6 Word Memoir – Redacted*

University of Baltimore

Spring 2024  

This project required students to craft a personal statement using only 6 words. For my process, I focused on my time as a Graphic Designer for the government. One aspect of this type of work is I cannot share all of my work due to the classified nature of it, so people do not know the full story of what I do. This can be both intriguing and misunderstood. So I leaned into that! I created a generic paragraph using ChatGPT and strategically scattered the phrase "I'm not telling the whole story." throughout. 

I created an animation of the paragraph being censored by black bars, actively safeguarding "sensitive information", leaving only the 6 chosen words. (there is a 3 second pause prior to the animation, I want the viewer to start to read the full paragraph, only to get cutoff. This is intended to jar the viewer, create a moment of confusion and then with further observation, create an "Ah ha!" moment.) The paragraph goes from a symmetrical presentation (though I am not a fan of justified type, it works for this application), to a disjointed, asymmetrical display, adding to the uneasiness of the piece.  

I went a step further for the project by adding sound. The ominous music starts soft and grows in intensity to create an uneasy feeling. The marker sound effects are included to give the perception that the paragraph is being actively reviewed and omitted.