Assignment one – Say hello

The brief for this piece was to design a greetings card introducing myself and my work to my tutor. The lower half of the image shows the Earth, enclosed in a cave, being studied under a microscope. This represents my current career as a lecturer in geology – studying the Earth in great detail.  Hopefully this also illustrates that I find this a slightly claustrophobic activity that is somewhat detached from the real world. The upper half of the image shows me (up the ladder), having escaped from my cave and drawing myself a new world, which my friends are colourfully painting for me. This upper image combines: the types of activities that I value; my desire to be more creative; and the importance of my friends in my life. This upper image is meant to be a work in progress.

I chose to use a variety of media (ink, printed collage, colouring pencils) because I don’t yet have a particular style or preferred media but these are some that I am comfortable with. Perhaps I should have been more experimental in the upper half of the image as during this course I would like to push myself to use media that I am less comfortable with.

I think that the narrative of the image could be improved. It may not be clear that I have climbed out of the lower cave to draw my new world. I tried different things in early sketches – my hand drawing the world, and me just emerging from the cave. I could also have created a series of panels showing the steps in the story.