Tasting Digital Color
Dozens of people were tangled in an infinitely complicated jungle gym, all underwater. I watched them, but they did nothing. They didn’t try to escape. They didn’t try to crawl out of the maze. They just sat there. Meanwhile, I was perched atop a very high cylinder. I had an option. I could stay there, or walk along a narrow path leading to the white city. A friend of mine had already made that decision. He had walked along the floating square steps, and arrived at another cylinder. I looked down to the sea floor. Sharp waves lay right on top of the jungle gym. Their contours traveled all the way to two tall buildings. I stood, puzzled for a minute. They buildings felt as if they were in another dimension. Wait! One of the trapped fellow had managed to catch a rope around the building! Maybe he was going to set himself free. Then a split second later, one of those sharp waves I was telling you about decided to transform itself into a seamonster! He skyrocketed out of the ocean, and was aimed straight for the rope. It was if he was about to cut it, leaving that man stranded again. I was of course worried, so I waved my arms up and down, hoping to catch the monster’s attention. To my surprise, it worked, and the monster changed its course. I now had a giant, black, shady straight for me on my narrow cylinder. I had no where to go. I heard my friend scream to me, telling me to take the steps he had taken. But I couldn’t. I didn’t know why, I just couldn’t.
“Change the channel, man” he said. “I’m sick of these weird visual transitions.” “You don’t like That 70’s Show?” “Not these experimental and over saturated, not to mention poorly green screened transitions.” “I thought you would like that part the most. You’re always dizzy, and look upside down.” “Just change the channel. You’re not making sense. What’s your problem.” “My problem is that...” he was cut off by the other man’s scream. They were no longer sitting on beige couch watching That 70’s Show. Everything vanished around them. First the floor, then one by one the furniture began to dissappear. In a matter of seconds all that remained was the men themselves, in an infinite black void. After the screaming stopped, there was silence. One of the men tried to speak, but no sound came out of his mouth. A loud switching/clicking sound jolted both the men. They were no longer floating in empty black space. Instead the colorful swirls from the transitions of That 70’ Show filled the back and foregrounds. It began to twist and both the men began shrinking.
Moral Culpability vs Freewill
The little green people all stood there, motionless, as if they were waiting for an answer. Their eyes started straight at him, wanting that answer. Some passed the time with food. Small golden particles grasped by the hands of an emotionless character. They didn’t know what to think, so they
ate. The person targeted by all these green creatures wore a white shirt, red tie, and belt straps. His face was indescribable; hence the green peoples silence. If they knew what he was, they would express it. But they didn’t. They didn’t know what to think.
Meanwhile, the turned dark, and thick blue rain clouds began to cry. The water landed on the middleman, and suddenly, the green people could describe him. The water had made him wet. Once they though this- while eating their golden popcorn- they also realized that they could have
described him as dry before. Why had they forgotten this? The shadows from the clouds made his face look dark, why was he not light before? In a matter of seconds the green people had a complete description of the man. They though his pink mustache was too curly, his beard too fluffy, and hi shoul-
ders too large. They could finally think.
e h t
e r a s f t o h s g u w s o o g h d T ha elin s fe r u o
The Beautiful vs the sublime
Yuri was a very colorful turtle. His shell consisted of four colors: Red, Pink, Blue, and Black. He was very proud of his shell, and all his friends admired him. His life was good, and he was happy. One day, Yuri’s colorful scales began to fall off. At first, it was just a blue scale. Then the other colors began to break off as well. In just a matter of days, Yuri’s behind no
longer had any color. He would go days without poking his head out of his shell. He was completely embarrassed. Yuri’s friends came to see him one day. They begged and begged for him to show his face, and let the sun shine on him. He refused. His best friend was able to convince him to at least speak and perhaps explain himself to the group.
“I don’t want you to see my face,” he told them from inside his shell. “Why not?” his best friend replied. “I’ve lost all my beautiful scales!” he cried out. “I no longer have any color. I’m just plain black!” His friends heard him begin to weep from inside his shell. “Turtles aren’t even really
supposed to have scales,” said a friend. “None of us have any colors like you did.”
us a u T do nge ally he ct , r fi d or ed lle oc s ex , an d th tors cl d e lo ai pu vi o m r ew ke ed pl d . e c fin in It o de to 's ve r be re w the au d as m tif ev go icr ul ery ne os , s th . co ai in In p d g st e. an . e T ot Th ad, he he is v n r. is ibr eu W am an tra ou a t l ld zin sha gra yo g, d y u on es tha lik e of t e of or to th se e e it?
The snake that cannot shed it's skin perishes
I change myself i change the world
The view from the sky left the human speechless. He looked at the altimeter in front of him. 137K it read. One hundred and thirty-seven thousand feet from the orange and pink floor of the alien planet. His intuition told him something was horribly wrong. The planet didn’t appear round to him. At his current altitude he could surely see the curvature of the planet, but no, he couldn’t even make out the slightest curve. What will they think of me? he thought. He had discovered a planet that wasn’t round. It wasn’t blue, green, or even the brown that covered his home planet: Earth. The majority of this alien planet was orange and yellow. He could just make out small ranges on the surface, and they all appeared to be a pinkish orange color. There were seas of bright pink, and oceans of red and tan. It was like nothing he’d ever seen. He wondered if his discovery would change the world, and maybe people would remember his name.
Dear anonymous,
You wrote to me with one obvious question: What’s the difference between solitude and isolation? Well I have now had plenty of time to both analyze and answer your question. My answer is “One is lighter than the other.”
I mostly responded to the prompts by writing a small, confusing, and dark narrative. For the most part there was only one vital character per story, and the story always involved him trying to deal with the aftermath of a tremendous problem. My favorite prompt was the one about how feelings are the shadows of our thoughts, mainly because it provoked a really interesting quick write. I enjoyed using the watercolors the most, because I feel I was the most successful with the color palette in that medium. I didn’t take too many risks. I explored strange styles of art, like my watercolor with futuristic lines and such, but I don’t consider that a “risk”. In my writing, the biggest risk I took, if you can call it a risk, was writing in the form of letter. I was anything but consistent during these projects. Some days my work looked really good, and I felt comfortable with the theme. As soon as a new prompt came up though, my work would drastically change. I feel that several of my pieces are just plain horrible, while some are really artistic and have strong qualities to them. Luc Delamare
10 Themes
Melancholy Speed past present future fake disorder time taste