Hello everyone,
I would like to invite you all to participate in a new and hopefully ongoing art project that I am in the process of creating for my DIVA 202 (Digital and Interactive Arts) course at the Emily Carr University of Art & Design here in Vancouver, B.C. The scope of the project will deal with your personal storylines revolving around significant or memorable journeys in your respective lives.
The tangible aspect of these storylines will be plotted on http://maps.google.com/ and then the corresponding graphical lines that are created by the maps will then be used to connect person to person in the final cumulative outcome of the piece which will then be presented to the public in either a digital or printed format (still to be determined).
Instructions:
1. Think of a particular memorable event in your life when you had to purposely go from point A to point B in order to complete, achieve or otherwise attend this event (ie: when you had to walk from your childhood home to your very first day at school, moving into your first apartment, going to the office where you got your big break job interview, the location of your first kiss…)
2. Go to http://maps.google.com/ and click on “Get Directions” in the top left corner of the screen.
3. Type in your initial starting location in the “A” column – try to be as specific as possible (ie: full street address) – but if you are uncomfortable providing exact locations, just do your best to ensure the map can complete the correct plotting (ie: just the city, or a particular waypoint on your journey)
4. Type in your final destination in the “B” column.
5. Click on the “Get Directions” button to the bottom right of the A and B columns.
6. You will then see a point-to-point display of the directions listed in the left corner of your screen along with a full road map showing the graphical representation of your journey as well.
7. Write down a few words, a sentence, a paragraph – whatever you feel comfortable with letting others know about the significance of this journey – and please send it in an email along with your original starting and final destination locations so I can go ahead and plot everyones’ maps and create the piece as a whole.
8. Smile, laugh, cry, or otherwise personally reflect back on this memory and think back to that moment and what it was like to experience it 🙂
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
As an example of this process, I am providing you with a piece that I created last year for my Design One course at Emily Carr, which I am basing this new project off of. I titled the piece, “Life is a Highway” and within it, I wrote down the times that I have moved over the course of my life. I then took the plotted lines, created graphical representations of each and pieced them together into the final outcome:
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
Life is a Highway:
I am going to tell my life story by showcasing the times I have moved within my lifetime. I was born into this world on June 16th, 1975 in the town of Flin Flon, Manitoba. I lived there for the first 3 years of my life, until my father, a geologist by trade, was promoted and transferred to work at his company’s Vancouver headquarters. So, we packed all of our things and out we went down the road to get onto the highway and begin our journey west. We settled into our new home in the small town of Tsawwassen, which is about an hour away from Vancouver by car.
Through the rest of my childhood, teen years and into adulthood, I lived in the family house until 2002, when I jumped back on the highway and moved to downtown Vancouver with my girlfriend Cindy. That remained my base of operations until September, 2005, when Cindy and I broke up. Back to the family homestead I went, to lick my wounds and heal my wounded heart.
There I stayed for just over a year, sulking in my depression, until I decided that a change was needed and I moved into a new two-bedroom condo with my friend Spencer up to Burnaby mountain, next to Simon Fraser University. The irony of me living here is that after being single for so long, not a day had gone by without me thinking of Cindy, so I made the decision to contact her again.
And so I saw her for the first time in over a year and a half at the Starbucks in Brentwood Mall in Burnaby. All of the feelings that I kept in check for so long came back with a vengeance and we started dating again. I wonder what the future has in store for the both of us and what future travels will we be making down this highway called life?
Initial waypoints plotted on google maps:

Final Outcome printed and displayed:

— Artist Note —
I am no longer in a relationship with Cindy but am still happy with the final outcome of this piece – you may also be interested to know that there is a new special someone in my life who I am very close to, otherwise known as my “Snuggle Bear” 🙂
As always please feel free to check out my daily blog as well to find out more about the daily comings and goings of a digital artist:
https://flashaddict.wordpress.com/
Thank you to everyone for reading over my request and for your support and participation in this project!
Cheers,
John (aka FlashAddict)