Fair? Share!

Parallel realities occurring at opposite sides of the world.

In 2021, after reading an article about the ‘race for space’ and how they could use their billions to end world hunger; Billionaires Jeff Bezos, Richard Branson & Elon Musk Could Save 41M People at Risk of Starvation: Instead of racing to outer space, why not end world hunger? I was inspired to create a narrative illustration series about opposing lives.

The divide between the ‘haves’ and the ‘have nots’ is something that I find infuriating and devastating. The ‘Race for Space Tourism’ is an example of this ludicrous misuse of money and I felt was a subject I could bring to life sensitively. I began by researching the three billionaires mentioned in the article. Then thinking of my own experiences while volunteering in Swaziland in 2009 (now Eswatini) I looked back through my photos and researched Eswatini in the present, during the pandemic of 2020/2021.

Eswatini (Swaziland) 2009 Volunteer trip with All Out Africa helping these children was a privilege and changed my outlook as a 21 year old. The Volunteering took place in three NCPs (Neighbourhood Care Point), where the children had two hot meals a day and lessons before they went onto formal education if they were able to. Many of these children were single or double orphans, meaning they had lost one or both parents usually to HIV. One boy in particular had a tragic story. Nicknamed PhoPho (Uphopho is ‘Papaya’ in Siswati) by one of the local charity workers. Double orphaned, he had no other family and had to live with an elderly neighbour.

He was a mischievous little 6/7 year old who acted up at the NCP. A fellow volunteer offered to sponsor him when hearing of his story. As part of this, she was able to visit his home and living place. Coming back to the volunteer lodgings, the volunteer was in floods of tears seeing the slum PhoPho lived in, not only that, the elderly gaurdian was pleeding with the volunteer and charity worker to take the boy with them, as she couldn’t cope with his unruly behaviour. Years later, I spoke to the other volunteer, she had been sponsoring him to go to school for a few years, but he had stopped going to school.

Developing my characters for this narrative, I decided to use anthropomorphic characters to express the difficult plotline in this graphic novel. Deciding on a Lion to represent PhoPho, as a native animal to Eswatini and one that is usually used to represent regalness and royalty. I felt it would express the narrative and PhoPho’s change over time the best. Considerations for his clothing, physical state, happiness and how that would alter his appearance over time. I also kept one feature the same, his triangle fur marking, so it is easily readable that it is the same character.

I chose a Badger for the Billionaire’s character, known as ‘Bill’ as it would be a good contrast to PhoPho’s character. Known more in western countries, and a smaller size than a Lion, it would express the differences between the characters while the narrative showed their similarities at the beginning. I experimented with how Bill would look over time and how his privilege and success would affect his clothing, physical state and personality. I again kept one feature the same, his kicked out black fur under his eye, to preserve likeness.

As these were two polar opposite stories, I wanted to create a parallel narrative form. Not only did I want to reflect the gap between the characters, I wanted to offer a different reality. My narrative needed to not only be understood by children, but also offer them some hope that things can change! To do this, I wanted my comic to phyically Flip, so the act of flipping the book also flips the reality into a fairer, more hopeful story. The Idea of titles ‘Fair? Share!’ created this opportunity for children to consider different outcomes and opens a conversation about equality.

The final concertina graphic novel focused on 11 pages of the Fair? narrative including four fully rendered pages, front and back covers and narrative introduction. To flick through the graphic novel, click here.

If you would like to know more or discuss any part of the project, please contact me.