Bouba and Kiki

Simply, it symbolizes a bad day (left) and a good day (right). The left panel is darker thoughts and feelings. The right panel is also thoughts and feelings, but joyful. The bolder coloured pencil on each panel represent thoughts, and the more nebulous watercolour represents feelings. These are representative of my own bad and good days, but also of the people that I work with. I was hoping that even though we have different experiences, we can all look at these and find some shared meaning and ability to empathize.

The name “Bouba and Kiki” refers to the Kiki/Bouba effect where people across cultures and experiences all name two shapes (the first one spiky and the second one rounded) consistently when give the choice of these two nonsensical names. I deliberately reversed the common associations because, as an autistic person, I am often misread, and I often misread others. 

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