GD 2: Reinterpreting a Cliche - Part 2
This is my sticker in action for Exercise 4 from GD2 (The project is called “Reinterpreting a cliche”) that I posted the image of not terribly long ago.
The American flag, often used as a symbolic form of patriotism, nationalism and pride, I decided to apply it to a different perspective. Rather than putting the American flag on symbols of pride and glory, instead the stickers are marking the lonely, abandoned and uncared for parts of our country we often try to ignore or forget. My original meaning for making this was in reference to Obama’s American Reinvestment and Recovery Plan, but I’ve decided to make a more general and open ended statement that is up for interpretation.
I have some ideas for actually using this for something in real-life outside of the internet/class. I have to finish formulating the plans, but once I do, I’ll announce it here. I just need to do more research.
A couple more photos here:
GD 2: Reinterpreting a Cliche - Part 1
We were given the task of reinterpreting a cliche and having a clear message being told through the image. I originally applied some copy, but have since decided to revise it completely without, and turn it into stickers. I’ll post photos of the stickers once I get them printed.
GD 2: Talkin’ Shop: A Trip To Carol and John’s Comic Shop to Catch Up With Friends
I have finished my 6 week project for GD 2. We were given the task of telling a story about a trip we took, giving a personal account of the experience. I choose to go to Carol and John’s Comic Shop in Cleveland, OH on the west-side in Kamm’s Plaza. I have been going there for nearly 15 years on and off. I had always had an interest in comics, but it wasn’t until the mid 1990s when Maximum Carnage, a Spiderman tale that crossed over many of the Spiderman books telling the story of Spiderman and his arch-enemy Venom teaming up with a few other heroes to fight Carnage who had also assembled a team of renegades causing trouble all over New York City. It was the first time that I realized that you could tell an interesting story in a book with pictures and it didn’t have to be for kids. (Granted many other books have done it better, but I was young at the time)
That comic got me into collecting comic books, I realized there was a shop not far from where I grew up that I could ride my bike to. I used to spend any spare money that I had and rode my bike back and forth to get them (usually without telling my parents I was doing so). Years pasted and in 2004 I started coming back to the store as I lived in Cleveland again and it was a familiar place I liked. I got to know the store pretty well, as well as the staff. As time has gone on I’ve also learned a lot about the store and it’s history as well. From John telling me about the original store and why he picked the iconic blue color that they have inside (“I thought it was heroic”), the photographs of the store when it was converted into a movie set for American Splendor, as well as why John moved to the new location around the corner, I was able to have content for the story I needed to tell.
I originally planned to make the story a personal account of being there, as well as having a second underlying story of the store’s history, but that was off topic for the project’s requirements. I am going to be making an entirely different set devoted directly to the store and it’s history (origins to today) specifically for them. What I am turning in for class though, is a more personal account of going into the store and having a conversation with Carol and John both about some of the more interesting tidbits of the shop as well as some introspection of various other things.
The structure of this modified story is told in a deck of trading cards much like the ones I used to collect when I was a kid. It starts with the introduction, character cards with a portrait on the front and stats on the back (modeled after superhero power cards from the 1990s), then eventually moving through the conversation. The last 16 cards are photographs from around the store, highlighting some of their unique elements, and on the back when pieced together makes a map of the area. So that way anyone interested by the story can also go there. I owe thanks to Mike Lembke who took my photographs for me using a lighting kit that I did not have access to. I had pre-planned just about every detail in the project ahead of time (from design to the items that needed to be shot), but without his skill and equipment the photography couldn’t have been as successful.
Here are some photos I took of the overall completed project:
Here are some detail screen caps of the cards:
This is the map that the last cards make:
I have set myself a deadline of the end of the month to finish the set that I am going to make for them. I will post any significant changes to the cards then. But for now this is it. On to project 2.
