Noograms
By Celso Singo Aramaki + AI (Updated January 2026)
Narrative Influences: Maus and Japanese manga
Maus helped expand what graphic novels could do: serious history, complex emotion, and formal experimentation without losing readability. That influence shows up in Noograms mainly as a respect for clarity, pacing, and the idea that comics can hold weighty subjects without becoming academic.
Japanese manga is another reference point—especially its long-form, serialized rhythm. Manga’s strength is time: it allows characters, relationships, and themes to develop gradually, with room for quiet scenes and accumulated detail. Noograms borrows that patience and structure, aiming for a narrative that unfolds across six chapters without rushing the reader.
A literary novel in graphic form
Noograms is built as a literary novel expressed through sequential art. The story follows an indie grunge rock band in 1990s New York City. The main characters are university students and aspiring musicians, moving between classes, rehearsals, gigs, parties, and the everyday negotiations of early adulthood. The plot grows through scenes and conversations as much as through events.
Characters and themes
At its center, Noograms focuses on people who are still becoming themselves. The characters talk—sometimes casually, sometimes intensely—about study, music, work, relationships, and the question of what to do next. The themes stay grounded: creativity under pressure, identity, ambition, friendship, and the search for meaning in a fast-changing world.
The visual narrative
The art direction aims to reflect the grit and vibrancy of 1990s NYC while keeping emotional nuance readable in the panel-to-panel flow. The visual language is designed to carry both atmosphere and subtext: what characters say, what they avoid saying, and what the city itself communicates around them.
The project’s trajectory (updated to 2026)
By 2026, Noograms is positioned as a long-term work developed through iterative writing, research, and visual experimentation—drafts, rewrites, style tests, and structural refinement. The process is treated as craft: improving coherence, character voice, and pacing over time rather than chasing novelty.
Work
Noograms is an attempt to combine the immediacy of comics with some of the depth and patience of literary fiction. It draws from Maus, manga structure, and classic narrative approaches, but stays focused on a specific story: young artists in 1990s New York City trying to build a future without a map. The ambition is modest and direct—make a graphic novel that holds up on rereads, with characters that feel real and conversations that linger.