Illuminations by Walter Benjamin,

Artwork by Abuhay Yared Dessalegn

I have selected three stories from this 

book to illustrate through sketches, 

capturing the emotions and ideas they 

evoke in me as I read them. The chosen 

pieces are:

1. Unpacking My Library

2. What is Epic Theater?

3. The Work of Art in the Age of 

Mechanical Reproduction

The emotional and intellectual connection to 

book collecting, emphasizing the personal 

stories behind every book. I think that by 

bringing each piece of the book, it will 

illuminate the collector's perspective. Even if 

the pieces remain unread, the act of 

gathering them reflects a mindset oriented 

toward a brighter future.

Emphasizing that epic theater transforms 

passive spectators into active observers. He 

views it as a form of intellectual resistance 

against the dominant ideologies of the time. 

So, I represent it as a single person 

performance by highlighting the dominancy 

by light and with only one person audience.

While mechanical production erodes the 

aura of traditional art, it also liberates art from 

elitism, allowing it to be experienced 

collectively. I aimed to depict the struggle 

between embracing modern techniques of 

art making on one man’s mind and 

preserving the authenticity and timelessness 

of traditional artworks, by highlighting the 

one of the sources which is the book.

I used an XP-PEN tablet to create the 

illustrations in Photoshop manually. In 

each piece, I represented the concept of 

illumination through light, visually 

reflecting the core ideas and themes of 

the work