Thinking Sideways is a game that attempts to convey the frustration of having ADHD in a traditional classroom. It does this by having the user try to solve a maze while remembering colors that come up on the screen. Most who do not have ADHD do not understand what those who have it experience.  This makes it difficult for these two groups of people to work together. Thinking sideways attempts to bridge that gap by giving a person without ADHD the emotional experience of someone with ADHD trying to complete an assignment. The confusing maze that is difficult to use is supposed to represent the many paths ways one could go about completing a task, but most of the time I have been forced to organize my work ways that are time-consuming, frustrating and untimely unhelpful. After completing the maze, the user must input the colors that appear. This is to represent that when I involve all the thinking I'm thinking about I tends to have better ideas. It is also to simulate the frustration of not knowing what needs to be on an assignment and organize in advance.

The Family Tree is a living time capsule for extended families, allowing each family their own specific branch to share memories, hardships, or joyful moments with one another as a means to bring the family closer together with these shared moments available to share for generations. 

In my Family Tree, the trunk represents my cousin, Brad, who died of a brain tumor at age 13. During the one year from when he was diagnosed to when he died, all 75 extended family members connected in ways we never had before. I thought it would be appropriate to create a base in his memory, with “B LISKA” written on the side of the tree trunk, which was the license plate he wanted oto have on his first car. I created the branches to represent the various extended families that make up my larger one, with caps labeling each family’s last name and designated repository. Anyone in the family can use the vessel to share special memories and aspirations as keepsakes for other family members to view and future generations to see. 

The Brief:

Memory Keys: This project is a vessel meant to help people connect with loved ones through music. "Keys" achieves this through sound vibrations and as a vessel that holds very important memories.

In this project, users are meant to "play" wooden keys that resemble the action one would use when playing the piano. This  project is based off of the piano but uses simpler mechanics to achieve sound. Instead of a hammer hitting a string, "Keys" uses a metal ball to hit copper to create sound. Apart from being somewhat of a meditative tool, "Keys" is based on a special form of communication I had with my grandmother.  For me, this project is a very important part of honoring her memory and moving on. For others, when using this, my hope is that they can connect with people they may have lost and help refresh their memory of them. 

For this studio, I worked on a vessel that highlights the lessons I learned, the obstacles I overcame, and the relationships I formed during the 12 trips I went on at camp. I decided to delve into different events that shaped his identity. I would shape my vessel after the 12 trips, 57 days, that I spent in the wilderness of Maine with my summer camp. These experiences would shape the way I dealt with adversity, craft unbreakable friendships, and help put life into perspective.

The physical project is just a backpack, but when you open it up you find a mountain range with six different peaks. Each peak symbolizes one of the six years that I went to summer camp. Each year had two of the twelve trips. Furthermore, each peak has a symbol that relates to one of the divisions at my camp. The mountains are made on Rhino and are modeled after topography maps. The twelfth and final trip end with the hiking of the tallest mountain in Maine, Mt. Katahdin. This is where the idea for the topographic mountain came from.

"Mental Shoebox" is a vessel in the form of a shoebox locked in a complicated way that helps someone empathize with the mental and social roadblocks I have had to overcome to be able to perform athletically in track and field. Made out of wood, this box opens up when the user moves a piece through a maze appropriately to unlock one of four chains that lock the box, each representing a different challenge to accessing the shoe.

The goal of the box is to create empathy with the frustration and difficulty it takes to overcome mental challenges while simultaneously struggling with physical ones. It also helps users understand by creating mindset where they can access the racing shoes and run, having overcome all relevant challenges. While a complicated puzzle to access your shoes is not what every runner wants, the challenge and mental preparation it takes to open a box of some complicated variety, is necessary in preparation to actually run the race. The box is taller than it is wide or long, and has a maze on top the user must complete to unlock the box. Four chain attach the piece that moves through the maze to each side, so that when you have completed each chain, you can life the top off. Hopefully, any non runner could open this box and understand the correlation between mental, social and physical preparation and empathize with the mental difficulty of getting ready to run.