2023
A 10 page wordless comic that follows a children’s glove that gets abandoned by its owner and placed on a fence, awaiting their return. The comic deals with themes of breakup, loss and grief and is completely wordless, the only forms of communication are signed in British Sign Language and are not translated for the reader. The glove is united with a different child who only has one glove and they live happily ever after.
A copy of this comic was purchased by the University of Dundee as part of their Museum Collection.
The comic is on display in A Decade of Design exhibition in the Lamb Gallery, Dundee from May-August 2024.
My aim with this comic was to tackle themes of breakup and loss and to have the glove go through the stages of grief without using any text. One way I had the glove and the characters communicate was by using British Sign Language (BSL) throughout the comic.
This is best showcased in a sequence which shows the glove communicating through BSL, whilst also deteriorating physically to showcase time passing. I deliberately decided not to include captions for these signs as I hope the glove’s panic and then sadness are clear through the visuals without needing to know exactly what is being said. This also adds a layer of depth for those who are familiar with BSL, and for those who are not, I hope it becomes even more interactive. For example, if they wanted to know what was being signed they would try to look it up and encourage them to learn themselves. The translation for this page is (hopefully) as follows, “surprise, shock, confused, no, please, sorry, angry, hate, nervous, sad, worse, depressed, terrible, lonely, need love.” This, quite crudely, follows what are said to be the seven stages of grief. It may seem quick, happening over one page but I feel the reader would lose interest if spread over more pages with less visual variation. Whilst not in complete sentences, it covers the
basics and one has to remember, this is an inanimate object saying these things, give it some credit.
The BSL sign for love is two hands placed on the chest, which worked out very well for me as that was coincidentally the pose I had the character in on the final page anyway. A nice bonus.
When that same child is hit by a snowball towards the end, they are seen with only one glove and I drew their hand in a position that could have multiple interpretations. For those not familiar with BSL, it could simply be shivering due to the cold, or possibly shaking with anger or fear from the snowball throw. The sign for cold in BSL is also a fist shaking in that position, and if not shaking, can mean hate as well. I hope this comic can have different interpretations, depending on who is reading it, which is one of the joys of wordless comics.
I chose not to include the human characters’ faces to make sure the focus of the story remains on the glove but in the final panel I wanted to show the child smiling to clearly show their joy in finding love (a glove) too.
The centre spread (see above) of the comic actively invites reader interaction as the page needs to be rotated 90 degrees to properly view the next panel and then another 90 degrees for the next, and so on. I feel this spread works as an interesting centrepiece for the comic, as well as adding to the narrative. The cyclical nature of the season changes has a repetitive, endless feeling and by having it winter on the pages before and after implies a page could be turned as many times as the reader wishes and it's up to them how much time may or may not have passed whilst the glove remains on the fence.
I hope it is clear that the page should be rotated and I have included visual elements that help to lead the eye from one panel to the next. In the top right corner of each panel is a coloured circle representing the sun/moon, this rough shape is continued over the panel border in the same colour, now representing a patch of grass or a pile of leaves or snow. I have also included a path on the ground which leads the eye clockwise across a panel, leading directly into the treeline in the horizon of the next (and previous!) panel.
