This artist illustrated her credit card debt to take stock of her finances
Even for those of us who keep a budget, expenses still find a way of piling up. Graphic designer Kate Bingaman-Burt found herself in this dilemma when she realized she was in $24,000 of credit card debt.
To start making herself more conscious about her purchases, Bingaman-Burt started illustrating her credit card statements.
Immediately, she started getting feedback from other people who were hiding from the shame of their credit card debt. As she shared in an interview with GOOD:
"I was drawing in a pretty public way, and I wasn't sure how people were going to react. Some folks were like, ‘That’s so dumb, why would you want to do that?’ But a lot more people would tell me about their stressful credit card debt. I ended up being a credit card priest, basically. I was suddenly the confessional outlet. It was very emotional."
So she started illustrating something else: the items she was buying, and then how those purchases actually came through. The result is a body of work that tackles financial transparency in an approachable way. And, many of her purchase logs also double as an unintentionally helpful shopping guide for yourself:
You can check out more of Bingaman-Burt’s work on her Instagram, or on her website. And lest you think art about another person’s shopping habits isn’t your thing, she’s also a wickedly fantastic designer and artist:
