What??? We can illustrate ANYTHING??? As one of the most least-decisive people I know, this is one of my least favorite words. I want to do a hundred things and I cannot decide on one of them. So what’s a girl (with every ambition and no time to kill) to do?? Well if I know me, it’s come up with a new super-ambitious project idea, of course!
The idea here was to create a kind of “field guide” for SNC. I wanted to include little spot illustrations of all the lovely little things I most adore about this college. There were so many things to choose from! Our lone (but MARVELOUS and surely under-appreciated) mural, our zippy but adorable campus shuttle, the campus dog, the white squirrel, all the other squirrels, the statues, professors, potato bowls, studios…..I could literally go on and on. There was so much that I wanted to do. Problem was, I wanted to do them all well. Too well.
The vision was to create a campus map using the object illustrations. I figured it would look nice printed on a bandana, a water bottle, inside a campus directory. But after hours spent in Adobe Illustrator I became unbelievably frustrated with how poorly everything seemed to be working. It all took many times longer than I thought to create each illustration, and I found myself becoming more and more discouraged as I tried several different formats with no luck at all.
A map?? The locations are too spread out to look any good. And what to do about that mural?? Next.
A bingo board Maybe? No, the items I made are too variant in size and shape. This format does not allow the for you to see the details of the illustrations. Next.
Postcard? (But how? Are my images even relevant to other students?) Next.
A scavenger hunt?? (But, why???)
UGH. It felt like every solution I came up with was another dead end.
Maybe just to finish a project, maybe just to settle my mind, I simply threw together a sticker sheet. Here it is, begrudgingly.
Overall this project was wildly frustrating. I did have big dreams for this project, and I fully intend to return to it as soon as I can. I think this could be really great if I give it a few more weeks. Maybe it could be a nice addition as-is to the art vending machine next semester. I know I can do better than this, and I know I will. For now though, this is my “good enough”, and that’s enough for me.
