Our Zine was about Roosevelt Island, we were trying to focus on the history of the island and how much time has changed on the island throughout its history. A lot of our pictures tried to focus on the different aspects that we were given (body of water, park/public space, etc.) and the text was primarily based on the history of different parts of the island
Final layout:
Seminar Text:
My life is quite luxurious, and I am certainly very happy about that. I have heard stories from a long time ago that this island was once a hell-hole, that this island would have been lost to history with what the humans were doing here, but that was almost two centuries ago. From what I’ve heard, the place was just horrible, and no one would care about it at all, had the humans continued on with those actions, the island would have never changed, and would have possibly been far, far worse.
However, the next two centuries brought about so much change, more people started visiting, the humans changed everything about the island, they started creating so much around the island and on it, they turned it from a near inhospitable wasteland for outcasts to a place where even children could come visit and even live in, and the people seemingly did not care at all about the prior history about the place. To cement this belief they had, and to celebrate their accomplishments of re-inventing the island as well as one of their great leaders, they created me, and named me after one of their greatest leaders, they named me the Franklin D. Roosevelt Four Freedoms Park.
Today, I remain here, alongside an advanced school for the humans, a degrading prison, and an art exhibit, preserved as one of the only natural parks, surrounded by this inorganic and ever-changing cities. The humans themselves also make sure that not only I, but the rest of the island remains in this extremely clean state, and even more impressive is their dedication to maintaining this prosperous state. The humans have even created an entire group to ensure the safety and prosperity of the island, they maintain the peace and are known by the humans as the Roosevelt Island Public Safety Department, they will walk around the whole island, but in particular, will visit me, just to make sure I am safe from any humans, even if they make the smallest of changes, these people will work tirelessly to make sure I remain in the same condition I am currently in. Even the humans who don’t live on this island understand the necessity of my preservation, after all, they were the ones who originally wished to preserve me. This makes it difficult to believe this island will even fall into the state it once was.
In addition, there are even people who will keep the island clean from more than just the garbage the humans generate, surprisingly, those people are actually not those who are funded from the island, but from the surrounding city itself. They keep the whole area around me clean. They clear off the dust and leaves that fall from the trees, even when they won’t damage me in any way, there are folks who will be willing to cut the grass right that is on me. They will set up places for people to dispose of whatever is of no use to them anymore instead of having them throw their useless items on the ground.
I can’t believe the amount of change around me, not only with the city, but on the island as well, and while there are changes even on this island, such as new architectural structures being created, I feel that, despite being relatively young, these little groups the humans have created will preserve this park forever, after all, the island I live on is called Roosevelt Island.
Draft Layouts:
Collaboration:
I think that in terms of collaboration, it went extremely well, and we all managed to contribute to the main goal equally in the final layout. Our greatest strength was that we all were able to individually make good work to put into the Zine. In addition, when it came to deciding how we would arrange the zine, we were all able to make compromises for how we’d put it together and the order. This compromise and agreement enabled us to decide how we’d put the zine together extremely quickly. I think that I managed to achieve skills in actual group collaboration and communication as both were required to make the project work. Without those, I’m sure that the whole project would have completely failed. In terms of actually making improvements, I personally should have been able to listen more to the group. Because of that, I wasn’t able to create the best works because of confusion, which lead to the rest of the members being somewhat exasperated with me, and in turn, me being frustrated with myself. In addition I found it difficult to remember some directions that were given by the group. However, I ultimately understood exactly what the group wanted.
