1/2″ of blank paper on the right-hand side of the page. This allowed me to join the pages together and create a folding motion as detailed in the following photograph.

Shot of Folding Mechanism in Book #1

Final Book PDF:

Completed_Final_Book_1-1622c0i

 

Final – Book #2 Intraview:

The second book was a bit more experimental for me in that I chose to construct a more “traditional” book, however, to begin this section I will discuss the content of the book first.

The main content of this book was poetry. The poetry was written by myself as well as taken from songs that Suzanne or I loved.

 

Link to Poems & Lyric:

Int_Studio_P2_Book2_Poems_Lyrics

 

The two songs came from our playlists on Spotify. I decided to choose these two as each one held a deep significance. For “Turning Back,” which was partially translated from Arabic to English by me, I chose it because it is a song that reminds me of an important time in my life. Moreover, the second song was a happy coincidence. It was originally a song on Suzanne’s playlist but once I heard it I was immediately brought back to my childhood. The Cure is my mother’s favorite band and it was a great unexpected connection between us.

As for the poems themselves they are based on the observations and time I got to know Suzanne. Originally created for my seminar class, I used them here because they encapsulate both Suzanne and I. They capture Suzanne as she is the basis and speaker of the poems; they capture myself as I wrote them. It is impossible for them to not contain some connection to me as my ideas and perceptions of Suzanne are what they are truly based off of. Whether or not they are “truly” accurate is up to the world to decide.

After choosing the poems, I needed to find a way to present them. I decided that I would work with them by hand and create the book itself. I decided that almost every page would have an illustration that went along with it. The illustration would reflect the poem that it was next to. For example, the page that includes the poem “Surrender” references tentacles that wrap around the speaker restricting their movement, therefore, I decided to illustrate an octopus with long black tentacles. It can be seen below…

Book #2 Intraview – Pages 1 & 2

For the front cover of the book I wanted it to be visually and tactilely interesting. When the time came round to start I had just taken the Laser Lab orientation and decided to pursue it.

Laser Lab

  Laser In the Works

After playing around with the results, I realized that the lines I created for the front cover could not be seen very easily. After a suggestion from a friend, I considered going back to the laser lab to redo it but in the end, I did not have enough time. Instead, I decided to take a practice version of the front cover sand it down to remove and burn marks/debris. Then take it and place it on top. This way you can clearly see that it is 3D and clearly see the writing.

Interestingly, when I sanded the illustration board it came up with a suede-like texture. I loved it and I will definitely use it in the future.

As for the construction of the book, I decided to go with a simple sewing technique that joins all the pages together. All of the pages were folded and placed on top of one another, then sewn together. The front cover was glued to an extra piece of paper that was also sewn to the rest of the pages; thus, connecting everything together.

 

Final Book PDF:

Book #2-2k14lr0

 

Reflection:

In all, this experience was a multitude of things. It was difficult and a struggle, for sure, but it also helped me learn and reaffirm beliefs that I already had. One such belief was the importance of communication.

Within my pairing, there was limited communication. I made a lot of effort in the beginning, but it slowly turned into nothing as I decided that it was not my duty to chase after my partner. This was a shame because I felt that we got along but when they couldn’t reciprocate, it obviously perturbed me.

Nonetheless, I also lacked in communication. I did not discuss these issues with my professor as I felt that I should’ve handled it on my own. As a result, I found myself struggling and unsure of how to move forward. It revealed to me, the role I play in group situations. This one, however, was completely different from my previous partnerships/groups in that I let the other do what they wanted. Normally, I would be on the phone with them constantly making sure things were getting done but I decided that that headache was not mine to shoulder this time. We are adults now, or at least should be. Regardless, I know that If I have a problem I need to speak up, no matter the consequences.

As for the actual project itself, I thoroughly enjoyed illustrating everything. I also enjoyed utilizing the text in different ways to achieve harmony between them and the illustrations. I can definitely see myself doing this in the future. Furthermore, I was proud of the results of the two techniques I had never used before, marbling and laser cutting. I pushed myself out of my comfort zone and it paid off. Now I can see myself utilizing it in the future.