ARTIST STATEMENT

How Having No Words Has Made Me A Better Storyteller

Being notoriously shy, soft-spoken, and mild-mannered, entering my sophomore year of high school felt all too much like I was being thrown into the deep end of a public pool.  
My second year on The Tower Newspaper’s staff brought more than just early-morning “E-Board” meetings and late-night deadlines, but the urgent need for me to assume the role of Graphics Manager as left vacant by my senior mentor the previous June.  Teams of copy editors could debate for hours on end over AP style and oxford commas, page designers bounced design ideas off of one another over lunch-- and yet I was the sole staff member with the power to decide the colors, tone, and overall atmosphere of all twenty-six of this past year’s issues through my graphics.
This deep end felt like Mariana Trench.
However, by communicating with my fellow staff members and forcing myself out of my deeply-ingrained shell that I was able to achieve this feat.  The Tower, being a weekly publication, turned into my own personal challenge, each week demanding more and more from my art as our team demanded more and more from ourselves.  I was responsible for the creation of each week’s editorial cartoon-- occasionally alongside my own editorial-- as well as the multitude of graphics needed for any given number of articles (my workload record for one weekend is ten graphics).  Over time, I also began playing a larger role in assisting page designers, suggesting layout and graphic ideas in order to tie together the ever-dreaded “everything-at-once” page. And--almost always while nursing an iced-coffee-- I attended the weekly 8 a.m. editorial board meetings to propose the week’s cartoon, receive feedback, and make any necessary edits that following evening.
Though I was initially drawn to journalism for its intimacy and story-telling, only now-- as I pass the metaphorical torch to next year’s Graphics Manager-- do I feel as though I can properly articulate why I am drawn to illustrative journalism specifically.  
The core of my work has always been to have purpose.  
How does this graphic supplement this article?  
What does it say?  
What does it add to the story, and is what it’s adding important to the readers?
By asking these questions, I have learned that there is so much more to a graphic than pretty colors and a clever presentation.  Graphics are a language all their own, with meaning to be found in every brush stroke and speech bubble. As an artist, one has the power to extend beyond their natural audience and reach readers with connotation, with choice, with intent-- not words.  Illustrative journalism has exposed me to the challenge of conveying a thought in a picture, and the even greater difficulty of ensuring that the thought translates to others the way it does to you, the artist. Now, when I return to my reporter-roots, I am more critical of my words, for I have faced the 2 a.m. “art block” resulting from the struggle of not having any.
A graphic is a question, a shout, a scream, a whisper.  My pieces are all of these things, absent the bite of words.
My art is silent-- but that does not mean it’s not speaking.