Project Title: Type Installation
Year: 2015
Client: Class project
Materials Used: Mirror shards, digital projector, wooden scaffolding, Photoshop
Collaborator(s): Ricky Gomez
This was a project for an illustration class. We were asked to “illustrate” a phrase using 3-dimensional materials. I chose the title of a song by Over the Rhine: “All My Favorite People are Broken.”
My interpretation of this title, and by extension the song, is that while our friends and loved ones hurt us with their imperfections as we hurt them, we need each other to thrive. I wanted to use mirror shards to symbolize pain and imperfection, but also self-reflection.
My biggest inspiration for this piece was a work by Liam O’Callaghan called “Chaos and dreams yet to come” (2005). In it O’Callaghan uses three projectors to reflect the light off of mirror shards and onto a blank wall. I expanded on this technique by arranging the shards into letters. I put together a makeshift scaffold for a projector and shot light at the mirror shards from an angle to create the installation you see on the opposite page. I had a friend help me photograph it before making some tiny edits in Photoshop.
This project was a huge challenge for me and took a lot of time and work, but it’s probably one of the pieces I’m most proud of. As a graphic designer, it was nice to work on something tactile for a change.
The banana was an integral part of the process.
