imonclouddesign

[imonclouddesign]

Ever Tried, Ever Failed

“Ever Tried, Ever Failed” Samuel Beckett, Worstward Hoe, 1983 it is a motif that recurs.  Much like who watches the watchmen? Although about different types of power

Most of these are fanatically structured around the quotes.

Can you relate to them?  Ie if you fail - you try harder to succeed.

Go through the process do things change?

Try to reject the term failure in yourself - integrate words such as interpretation and experimentation and attempts.  Part of the creative process.

Do not make a final judgement on your work always experiment and adjust never fail.

Practice-led - reflect on the process of making art regardless of subject - the process may change drastically between different subjects.  TALK ABOUT THEM NEXT WEEK.

Making adjustments, looking at the stepping stones to get to end result rather than the end result

Discuss Anti-Art - the art of failure resisting expectations.

The art that fails - being objective about it.

Lisa Le Feuvre - ideas about what she means - time wasted. Money wasted.  Failed works - taken out of context.  Entire exhibitions of sketches buried previously in piles of papers now given new lease.  Shows the process not necessarily a failure.

Van Gogh’s Sunflowers - think about the process - artist pre-occupied with Sunflowers - painted why? (It is believed he painted them to decorate Paul Gauguin’s bedroom for when he moved in - to make it sunny). Is any particular one “the” sunflower? Are the others part of the process?

What do the pictures say?  Was it an ongoing project that he was never happy with?  Maybe he never got them right in his mind.

Contemporary storyboard Toy Story 2 a nice way to demonstrate how the artist gets to the end result. Concept work again as stepping stones towards the final piece.

Reclaim the process of getting to the end result.  To be able to show the process to the examiner.

What does it mean to Fail?

Mikes Poppe Profundis 2017 shows a courtroom, he is chained to an iron ball in the centre of a concrete block, which ties in with power from last week leading to justice - showing someone chipping away to free himself.

Clearly a political statement, justice etc., he failed as he couldn’t get out of the block.

If he didn’t do what he set out to do - was that a failure or did the end result change?

This is a performance piece and maybe unintentional.  Can change with communication and he did that.

Failed Art - incomplete pieces - are they the same?  Some may appear very different are unfinished the same as incomplete?  Art is never finished it is retired. Communication alongside images can tell the story ie if the portrait is being done on an individual that then dies. As in the art in the slide.

Some works that are not finished are only retired, some works have fewer elements.

Quite often even Rafael had students to help support his work which opens up questions about architecture.  Opens up lots of questions.  Some works are done to look half-completed whereas others are actually only half completed.

Making art of failures - materials being used.  Street art where they take discarded goods (wood/furniture) and create areas for homeless people to congregate and even live in.  Reusing/repurposing and salvaging waste.  As we are increasingly conscious of the impact of the amount of waste.

Use of coffee beans also to create art.

Eco-criticism ties in with this kind of art of trash.

Next Stop Atlantic - what do New York City do with their disused abandoned subway carriages - they dumped them in the Atlantic Ocean.  A photographer was very keen about photographing the process of breaking the carriages down before dumping them into the ocean. Leads to thinking about sustainability and long term environmental impact. Approximately 15000 have been dumped. What is the object of this work?  Helps to encourage outrage.  A lot of up to date artwork relates to waste.

People are becoming more aware of it, in early 90s people thought the metal was reused.  Nowadays people are turning them into artificial ecosystems, people have gone in to create environments for life to congregate.

The failure is not necessarily the artist but institutional failures - the authorities of power - ie what do we do with our waste?  Throw it in the ocean!!

Art has now drawn attention to that.

Observist Animator Don Hertzfeldt consisted of four segments introduced as a collection of unaired/rejected promo materials for the family learning channel.  The fact that these are failed commercials for a family learning channel is possibly a fictional setup.  What does it expose? What is the point of the satire?  Instead of drawing attention to appropriateness - going against expectations.  It is classically a children style image and drawing attention for it being done for the children’s attention.  

Familiar works? Anti-Art - an act of resistance - pushing back against what is acceptable forms of art.  What you deem appropriate - pushing the boundaries. Duchamp was caught out by the process.  It is as if Duchamp tried in disbelief to use simple objects as art and succeeded.  By presenting things as art anything could be put on to a podium and displayed in an exhibition.

