50 Visionary Women Writers

SHE: A VISUAL ODE TO VISIONARY WOMEN

It’s so satisfying to see this project come to fruition, and we're grateful to everyone who made it possible. Thanks to your support and enthusiasm, we tackled our most ambitious creative project to date: 50 illustrations celebrating the voices of 50 female authors.  Each illustration is available as a print, and all are bundled together in a beautiful boxed collection of 100 art postcards (50 writers, 2 of each). 

The most difficult part of the process was narrowing down the range. There were many factors that went in to choosing these writers, the final and most crucial of which came down to artistic instinct: Does this line inspire something visual that’s worth conveying? The writers and quotations we chose did just that, and they run the gamut in their tone - from profound to ironic to amusing to sentimental.

Perhaps, because of the sombre mood in this week's news, I’m going to overstate the meaningfulness of this tiny project in a tiny corner of the internet. Working on this had a profound impact on me, and here it is: In a time of divisiveness and cultural struggle, reading these writers has given me hope that we can find common ground and learn to talk to each other again. After all, simply choosing to write is an act of hope, hope that all of the people outside of our lonely heads are, despite all of our differences, reachable.

In a post-modern, post-social-media, post-digital, post-everything world, this may make me a hopeless romantic. But I still believe in the power of words to heal, to bring people together, to connect us, and hopefully to make us laugh once in awhile - in spite of life’s tragedies and our inevitable human flaws.

The fact that the words of these writers, many of whom wrote centuries ago, can still reach us, and prompt a new conversation that transcends the isolation of place, time and even culture, gives me hope. I’ve done my best to honor their words, to bring something fresh and relevant to my work, and to keep an important conversation going - that of thoughtful, talented human beings.

If you helped make this project a reality, thank you. If you are new to the project or to our work, welcome! Regardless, we hope you enjoy the illustrations, which we've shared below. 

- Evan Robertson