Illustration: 'Journey to No Imagination'

Journey into the Imagination

Our task was to create an illustrative piece of work with this title 'Journey into the Imagination'. I began by brain storming some ideas, and immediately thought of transport when I read the word 'journey', I also connected the word 'imagination' with the mind. This gave me the idea of drawing a brain, with the title across the top and maybe replacing the lines of the brain with roads, to create the appearance of a journey. I then went on to think about children's imaginations, and how this links with children's nightmares and frightening 'monsters in the closet'. I then thought I could draw a figure in a doorway, to give a scary appearance and to reflect this idea of nightmares and how our biggest fears are in our own imagination. I then looked at a 'never ending corridor' and how this reflects how our imaginations are so wide they never end, and this also connects back to the nightmare idea, and if the corridor appeared very frightening. Over the top of the corridor could be typography with the title, writing in text that reflected the scary appearance of the never ending corridor. This made me think about sleep paralysis and hypnogogic hallucinations, which I, myself suffer from. I thought it could be interesting to draw something that showed scary figures and how this is just our imagination although we are unable to do anything about it, this shows the power of our mind and our imagination. This was one of my main ideas.

Another idea I thought of began at me thinking of a city where 'imagination is banned', and I would depict a dull city scene with 'normal people' painted in grey to represent their lack of creativity. I then thought of a factory scene, where the industry is destroying the colour in the sky, this gives the idea of depression. I then thought I could draw a queue of people outside the factory, all increasing in age; at the back of the queue, painted in colour would be the babies and children, who still have a large imagination and are very creative, whereas the front of the queue would be the adults, who are forced to become dull and less creative as this is considered more 'normal'. I think it is interesting that it is more normal to see a person walking down the street hysterically crying rather than laughing or singing. Someone who is constantly smiling or laughing would be considered 'mental' or 'crazy', I think this is a sad concept. Whereas it is normal to see a baby or a child laughing or smiling, and they are able to freely be creative. This was my second main idea.

My third main idea involved the effect of music on people, this was the direct opposite to the previous idea. I thought I could portray a depressed person, painted in grey, and they plug in their music and the colours seem to grow and flow through the headphones, making the person happy and colourful. Although I rejected this idea as I thought it would be too difficult to show this much motion is a still picture. I also wanted my idea to become almost propaganda for the depressing modern day life.

Hallucinations, Nightmares and Sleep Paralysis 

I was choosing between the two ideas of nightmares and 'journey to no imagination'. I explored the nightmares idea and drew sections of the college with one figure in to show the idea of feeling alone, and scared. I then drew in another scary looking figure to show the person feeling frightened. I also drew the hand from a dementor (from harry potter) as this is very scary. I then experimented using different scary typography, I used the font from American Horror Story and Series of Unfortunate Events, to reflect the atmosphere of the picture. These sketches are pictured below.

Journey to No Imagination

I then explored the factory idea and looked at Quentin Blake's work, as I wanted the people queueing to go into the factory to look interesting (pictured below). I thought his work would work well in the picture if I painted the young children in red and yellow and happy, creative colours, and as the queue went on, and got older, I would paint the people in more muted colours and eventually in grey to convey this loss of creativity.

I then looked at the idea of propaganda, for this idea, as I wanted it to make a statement, conveying the loss of imagination, and the rejection of creative and happy people. I thought about putting a mental asylum in one corner, and making it bright colours to show that anyone still happy as an adult would be considered 'mental'. Below are some images of propaganda I found interesting, that go against the government or encourage people to do things. They also show that we are almost trapped in this world, and I want to convey a similar powerful message in my work.

The End Result

I am happy with my end result as I think it conveys the powerful message I wanted it to, and I feel I have captured the engulfing appearance of the smoke, taking over the colourful area, representing imagination. Below is my final result. I think it appears quite chaotic to convey the chaos of modern life, and it also appears quite depressing. On the bottom right, you are able to see the queue of people, walking into the factory labelled 'normality'. I felt that this task was successful as I am happy with my end result, and I feel it conveys the message I wanted it to. I enjoyed researching the illustration artists and other artists such as Dali and Max Ernst to explore the ideas they convey about the dream state and their own ideas of what we see in our dreams.