1. Visual Storytelling Through Typography
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2. Archiving Black Identity in Contemporary Design
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3. Centering Black Narratives in Visual Culture
NY Mercy University
Creative Direction: Akeem Carnegie
Advisor: Jennifer Roos
The Black Experience In Design
Identity, Expression and Relection
This project responds to The Black Experience in Design, a book amplifying the voices of Black designers across disciplines. Through experimental layout, manipulated imagery, and typographic disruption, each composition reinterprets themes of visibility, community, and legacy. I explored visual language that resists erasure—drawing inspiration from archival aesthetics, protest art, and underground print culture.

Concept 1

The cover reimagines Nurse Ratcheds gaze as a stark, dripping eye symbolizing relentless surveillance and emotional detachment. The bleeding effect speaks to the quiet violence of control, where constant observation becomes both weapon and wound. Set against a deep black backdrop, the image captures the psychological weight imposed on the ward. The distorted typography echoes the theme of suppressed identity, with letters that seem to fade or hide, mirroring the erasure of individuality under institutional authority.

Concept 2

This cover for One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest features a hand-drawn flower, intentionally left partially unfilled to symbolize the lasting trauma of lobotomy, a visual metaphor for patients losing a part of themselves. Yet, the vibrant green filling within the flower gestures toward the unlikely warmth found within the ward community, friendship, and shared resistance. This contrast between absence and color reflects the novels central tension between dehumanization and human connection.

Concept 3

This cover juxtaposes a cold, sterile medical instrument with a field of soft, flowing flowers to highlight the novels central tension between control and humanity. The tool, symbolizing invasive procedures and institutional power, slices through the organic backdrop, interrupting the sense of peace and natural beauty. The blurred floral imagery evokes fleeting freedom and fragility, while the contrast underscores the psychological impact of medicalization and authority. The design reflects the novels struggle between suppression and the enduring presence of life, warmth, and individuality within an oppressive system.
Medical Flower Book Cover

PROCESS

Hand-made Collages