Kristin Becker's DTC Classes at WSU

1. Lynda Barry seems to be full of bold images, dark/odd words, and an overwhelmingly fascinating mind. I enjoy reading her book if not for the sole purpose of thinking about the words she writes and then asking myself the same questions. The image I chose is one of my favorites on page 15 of the book. It was hard for me at first to decide on a part of the page I wanted to capture. A quote I took out said, “And year by year memory scrubs a prison” (15). I did love the wording but the image was not much to go off of. Instead, I chose the anatomy system she uses frequently throughout the book. Honestly, I think Barry is trying to say that childhood is messy (whether creatively speaking or with home life/ school life). I say this because not all that she writes makes sense but at the same time life, childhood, and art/images don’t always make sense. The reason I think she comes from a darker past is the coloring in the image (Dark reds, yellows, images of plant life). The body is outlined in flames starting at the head and ending with a fish that reminds me of something stinky and rotten. I found the photo had more to just the anatomy. There is a face in the liver and stomach and green venus flytrap like plants where the brain and productive organs would be. The words on the sides make no sense but the checks on the sides say otherwise.
2. I think she wrote it beginning with lighter childhood memories to darker thoughts and odd insightful questions. She might have also written the book in away mirroring her life growing up. The media she used is clippings from books and newspaper as well as from medical books. This relates to her message that art and life is messy and the answer is not always given or known.The same way taking apart a page of writing and gluing it to another book gives it a different meaning or might also give words that would be forgotten in a book seem more drawn out. Words such as, “the eggs of a certain blue hen,””the coal age” and “a piece of paper pours from volcanoes” are some of the lines I was drawn to and would use.

Crop Image from pg. 14 of Lynda Barry

• (1) Barry says that an image is alive in the same way that our memory and experiences are alive and that it consists of both memory and imagination. So to me it seems like she is trying to focus on the fact that children’s minds are more alive and at play than an adults mind seems to be, I used page 14 because she specifically references these things.

• (2)To create the book I think Lynda used multiple forms of media including cut out images and drawings/paintings and pieces of fabric that I think she then scanned and arranged them using either photoshop or illustrator. I saw what seemed like pieces of fabric. Magazine images and writing that looked like cut outs. She also used a lot of color and abstract art forms as well which made it more playful.

1. 

   What It Is? Lynda Barry Crop

   Lynda Barry seems to be saying that images are found both outside and inside of you and that you don’t ever completely understand these images. Referring to the image in the top left that I selected it shows how your eye sees what is outside of you and helps to store the images inside of you. Also, she is trying to convey the message of let kids be kids and don’t take away the wonder of being creative by giving them a hard time. Barry added the quote “Don’t be to hard on the kids,” because she’s trying to explain what she went through as a child and what can happen when you are too hard on a child for being creative. She also explains how every child has creativity until an event happens that makes them stop believing they are creative. She uses the word memory to reflect that everyone has a memory and somethings are hard to forget.

2. I believe that Barry used a scrapbook technique to make up this book and then scanned the pages on her computer and edited with photoshop. For the images that I chose from a page in the book you can see the overlapping of paper. She has cut out different quotes and used different types of fonts to create a diverse feel. The media she uses to create the book are ink or in some places looks like sharpie, also she uses pen and clipped pieces of typed words. This relates to her message because creativity can be many different things, you can’t pinpoint art down to good and bad it’s more diverse just like the images I selected.

Screenshot Taken From Book

I think this book is very cynical and nature and even the look of it is really jarring and rough but I feel like it’s supposed to be that way. I chose this selection because I think that Barry is trying to say that lonely people have to end up being more creative. When you are alone you have to come up with more ways to keep your brain distracted, being alone with your thoughts can drive you into madness. Only a lonely person would come up with the quote “I believe a kid who is playing is not alone”. I think that this character is for the most part shown alone I find the people who think most deeply about these topics like life and consciousness anyway are often ones we might consider loners.
I personally think that this is composed of mostly traditional media, there are effects in the pages and the compositions like the bleeding of paints and colors that are more of a pain in the ass to do digitally as opposed to using real paper and doing it yourself. Just like writing on real paper is way easier than making the paper effect in Photoshop. Also although Photoshop has brushes which emulate the look of a sharpie or similar marker, it still feels stiff even when using a Wacom tablet. There are parts of the girl’s shorts on page 51 that look inconsistent to where only a real marker would have been able to make those marks without an absurd amount of work for the same result.