Natural History Museum

We decided to go to the Natural History museum in Manchester as a group in order to gain some more inspiration. We thought that this trip give us some more ideas and would also be useful to Tui, who's project involved researching Lonesome George who was the last Pinta Island Tortoise, so any research concerning tortoises would be considered useful. I really liked looking at the different ways collections were arranged in the museum, because it directly related to the discussion we had about how to present out work at the end of the project. 

 

This collection of shells interested me because I like the way they are presented very neatly in different sized boxes. To me this looks like a 3D patch work, made out of rectangles of all different shapes and sizes. Looking at this collection really started to make me think about if we collaborated our own work, could we make a patchwork surface? How could we incorporate film and media into this? 

 

This collection made up of photographs of plants and insects really caught my eye as well. I really like the way that the images are all in their own individual little frames, which are also different shapes. This collection was also really well lit, so the photos looked really effective with the light shining through behind them. This collection really started to make me reconsider what I should be aiming to have as my outcome and how it can fit together with the rest of my groups work, in order for us to have a successful exhibition at the end.

 

 

The Egyptian section in the museum was also quite inspirational, as it consisted of lots of different artefacts that all had different meaning, but fit together because of the time they were made. I liked looking how they had been arranged into different collections because of either the time they were created, or what their purpose was. 

 

I found this trip really useful because seeing everything in the museum got me thinking about how collections of items are put together. It started to make me think about how all of are outcomes are going to fit together in a successful way. I've don't think that our work will look successful if it isn't presented as one whole piece, so I have come up with a few ideas that I think will work quite well; I have seen these beach combing collections where people collect one item everyday for a year whilst walking along the beach and presenting them in a net, so the pieces look like a tangled web of different objects. The trip to the museum started to get me thinking about time and how we could do something similar to the beach combing idea, but all the things we include are about the 24th of June, so our piece of work will look like a tangled timeline, showing everything we know about the 24th June through out the years. Just like the beach combing projects, we would be connecting things together that wouldn't necessarily have anything in common, except for the day they took place. 

Jamie Chalmers/Mr X stitch

This very informative lecture, given my Mr X stitch himself, was the most enjoyable lecture I have attended so far. Chalmers explained that when he originally started cross stitching there weren't any decent or modern patterns in the market, so he started designing his own patterns for the market. I visited his on line shop and I found the patterns to be a lot more interesting than any other I'd seen. Truth be told I had never considered contemporary cross stitching, so hearing how enthusiastic Chalmers was when he spoke about all these different companies and artists I'd never heard of before really started to get me interested in different types of embroidery. 

I took note of as many artists Chalmers spoke about so that I could research them further in my own time. All of these artists either focus on creating pieces of art work or novelty items, which aim to be aesthetically  pleasing or amusing with no physical purpose.

The artist Severia really caught my eye in Chalmers lecture because she stitches with alternative materials and objects such as cross stitching into domestic irons, cars and garden spades. I thought that this artist's work was really unique because of the range of materials she uses as the bases for her embroidery. Seeing her work has really enabled me to consider using materials that wouldn't be associated with stitch.

We were also shown the work of Lord Libidan, who creates 3D pieces by using cross stitch and a plastic surface that can be stitched together. The plastic surface can hold its own weight, enabling him to create structures that represent characters out of the film Transformers. These objects that he has created are especially unique because you can transform them from being a lorry or a car to being a robot.

I found the idea of the work by Crapestry to be really interesting because it gives another meaning to the original piece of work. The idea is to take old cushion covers and other pieces of embroidered pieced and stitch into them yourself. The work that we were shown included an original image of a cat and a dog watching TV but the artist changed it so that the pets were watching porn, and others were of animals that had been altered so that they were smoking.
Another artist who does something similar with their work is Stacey Page who takes old photographs and alters them with the purpose if giving them a new story. I really like the comparison between old and new with this type of art because the artists are using old bases and creating a new surface on top. I think this is a really interesting form of recycling art.

Hetain Patel

I enjoyed this lecture because Hetain Patel was really informative about his work, he gave interesting and clear descriptions on what his projects were about and what he aimed to achieve. Patel completed his fine art degree at Salford University where he graduated in 2003 and he has been an artist for the past 10 years. He started his career in art by creating photography and film pieces and displaying them in art galleries and he later moved on to live performance theatre by merging his work together. 

