Invisible Cities

Jerry Uelsmann, Tree House, 1982

Background
The book, "Invisible Cities" by Italo Calvino,  explores the concept of imagination and varying perspectives. The explorer Marco Polo describes cities of his travels to the Chinese Emporer Kublai Khan. Because the two speak different languages, Marco Polo uses objects from the cities to describes them. Kublai Khan wanted to know about his expanding empire, looking to Marco Polo and traveling merchants to describe it. 

Assignment
Your assignment is to read an excerpt from the book about a particular city. You must then photograph different objects to merge together to create an image from the city. You will manipulate the images either in the darkroom or in Photoshop. Note that if you choose the darkroom, your options will be slightly limited. Yours might be rather more of an altered negative.

Objectives

• Study the history of photo manipulation  and apply that to darkroom or photoshop techniques.
• Read and analyze a portion of text from "Invisible Cities" by Italo Calvino and manipulate imagery to depict the text.
• Utilize proper techniques in order to mount the image and text in a professional manner.

Steps FOR DARKROOM

• Sketch out your idea on a piece of paper
• Photography 1 roll of film with items from the city that you choose
• Print 3 images (1 - 8x10 and 2 5x7s)
• Mount your 8x10 on a piece of black paper with the printout of the text next to it

Steps FOR PHOTOSHOP

• Sketch out your idea on a piece of paper
• Photography at least 25 images for the piece. You may use images that you have taken before (ie on a vacation, in your backyard, on the moon, etc).
• Print 1 images 
• Mount your 8x10 on a piece of black paper with the printout of the city next to it

Grading Criteria

• Creativity
• Innovative Design
• Technical Quality
• Craftsmanship

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