A few months ago, I saw a map of a woman’s heart from the 1800s. The map seemed inadequate to me in what it carried, if still lovely and interesting in its way. It also had me thinking about a project I made a few years ago about mapping body parts in relation to memory. As in: what memories does the body contain, can it hold? The drawings were large and sort of essay-like in their associative sprawl. I am wondering now again about body parts and if they can be mapped in any real way. So I started yesterday with a heart, updated now, specific and moving toward reality. It feels like the beginning of something. [If you click on it, it links to a larger version.]

[I'll stop here. But know that I wanted to continue for a very long time.]

My, how time flies. Hello again, friends. There have been a few new and exciting changes in the last month that I thought I’d share with you here. As you likely know, I’m in New York City now, living in Hell’s Kitchen a few blocks from Central Park. It’s pretty and close to many things and even sometimes quiet. (Although while jogging through the park this week, some lady did call me a mofo. And she didn’t abbreviate, as I have. I kid you not.) Anyway, here are the new things.

Work

This past May, in the thick of thesis frenzy and moving anxieties, I began working with a company called Takeout, which was seeking to rebrand itself and expand more deeply into the U.S. And I’m happy to say we are doing just that. Amidst the growth and new office space in Dumbo, which feels decidedly cool, I’ve come aboard as the Creative Director. Basically, it means I do a little bit of everything, which is probably true of all small companies. In addition to all creative work for Takeout (collateral, website, branding), I work with our clients to help them communicate better. I’m sharing whatever I can in my portfolio, so, if you happen to be curious about this sort of thing, keep an eye out for new work there.

Springtime in Upstate New York

I am super delighted and excited to have received an invitation to Yaddo! Yaddo is an artist community in Saratoga Springs and they offer residencies throughout the year. They have a rich history and some of my all-time favorite writers and artists have stayed there. I’m headed up in April and plan to spend three solid weeks doing one thing: finishing my manuscript. (Speaking of my manuscript, a couple of my essays were published recently in Copper Nickel and Southloop Review, which I suppose is an update too.) Anyway, I’m looking forward to the quiet and the time and the fact that I can do nothing but draw for twenty one days without interruption.

Miscellaneous

And of course, I have like fifty unfinished projects in the mix. There are two that are for real coming together (Drunk Chats and The Telephone Project), as well as a third that is still in infant stages but will I think become an artist book. It’s about living in New York, which is a glowing and fluctuating and sometimes odd experience, particularly after life in Tucson. (Oh! And I am visiting Tucson in a few weeks which shall be most excellent.)

So that’s the news from my corner of Hell’s Kitchen. I’ll let you know when my projects are up and running and able to be participated with.

These are the icons I recently made. Lately, I’ve been all about the icon. Icon as a means of communicating an idea simply; a way of layering the narrative; and a way of peppering design with illustration. There’s beauty in the notion of rapid representation of a concept. I understand that function, that association. Object as symbol, as reality. There’s beauty in the idea of an object carrying meaning (and really, don’t all objects carry meaning?) But aren’t icons so reductive? A few lines meant to represent the entire world (e.g. the globe). Come on. Though maybe they are simply a point of departure for thought. Icon, from sixteenth century Greek, sketch, description, likeness, look like; -graphy, meaning the process of writing, related to the word carve. In a way, icons are the condensation of my goals as a creative human: a combination of writing and image to create meaning. They also contain a map-like quality, which I’m drawn to.

I suppose I’m thinking about icons because I’ve seen so many of them trending in designs. Infographics are filled with them, logos are dotted with these small symbols and brands like Foursquare and Living Social use iconic silhouettes in their apps. Initially, I thought this was a trend toward incorporating illustration; but now, I wonder if it’s more about time and universality. As in: communicate as quickly as possible with as many humans as possible. The icon is perfect for this.

But what, if anything is lost? Complexity, maybe, or depth. So again, I think the icon is critical in layering a story (say, of a brand) but it is not the whole. Icons help our eyes navigate and interpret information as with a map. Designers are like cartographers in this way: helping readers maneuver the [visual] landscape.