3 words: identity, image, thoughts

A sentence: I want to reflect how a personal identity is often conflicted with standards set by myself.

A paragraph: Body image and self worth is an ever growing problem throughout our generation with a collective obsessiveness as to the way we look and how we should be presented. This creates a comparison anxiety between ourselves and others, however it’s not all doom and gloom. I want to use this project as a self growth tool to reflect upon how far I’ve come and celebrate my personal small achievements.

How you want your book to look and feel: I want my books to all have a very handmade and personal feel so that the reader can understand my thoughts and emotions.

Format, size and orientation: My three small books will all be different sizes, my main book ‘Erasure’ is just off being A5, then ‘uncomfortable Skin’ and my essay are 0.5 cm smaller than each other. This cascading series offers the reader a structure to follow and show hoe problems are slowly getting smaller.

Binding and cover: The covers will be card with linen spines and all Japanese stab bound.

Titles: ‘Erasure’ is my main book of the trilogy that shows a narrative of contrasting childhood archival imagery vs. current images however all images are disturbed by my current thoughts. ‘Uncomfortable Skin’ is a book filled with close up and detailed self portraits that are raw and exposing of myself. Some have also been hand edited to again show disruption within the structure.

Design and layout: For every image in the book there will be a poem on the opposite page. Each image will be stuck onto parchment paper then stuck into the book, this gives the images a border and a purpose.