atypical

Who knew that cutting into a book would be so ridiculously hard. It's just paper...but mass quantities.

I'm excited about the end result of my book. It was an interesting process to go through, and it was neat to see what everybody else came up with.

The first segment of the book is comprised of the Contents label at the top followed by a collage of psychotherapists found about halfway though the book. Because the book is the history of psychotherapy and therapists, I thought it was important to highlight the actual people rather than going entirely metaphorical for the first third.

The second third of the book consisted of woven strips that gradually (in groups of 3 to represent the Id, the Ego, and the Superego) were removed. The first woven section represents the mind, and every grouping after is representative of psychotherapists helping the individual unravel his inner thoughts.

When flipped, the last page of weaving reveals a small slit, the third and final section. At this point, the psychotherapist has reached the edge of the subconscious. After doing some basic research and talking to a couple of psych majors, I found the subconscious to be infinitely expansive. So:

The back of the book is cut to allow the subconscious to continue out of the book and expand forever.

I enjoyed this project a lot; it gave us the chance to reinterpret something new. By giving us a solid and asking us to carve away at it, we solved the problem in a way that was atypical to the usual. Often times, we find we are given a blank paper or a sheet of cardboard and told to construct something out of nothing. However, we already had something, and we had to deconstruct it to something more. Very clever.
-a