Initial Ideas 

Conformity 

- The backdrop of the student protest against the established order  

Contrast 

- Sickness and deformity 

- Communication/ lack of communication 

Isolation 

- Watanabe isolation over phone and Naoko isolation in sanatorium (tree phone box) 

Tragedy 

- Suicide (exhaust pipe, rubber cord, rope - deconstruct) 

- Play with water on this theme 

- Life and death 

- Classic greek tragedy 

Memory 

- Hazy except significant relationships 

Key Themes

Memory

1960’s - Rioting in Japan

Life & Death 

Grief

Sexuality

Student life

Rains a lot

Travelling 

Time 

Letter writing

Sickness and Deformity

Contrast

Injury 

Tragedy

Suicide

Fate

Hunger

Fairness

Passion

References to classical greek tragedy

Responsibilities of life

Loneliness

Isolation

Alienation 

Coming of Age

Communication/Lack of Communication

Nostalgia

Modify an Object

books, documents and systems

Objects from theme

Combine many objects

Deconstruct, break or alter

Subvert

How it’s photographed/documented 

Use tools in an unconventional way

Type

use only type

How could type be used as an image

Can type become a pattern

What’s influencing use of type

Key themes applied to type

Make it physically 

Modify an existing typeface

Diagram

Timelines, graphs

What is the diagram of?

Dialogue, characters

Icons, pictograms 

Ideas 

Trees

Walking

The Beatles

Reads classic genre

Depression

Moonlight

Firefly released from the roof 

Growth 

People outside the sanatorium are more ill than the people inside

Dark forrest where Naoko committed suicide 

Guitar played for Naoko’s funeral

Lyrics from the song Norwegian Wood 

Storm trooper is his roommates nickname

Telephone booth in the final scene

Maps of Tokyo, Kobe, German

Trainline maps - Chuo Line Subway 

Flying bird

Fire/Burning of letters

Radios

Objects used to commit suicide : a rubber hose, poison, exhaust pipe

Ami Hostel

The Rikugien Gardens

Pool Tables

Waseda University

Soba restaurant 

Streetcars / Maps of streetcars 

Mental Hospital 

Split in two

Mirroring each other

Re-reading The Great Gatsby 

Matchbox 

Airplane 747 at the start of the first chapter

Rope & Ramen

Prompts

trees inside a phone booth

Bird inside the jar the firefly was in

Firefly in jar

Soba restaurant’s menu

Rubber hose as noodles in a bowl

Talk into exhaust pipe instead of phone in phone booth

Noodles in matchbox
Weather app - distort/collage/turn into grid for typeface