I had a feeling 2016 would be a contentious and bizarre election year in America, so I combined my art and design skills with my love of maps to create and release something positive about this country.

I believe it’s important to acknowledge and advocate for the value of art and design at a time when support for it in public schools is in peril. I also believe that geographic knowledge must be part of everyday education.

The “50+2” project involved creating mixed-media art pieces using vector maps and leftover paper stock, and then posting them to social media every week of 2016 for each U.S. state (and then some).