Dream Project
A project catered for myself: examining the overlap in language and visual storytelling.
Duration: 5 weeks
Completed using Procreate and Adobe Illustrator
This is student work completed at Cornish College of the Arts
If a dream project came along, what would it look like? That question, for me, is answered here. This project was designed and catered towards some of my favourite topics to examine through illustration, combining an examination of the human experience with the power of language. My goal for this project was to capture, in illustrations, extremely specific moments of sorrow that are experienced universally.
This project was inspired in part by John Koenig’s Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows, a collection of words from many origins that capture specific moments of sorrow that many have experienced yet cannot name. I selected a few of my favourite words from the collection and captured the experience in semi-abstract illustrations. The languages of shape, colour, texture, and movement were focal in producing these compositions.
The feeling of being stuck on earth.
Ancient Greek âστρον (ástron), star + ἀτροφία (atrophía), a wasting away due to lack of use. Pronounced “as-truh-fee.”
This definition is credited to John Koenig from the Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows
Astrophe n.
A state of confusion when your own internal sense of time doesn’t seem to match that of the calendar—knowing that something just happened though it apparently took place seven years ago, or that you somehow built up a decade of memories in the span of only a year and a half.
Greek εχθές (echthés), yesterday + αἴσθησις (aísthēsis), sensation. Pronounced “ek-thee-zhuh.”
This definition is credited to John Koenig from the Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows
Echthesia n.
A feeling of queasiness while offering someone advice, knowing they might well face a totally different set of constraints and capabilities, any of which might propel them to a wildly different outcome—which makes you wonder if all of your hard-earned wisdom is fundamentally nontransferable.
Middle English rede, advice + pedesis, the random motion of particles. Pronounced “ruh-dee-sis.”
This definition is credited to John Koenig from the Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows
