Big Eyes: a field guide

Have you ever walked past a house and asked yourself “who lives here?”

There’s this little game I like my mom and I made up when I was around 6 years old called “Big Eyes”. It basically consists of taking a walk around the neighborhood and letting your imagination do its job. Free the creative beast within you. Look at a house and ask that question. See a street name? What does it mean? What’s the history behind it? There’s no right or wrong. It’s all up to you. You are making it up. Be the Big Eyes that see everything and know it all.

For my field guide, I want to recreate this game. I plan on writing random prompts and encouraging anyone to take a walk around Chicago (in this case, Lincoln Park, but I believe the guide could be used anywhere really) and let their imagination flow. The guide will be a compilation of houses, streets, random rocks, yard signs, anything that could get the creative liquids going. These specific places/items will not be required steps in the journey, but rather serve as examples of how you can play the game.

This way, I hope to help people in interacting with where they are through walking.

Reading question:

Can maps truly represent a place in its entirety?

The short answer is no. The long answer goes somewhat like this:

Maps are propositions, meaning they seek not to represent somewhere, but rather to affirm “the existence and location of its subjects”. This, in turn, means that the cartographer has the liberty to propose what specific aspects they want, and leave out the ones they don’t. Because of this, maps become somewhat subjective. There are so many facets to one single place that it would be impossible to truly propose it in its entirety. Maps can create several different realities because they isolate the place they are portraying.