This self-directed animated short spawned from a challenge I inked from a friend’s blind scribble. The story follows a magical young boy in a run-down ink town trying to save and revive a giant mechanical fishhead the locals once used as an attraction. The ink symbolizes pollution, while the boy’s mentor, an ink-maker, represents the everyday people who are led by social and financial responsibilities and limitations to continue the cycle of environmental degradation. The boy, however, manages to rebel against this system with his youthful naïveté and creativity to inspire change in his own way: bringing a glimmer of life back into his bleak hometown by reviving the abandoned fish.
This piece reflects on the significance of art/creativity and how it-- even in the efforts of children-- can remind us of our humanity and motivate us towards social and environmental progress.
