Output details

Soonchild (text: Russell Hoban)

In this project, the artist was interested to explore to what extent Illustrations could be used to alter the pace and sense of progression in a longer text for older readers. In a series of book dummies he explored how the ratio of text to image could be manipulated to produce different emphases. Deacon also explored, along with the book's designer, how the physical form of the book could be manipulated, including the page colour and paper stock, to suggest transitions in mood or phases of the story. Together, the two looked at the different ways that an illustration could integrate with a page of text, without impeding the legibility of the words or confusing the sequence in which they should be read. They were able to manipulate these discoveries in the published book to help to create the impression of a narrative which followed a journey, and this journey not only moved through several distinct visual phases but also gradually increased in complexity and immersion as it moved towards its conclusion.