One of the projects that Patel spoke about was that his Sacred Bodies project, where he took photographs of his own body that had been decorated with an Indian ritual theme using Indian materials. He explained that he was interested in Indian culture because that was where his family originated from. I found this project really interesting because it showed me how a project can be developed through photography.

Patel then went onto explain that he didn't think the photographs showed enough information about what he was trying to achieve to the viewer, so he then went onto creating film. The project he talked about was called Copy/Paste, where he hired a body artist to create an improvised henna design on his back, that was filmed and instantly projected onto a screen in front of him so that he could copy the design onto his front. This was a four hour long performance piece that took place in the Bonnington Gallery in Nottingham. I found this project really useful to learn about because I didn't really understand how film can be interpreted into a project or how you would create a performance piece. The idea that Patel was getting across was the use of non verbal communication, which I think can be displayed really well through the use of film.

This lecture was really useful for me to understand how film and media is incorporated into a project, and how it can be used to make a project come together, but I do think this lecture would have been more beneficial to the film and media students in the group.

Twitter Work Shop

I attended the Twitter work shop and I reported back to my group later in the day. Going to the work shop was quite helpful because we were taught how Twitter worked and what it is used to promote companies, celebrities, etc to the public. I don't have Twitter so it was really interesting for me to see how it can be used in different ways. The idea of having a Twitter account to benefit this project is so that the tutors can see how we are communicating online. I don't have a Twitter account and personally I dont really like the idea because we are already keeping in contact over facebook, as this is a social media site we all have in common. To me Twitter seems to be a really hectic and busy social networking site. In the work shop we were taught about a site called Hoot Suite which links to Twitter and can put all of the hashtags in order, so you can see clearly what people have been tweeting about different topics. It was seeing this site which made me see how busy Twitter is. We were also shown another site called ifttt.com which can connect all your social networking sites together, so you could link your facebook account up to twitter and blogger so you only have to create one post which will appear on all your accounts.

Lucky PDF Lecture

After attending the Lucky PDF lecture with my group, it left me feeling confused as to what the artist group was about. The lecture wasn't well organised, and I got the impression that Lucky PDF were relying on the audience to already know what their intentions were and what the group aimed to achieve before the lecture had taken place.

From the lecture I got the impression that Lucky PDF use a lot of other people's work in order to create their own films, so it was interesting to see their perception of the project they were filming. They outlined the concept of what original art work is and what a recreation is. They briefly discussed if it is acceptable to use images that are on the internet and rework into them and use them as your own, and how this is different from taking your friend's work and reworking into that to make it your own.

Personally I thought this was a very controversial view.

As so little description was given on each project they presented, it was very difficult for me to tell what was going on, and therefore I doubt I will be referencing back to this group through out my project because I feel that their lack of organisational skills will reflect in their work but I will carry out some further research on them in case.

Ltd Lunch Time Workshop

 

This was a really fun ice-breaker workshop that took place on the first Wednesday and Thursday of the Unit  x project. The aim of the project was to make a sandwich that everyone in your group agreed on, but you were only given certain ingredients to make the filling with. The group I was in were given a range of foods to put in our sandwich which were: mushrooms, garlic, olives, rocket, sweet chilli, blueberries and goats cheese, but you could also choose two of your own ingredients so we decided to pick olive oil and tomatoes. 

Not everyone liked all of the ingredients that were given to us, so we decided to leave out the garlic, olives and rocket. We didn't think it would we wise to use everything given because it would've tasted strange. 

 

Once you had made your sandwich you had to cut it in half and swap with another group, unfortunately the group we swapped with had insufficient taste buds and decided to use eggs, chocolate, cheese, apples, grapes and everything else under the sun that would not be winning any Michelin stars any time soon.  

Easter Eggs in Manchester

The Big Egg Hunt 2013 was the UK's biggest egg hunt. It travelled round the UK stopping at 5 of the big cities where 101 eggs were displayed in each destination. This event came to Manchester on Thursday 7th March and left on Wednesday 13th March. At the end of the tour the eggs will be auctioned off to the highest bigger. Each egg was designed and decorated by either an artist or someone famous, so I thought I would see what kind of ideas the designers had come up with. 

