ICON12

With recent technological advancements, it is becoming increasingly important to train illustrators who are thinkers first and foremost. Worldbuilding, the process of creating both the visual language and imagined inner-workings of an environment, encourages students to create constraints based on an internal logic, and practice working within them. Worldbuilding further adds authorship to the design process, and opens dialogues on ecology, culture, history, and representation while giving students a channel in which to find and develop their visual voice. In this presentation, I will outline a working model for integrating worldbuilding into illustration curriculum. Illustration: World and Voice, an undergraduate course I have taught for the past two years, centers around a comprehensive, semester-long project exploring a simple prompt: create a travel journal for a world that doesn’t exist.