finn/wake—A selection of UM Graduate Thesis Projects. Situated at the unique confluence of art, design, and literary theory, these studio research investigations created the opportunity to work within the spaces between disciplines.

Picking up on cues from deconstructionist turns (McCoy, Derrida, Lupton, Miller) I examined arcane corners of James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake via literary theory (Strauss, Barthes, Perloff, Wittgenstein, Kosuth, Rabaté). My studio practice afforded me the opportunity to ask methodological and ontological questions about the history of graphic design and examined theories to afford it the autonomous status of “discipline.”

The result of these explorations challenged my understanding of dialectical relations of communication: production/consumption, work/play, form/function. Reading an unreadable (or difficult) text created opportunities to ask questions about how reading changes, how language evolves, how technology influences, and what codes we employ to deliberately obscure our language.

Resulting projects included: 100 foot long giclée screen print banners, performative group readings of Finnegan’s Wake, 3D typographic installations, a board game and companion app, and a typographic sigla font based on James Joyce’s short hand.