This may be considered a failure of artistic merits. Anti-Art.  It's about resistance, obstruction and disruption - an art gallery is a sacred place where people really determine what does/does not belong.  Whose art are we looking at?

The art is often representative of a quiet select of people.  

The purchasers and critics will be governing this structure.  The artists themselves may contribute to the conversation.  Things may start out as experiments and end up initiating unexpected things - including fashion.

Take conversations to seminars - what is art? Who approves of it?  What is my opinion worth?

Anti-Art extends to performance art - “dropping a Han dynasty urn” 1995 and “a Han dynasty urn with a Coca Cola”. The idea of breaking something or undoing art was quite controversial.  Is it breaking it as it is a precious object?   “General Mao used to tell us that we can only build a new world if we destroy the old one!”  Therefore to Ai Weiwei in his mind, this is what he was doing. Yet in other peoples minds, he was destroying an object of value.  Again goes back to power.

His form is breaking up the Art form.  

Tracey Emin has said that “my bed was inspired by a sexual yet depressive phase in my life, in which I remained in bed for four days without eating or drinking anything but alcohol.  When I looked at the vile, repulsive mess that had accumulated in my room I suddenly realised what I had created.”  Others argued this was not art.  Tracey Emin was quite big by late 90s and therefore was it her that was the art?  There is a feminist element of this.  Following the theme and breaking apart what can and cannot be art.  It is lifted as it is essential to her at this time.

Desire paths is a path created by usage, not a pre-determined path.  Normally these paths are created by people taking shortcuts across fields to get from point A to point B more quickly.”   Gaston Bachelart, The Poetics of Space 1958.  What are the well-trodden paths how might you do it differently does it make the original path a failed design or does it just mean there are two ways from A to B?

Artists can be very asymmetrical whereas architects are very symmetrical.  Think about creative routes you can take?  Make use of “failed” attempts to improve.  People can express things in their own way.  You can take things in your own way - it does not have to be what the artist was trying to say.

Think about failure?  Reflect on how and why work failed?  

[imonclouddesign]

Who watches the Watchmen?

Different types of power to think about - State Power; Social Power; Economic Power.

What is power?  Control - key elements; manipulation; influence (a slightly less aggressive form of manipulation); - refers to a group of people’s values and beliefs (ideas, beliefs and values) 

Characteristics? Wealth; Religion (Ideology); Monarchy - symbolic value;

Art? Creates discussion - addresses some imbalances, shows itself when one is pushed down by others the haves and have nots etc; Activists representing new ideas through various formats of Arts; Protest - resistance - proposing new ideas; Historical Marker - through the history of time across borders etc. 

What is power?

Establishment; Business; Politics; State; Law; Banking; Police, Elite; Civil Service; Church; Media; Wealth; Monarchy and Education - various forms of institutions able to exercise power over people.

Forms of Power 

State Power

Authority 

Wealth

Education - under popular discussion re private schooling or shared resources

Influence

Race 

Gender Patriarchy (Male) / (Hedgimany) Feminists

Sexuality

Wealth has its own privileges and sexuality being a dominant party. How factors/theories relating to the individual affect own practice.

How does art address this? Provoking people - Satire - “Vice” film shows good examples of seeking challenge structures of power about people without account making decisions about others’ lives about Politics and Power relating to the Iraq war. Collodud poem influencing Trump’s campaign - advisor changed the meaning about who should and should not enter the country.

Do you have a media platform? This could show manifestations of power.

Theorists of Power

Michael Foucault - a writer 1960s - 1990s interested in histories of ideas and looked at language within the structure of power - history of sexuality - looking at the way dominant class people oppress others and identifying as a gay man he figured how the systems were created to silence him. Through understanding Hetrodominance and how the reproductive sex has come to infect the main as to what can constitute a loving relationship, you can see how a lot of people would be excluded from that by the choices people make in life.

Foucault looked at Early 20th Century theorists to base his work on.

“It’s my hypothesis that the individual is not a pre-given entity which is seized on by the exercise of power. The individual, with his identity and characteristics, is the product of a relation of power exercised over bodies, multiplicities, movements, desires, forces.” (Michael Foucault)

What does he mean by the exercise of power?

