Noe Paparella

For my thesis, I created a brand called 22/15, which involves a series of drawings that show bizarre, monster-like characters. The characters are based on the tenants that live in my building at 22 West 15th Street. By creating a variety of different characters, I was able to cover a range of personalities, stereotypes, sexual preferences and physical traits. I then catalogued the characters into a book, with vectorized reproductions of the illustrations as well as descriptions (name, facts) indexed for audiences to easily review each character. The primary purpose of using real individuals as the basis for these characters was not only to showcase people in funny and humiliating situations, but to make them relatable  to viewers. Besides being decorative and entertaining, these drawings are a metaphor for the theme of fiction vs. nonfiction: how much remains true and how much do we recreate and readapt? In addition, these characters create a kind of fictional brand. Each illustration was applied to a marketable object related to the character’s identity or story. The application of my drawings onto different surfaces allowed me to use a range of different materials as well as develop a strong visual identity for this fictional brand. By applying the illustrations to a range of different yet somehow cohesive objects, I show the potential for their marketability of this range of characters as products within a real brand. www.noepaparella.com .