Callings Book Cover—2017
CLIENT—
First-Year Reading Experience, University of South Carolina
MY ROLE—
Design, Illustration
MORE INFO—
Every year at the University of South Carolina, the university holds an event for incoming freshman called the First-Year Reading Experience where, as a group, the class comes together to discuss the novel chosen for that year. The purpose of this event is to provide the entire freshman class with a common academic experience. Typically, the novels chosen are relative to the time freshman are at in their lives. For the 2017 year, the novel chosen was Callings by Dave Isay. This novel was about how different people found their callings in life. My illustration focuses on the feeling one gets when they find that one thing they want to do for the rest of their life. The hot air balloon symbolizes the uplifting feeling a person gets when they find the one thing that lights a fire within them. The dark, ominous scenery represents that uneasy, unsure feeling one has when they do not know what they want to do in life or what direction they are headed. The hot air balloon breaking the plane gives the illustration more motion and is symbolic of moving away from that unsettling time in life and into the free and clear of knowing what their calling in life is. The illustration also relates to me on a personal level because our first project in Design I is a hand-cut, craft paper assignment. That project started me down the path of my passion and calling as a designer which is why the illustration style is like cut paper.