 

 

 

My photos vary in quality as some were taken on my phone and the better ones were taken on my camera, but it is still clear how each artist has used a different technique to create their individual piece of this project. I found it interesting to see how some artists had added bits on or moulded the egg into the shape they wanted, such as the Dora the Explorer egg ,Sponge bob and Peter rabbit. Another interesting aspect was the way the eggs were finished, as some were shiny and some had more of a matt look about them. I think this was because some artists had painted directly onto the egg, which I could imagine to be quite hard because of its shape and texture, whilst others had printed their designs onto a plastic film and stuck them to the egg, fitting the shape so well that the joins were barely visible, such as the Tin Foil egg. 

I thought this project could relate to my Unit x project really well because each artist was given the same starting point; an egg, whilst each group participating in Unit x has been given the same starting point; the number 175. I thought it would be beneficial for me to see how each outcome varied from the next, and I can safely everyone's was completely different. I liked the way that the eggs could all be presented together and look like a set, no matter how far away the design on them was from the original starting point, in fact I think the most successful eggs were the one's that had been changed the most because it was more interesting from a viewer's perspective to see how the alterations had been make, and I think this is important to bear in mind through out Unit x. 

Unit x Brief

To start the project Unit X off, everyone from Fashion, Textiles in Practice and Film & Media have been split up into 4 groups; play, record, revolt and perform. Within these groups we have been divided into smaller groups of 8. The idea of this project is to work together as a team in order to create an output that will be exhibited at the end of the unit. 

During the launch lecture everyone was given the same starting point for their project, which was the number 175. This number was chosen because this year Manchester School of Art celebrates it's 175th anniversary. 

Having a number to base a whole project around originally seemed quite strange, but after a few ideas had been presented such as finding out what items cost £1.75, or what weighs 175lb I realised that having a number as the starting point for the project isn't as restricting as I first thought. 

We were asked to find out 3 facts surrounding the number 175, and present them to the rest of our group. The facts that I found out were that: 

-Flight 175 was involved in the 9/11 Al-Qaeda Hijack 

-175 years ago in 1838 John Wilkes Booth was born, he was the man who assassinated Abraham Lincoln 

-175 years ago in 1838 Oliver Twist, written by Richard Bentley was published 

I felt that my facts were fairly morbid and dull, but after discussing what our project should be about with the rest of the group, we came to the conclusion that we should focus on the 175th day of the year, which is the 24th June. I think this is a really good idea because it is a really open ended topic and there are so many different directions this project can go. We have also decided to call out group 'June' because it directly relates to the topic we have chosen. Our next task is to create a poster about the ideas we have come up with and present them next week.

Whitworth Art Gallery

In the front section of the gallery there is a case studies area where you are allowed to take photos of the work displayed. I found this section quite interesting because most of it was to do with textiles, and I especially liked looking at the old embroidery pieces.

The printed colour ways were created by an artist names Paul Nash who promoted the marriage of fine art and design by treating textiles in the same way as his paintings. I found it interesting to see how the feel of the pattern changes with the use of different colour ways.

This was a really interesting woven piece by Maria Eugenia Davila and Eduardo Portillo who are said to be at the forefront of contemporary weaving. This piece is made out of silk, Moriche palm fibres and wool from the Andean mountains, dyed with indigo, eucalyptus and cochineal, and hand woven in triple weave. They have used traditional materials in combination with new weaving technologies which I think makes you reconsider how old and new techniques can compliment each other. 

Guardian -2006

  

I found this piece so intriguing because you can really appreciate the tediousness of the work as it is a  large piece of work, and as it is all done by hand I think it is clear that a lot of commitment and time has gone into creating something designed to be aesthetically pleasing. 

These other woven pieces I also found to be really interesting because they are a lot different to what you would usually expect woven fabric to look like. The 3D piece I found to be extremely innovative because I would usually expect a woven piece to be flat tapestry so  as I have never seen anything like this before, I felt quite drawn to this piece. This piece has really made me reconsider what a weave is expected to look like, they are considered to be neat and quite regimented, made out of vertical and horizontal threads, however this is piece looks tangled and messy, which is I think represents a really alternative take on the concept of a woven piece of work. 

I thought the use of different textures in this piece was quite eye catching and I like the way there are so many different textures used in one space. The aspect I find most attention grabbing is the use of finer thread with the thicker pieces of fabric that appear to be suspended, or floating around the picture.