Click on the thumbnails to see how designer Natalie Olsen draws on a 19th-century industrial accident to suggest the story and themes in Janet Munsil’s play That Elusive Spark (Playwrights Canada Press).
Cover to Cover: Janet Munsil’s That Elusive Spark
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- <strong>1.</strong> One scene from <em>That Elusive Spark</em> describes a dysfunctional Psych 101 lecture delivered by Helen Harlow, a neuropsychologist, to a class of clueless freshmen. Her PowerPoint slideshow fails as she fumbles through material on the brain's biological functions, ultimately demonstrating that how brains work is too complicated for brains to figure out. My first idea was to recreate one of her quirky projections against a dark backdrop.
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- <strong>2.</strong> The publisher supplied a photo of Phineas Gage, a construction foreman who, in 1948, miraculously survived an explosion in which an iron rod was driven into his head, destroying much of his left frontal lobe. Gage's extraordinary recovery and subsequent personality change influences Helen's research. The portrait of Gage is compelling by itself, but I needed to find a way to connect his story with Helen's. So I erased part of the image, referencing the brain-shaped dollar-store erasers Helen brings to class as incentives for participation. But the soft fade of the deleted area wasn't dramatic enough.
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- <strong>3.</strong> My next move was to obliterate part of Gage's head by some bolder, more viscerally appealing method. Paint proved to be a more effective medium for messily altering his appearance. But the blood-red colour was too gruesome, not striking the necessary balance between darkness and whimsy.
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- <strong>FINAL.</strong> I scrapped the greyscale image in favour of a graphic black-and-white print. The style of the engraving is appropriate for the 19th-century history that features in the modern-day plot. In white, the paint splatter becomes playful and mysterious, concealing just the right amount of the man's face. Lastly, I extended the paint coverage over the title block to change the shape and perception of the letters.
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From the April 2014 print edition
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