An exercise creating a series of improbable single-image ‘stories,’ each comprising of a short word phrase and an unrelated image. The task was two-fold: (1) Collect several phrases from various sources and choose the seven most promising, and (2) sketch visual representations of seven themes/feelings—sad, boring, cute, frightening, erotic, stressful or frustrating, fantastic or magical.

For my approach, I collected eight phrases all from novels I’ve read, and wrote each on individual index cards. Then I separately created eight compositions to visually represent the assigned themes, also on index cards. (I went with an extra one for good measure, and because it was just too much fun to play with.)

Each image was laid out randomly, and then each phrase was paired with an image, again randomly. Considering the unexpected combinations of each, I was able to shuffle the phrases around to see how they fit with different images, before settling on the combinations shown here.

The results are a mix of literal and existential narratives, all unexpected and strangely more personal than anticipated.

Completed for the online course ‘Drawn from Life: Illustrating the Personal Narrative’ through the School of the Art Institute in Chicago, Summer 2024.