Missing 411 Cover Art Book Editorial

The project brief was to apply the documentary Missing 411 Hunted into a visual ensemble for an editorial space. Using significant iconography the landscape in the piece mirrors the same energy and tone as the environments mentioned in the film. The piece is meant to signify chaos and disarray where your eye has little resting room similar to how the moving parts in a case add further complexity and mystery to a set of events than not. The biggest forms in the piece are meant to consume and entrap, to see the inherent ending where most 411 cases end by rock clusters and/or water. When people disappear under strange and unforeseeable circumstances the world turns to free fall with elements surrounding such scenarios becoming identifiers and markers. A pair of misplaced hiking boots, a red but bloodless sweater, or a canteen placed on top of a rock carry more weight & meaning than if these objects were regarded as is.

Conditions that repeat themselves over and over again much like the 411 phenomena are not only symbolized by the ribboned planets but through the repetition of shape within close proximities. This is exemplified through the clouds, flags, doors, rocks surveying the mountain, the patterned trifold sitting left, and the accompanied boulders and trees in the artwork. The bear represents the American forests, where the documentary’s research is based with an ode to a guardian or protector highlighted in the film. Bears symbolize adversity, the species themselves able to survive challenging seasons which echoes the rampant weather conditions that occur within the scope of these cases. This weather phenomenon is visualized by the columns of rain and snow towards the center of the frame paired with clouds that interact with both.