Design and layout

Interviewer: Where did your ideas come from for the design and the layout of your work?

Nicki Greenberg: The layout is something that I'm fascinated by. How layout can convey information and how panels or frames in a comic can be more than just a box to contain a piece of the action. So I wanted to set it up as a photograph album. This was my idea from the beginning so that when you opened it up you were immediately transported back to the time of the events. So it looks like an old-fashioned photo album with the black pages, the sepia photographs with the scalloped edges. And that also gives you the sense of peering into people's private lives, into things that perhaps you shouldn't see and there's certainly a lot of that in 'The Great Gatsby'.

Interviewer: How would you describe the atmosphere of your art work in 'The Great Gatsby'?

Nicki Greenberg: Overall the atmosphere of the book is quite dark because you have the black pages and then the sepia photographs which are a quite dark greeny-brown colour. So even in the very exuberant sparkling parts, the parties and so on, I think there is a sense of tragedy or darkness overshadowing it. I guess that's how I feel about the book. It has a, even in its really bright moments it is bitter sweet. That pervades the atmosphere of the book.