Thumbing through my images from England, I had the idea to collage the ocean over cobblestone streets. A student of mine jokingly said, “You should put an octopus in it,” and so "The Kraken" was born. I didn’t want to just place any old kraken in the image so I researched British stories that involved a kraken and came across Victor Hugo’s story, “Toilers of the Sea.” A year after the publication a giant octopus was put on display at the Crystal Palace in London. It was then I came up with the idea that a giant kraken escaping onto the streets of England, catching English folk up, one by one, would make a humorous collage. The writing of Hugo's story is the text in the collage.