New Projects

So, mid-way through term and I have been leaning a lot about video editing, installation and animation as well as graphic design. It is safe to say that this is an experience worth having. To start off I am just going to post a photograph of what my group in my video installation class are working on. The brief is 'here and there'. We chose to project onto the side of the art school at Michigan, there is a large wall in the courtyard with a grid section so we decided to work with the concept of transportation and elevators.

This is quite a bad photograph taken from my phone of the test projection. We aligned three lifts together and simultaneously they are travelling up and down the wall. I am happy with the test so far as I feel that we are making good use of the space available -  the lifts fit within the perameters of the gridded wall, and as the film was shot from the perspective of the lifts travelling up it does that illusion of a world within the wall. 

Next class I am taking is time based media. Our first assignment was an audio piece where we had to create a list. I chose to make a response to the experience I have had of moving to the United States. My list is of some of the lies that I have told to some ridiculous stereotypic questions that I get asked on a regular basis because I am British. I decided that the best way to portray this was in a mock interview style. It is representative of the situation in which I have been singled out as a "foreigner", and that I have something to say simply because of my English accent. I had a lot of fun making this, it was a good exercise as despite previously having worked with music technology, a conceptual artwork that was purely based on sound has been an interesting challenge.

The next project of this class was stop-motion animation. Now, I have had a little experience in this before but it was interesting to start from scratch with this and make something with another person. We were instructed to make something which depicts a natural motion. My partner Keyana and I discussed this and decided to do a piece called "A World Within the Clouds" - the natural motion was the moment when you take off in a aeroplane and travel through the clouds only to come out the other side into another world. In this moment where you are consumed by clouds, we wanted to create this alternative reality where people are flying and things are simply surreal.

My next project is to create a film sequence of the vivid dreams of various members of my TMP class. Below I have included the tests for how to shoot one of the dreams.

Alongside these time based projects I have also been taking studio:2D. A class which is mostly on graphic design and illustration. I am working on a card game at the moment, but below I am posting one of my first assignments. We were asked to create a drawing which communicates one of the principles of design (I was given rhythm). We were then supposed to represent in this drawing a question from the scientology quiz. I chose "Do you sometimes wonder if anyone really cares about you?"

DO YOU SOMETIMES WONDER IF ANYONE REALLY CARES ABOUT YOU?

The concept of this drawing was to represent a broken friendship. The idea of whether anyone really cares about you is executed by the narrative shown in the text and the rhythm of the hand prints. What I have been trying to convey is an event where the protagonist has been taken advantage of by a best friend in a sexual act. The text is there to explain the confusing thoughts of the person being 'betrayed', and the handprints have been placed in a rhythmic way to show the abuse, and the sexual act itself.

Art in Context: The Male Gaze.

"What I really am will never be obtained by your gaze. I am an apparition of who you really want"