In collaboration with the literature teacher Claudia Paternoster in a 7th Grade class, we created the covers of horror short stories written by the students. A large module of lessons was dedicated to the work of writing: at the end each student wrote their own story. During the art lessons we analyzed the graphic features of books, movie posters and in general of the Horror genre. We observed the prevalence of dark and cold colors, the usa of contrasting lights and shadows and the use of backlight to give a sense of restlessness and mystery to the images.
After these observations, each student prepared a sketch of their own cover on an A4 sheet. In this sketch they identified the graphic spaces of the image, including the title and author of the story. Starting from the sketch we used mixed techniques and collage to create the image of our cover.
Once the image was finished, we photographed and processed it on the computer, choosing the font and the most suitable location for the title and the author on the cover. The whole work was published and became a real book, with all the stories and covers. The title chosen by the class was “Through the the pages of terror”.
