Of A Flower (thesis)

2019 April

Of A Flower is an interdisciplinary project focused on combining writing and two-dimensional animation to enhance the experience of one another. In Japan, this is known as the media mix strategy, and it is used by giant corporations to great effectiveness. I sought to learn what individual artists can learn from such a strategy and how they could feasibly simplify it to achieve their own personal goals.

Read the project's successes and failures here on the Electronic Theses for Schreyer Honors College website.

The story itself explores the walled gardens humans create for themselves and the limits of our own consciousness. Elisabeth, a young florist, lives in a world full of spirits and city states. Her refusal to leave her father’s lodge in the wilderness drives some of the townspeople to become suspicious of her, increasingly threatening her to stay in town or leave it. She does not, however, choose a side, and continues to live in both worlds. One day, she comes across a starved bunny spirit, and in her charity, takes it into her company. However, the city authorities were quick to discover she was housing this spirit and clamors to drive her out. Ultimately, it is a small minority of townsfolk who answer the authorities’ calls, forces her to abandon her flower shop and live at the outskirts of the town she loved.

Design document and thesis excerpt book for the IDS Undergraduate Thesis exhibition. A similar document is available on the Electronic Thesis for Schreyer Honors College (academic format with less pictures).