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Jsmall_03_11_Sequential art

TEXT To unravel the form's capacities, let's begin with Scott McCloud's consideration of the sequential as its defining aspect: 'Juxtaposed pictorial and other images in deliberate sequence'. DESCRIPTION A winding succession of images resembles a path on a game board, with a different image on each space. An arrow points along the path from a circle labeled "start." In the images, a person walks through snow. They tilt their face upward and raise their hands as snow falls around them. A snowflake hangs on a black background. A house stands under a dark sky. TEXT The passage of time is written in space. DESCRIPTION Further down the path, a sun hangs in a partly cloudy sky. The clouds disperse. The sun sets on Stonehenge, gleaming through one of the openings. Shadows stretch out across the ground from the stones. TEXT In connecting the dots. DESCRIPTION Continuing down the path, conical trees stand silhouetted against a dark sky. A man and his dog gaze up into the darkness. Lines form between stars, creating the constellation Orion, resembling a muscular figure holding a club aloft as he grips a large creature's neck. TEXT Traversing the gaps between fragments and stitching them together - a meaningful whole emerges. DESCRIPTION Four circles form the border of the caption, standing at the corners with wedge-shaped notches cut out of them to create the impression of an invisible box, a gestalt figure. On the path, icicles cling to bare branches. They melt and drip away. Rain falls. Plants sprout from the earth and bloom into small flowers. A bird holds a worm in its beak. Leaves emerge from buds on a tree branch. A snake coils its body. A caterpillar rests on a leaf. A person jumps off a dock toward a ball thrown upward by others in the water. Text formed by the resulting uprush of water reads, "splash." Blooming flowers cluster together. A butterfly chrysalis hands from a thin branch. A bee hovers over a flower. A cricket stands in the grass. A butterfly emerges from the chrysalis. Ants swarm over a dead cricket. Butterflies float through the air. Geese fly in a V formation. A pumpkin rests on the ground. Leaves break away from a tree branch and fall. The panels break away from the game board. The silhouette of a woman, set apart from the game path, blows dust toward a falling leaf, which transforms into a human figure. The panels come apart. The figure stretches and raises its arms. It runs ahead and leaps, then sprouts a pair of wings, breaking free of the panels. TEXT It's a participatory dance, an act of the imagination, in which the reader animates and transforms the static into the kinetic… and brings it to life.
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