Essential personality - untouched by anyone else - he believes there are forces that shape our ideas such as factors - absorbing/resisting parents ideas - Foucault believes the idea of pure untainted self doesn’t exist is influenced by relations of power that are exercised over our bodies - by basically delegitimising himself as a gay man that demonstrates an exercise of power. Everything affects us as a person. Do you believe? Resist?

Foucault’s Panopticon (an old french style prison system where there is a tower in the centre of the room, all the prisoners are around the outside with a single-window facing inwards, the tower has windows all around facing outwards. The theory is that takes one person in the tower to control the entire prison, from a fear of being watched) - from a book called Discipline & Punish where he talks about the history of the prison system. Gives a way of thinking through the elements of the current media landscape.

*If you throw in the element of two-way glass - it demonstrates how power becomes the apprehension of authority - rules and conducts that govern our lives - social norms etc.

Discipline power is exercised through its invisibility and the apprehension of power. The acknowledge and follow certain social regulations because we may be watched. The arts have started to address this. Seen, Shoen and Manifested. Graffiti has been brought to life by Banksy; Fashion offers us space to express who we are as an act of defiance. We can challenge ideas of power. Ideas Cameras, Surveillance are all key to current ideas and thought about how this may work. What data may be shared.

Imagine the internet as the tower in the middle of the prison how that impacts everything we do. Show how invisible force conditions our behaviour. How today’s life revolves around the internet.

Visibility is key.

Love Island is a dating show - unfeasibly beautiful people constantly surveyed by a big brother type machinery which follows their every move - and becoming a couple with fame, glory and money. Panopticon!!

Power? Fun to watch (surveillance); psychological ruin; you can watch and control them- and think you have the upper hand, but often they may win the upper hand. Reality television - not real - fake and very commercial. Making money for the television company and they often determine exactly who you will and will not like from the off. Beauty standards are very antiquated ideas no queers; obese or plain people. Very synthetic set to create paradise! Shows how gender can play a role in power.

Michael Cunningham - “Everything in the world is about sex except sex. Sex is about power.” Again, brings back to Love Island! Mechanisms and how power manifests others.

Foucault says, “ Power manifests itself in lots of ways and conditions who we are as subjects.” He said “If one had to speak of sex, one had to speak publicly in a manner that was not determined by the division between licit and illicit even if the speaker maintained the distinction for himself. One had to speak of it as a thing to be not simply condemned or tolerated but managed in certain of the systems of fertility regulated for the greater good of all the made to function according to an optimum. Sex was not something one simply judged it was something one administered.” Foucault implies that sex is a discursive instrument and the development of dominant sexual examples or by social standards preferable sexual examples can have real-world impacts on peoples lives. What is the utility - reproductive sex - used to provide good sex?

He also acknowledges the foster the basis for reactions to the powers. “The appearance of 19th-century psychiatry ‘Dearest Prudence” and literature of a whole series of discourses on species and subspecies of homosexuality in version pederasty and psychic hermaphroditism made possible a strong advance of social controls into this area of perversity but it also made possible the formation of a reverse discourse. Homosexuality began to speak on its own behalf to demand that its legitimacy or naturality be acknowledged often in the same vocabulary using the same categories that it was medically disqualified. - Trying to state it should be considered normal and not a perversion. If you continue to say, someone, they do not exist they eventually will rebel, as they do exist. It can also affect their mental state. Especially as controllers may believe that others will “bounce back”. It can be about creating discourses of resistance. You can bring on awareness of some movement bringing on changes which would affect others.

Theorising Gender. - Simon De Bouvoir, a Feminist wrote The Second Sex, 1949 - you have a choice to agree or disagree. It was a game-changer - what does it mean to be a woman? It created lots of revisions and people pushing against her as her conception of people being binary, your talking about specific women, not all women. She helped to pave the way for the feminine discourse. This preceded a lot of civil rights movements in the 1960s - black folk in America being the most visible - but there are lots of other civil rights movements. She talks about the myth of the woman and how people determine who others are by the way they exert power. “few myths have been more advantageous to the ruling caste than the myth of women: It justifies all privileges and even authorizes their abuse.” The Myth of women shows that genders have biological characteristics in their personality. i.e. old men are irrational, and women are emotional - these kinds of statements will put people down and make them feel inferior or ashamed. The woman’s place is in the home. Men needn’t bother themselves with alleviating themselves with the pains and burdens of physiologically of woman’s lot since these are intended by nature, it’s the way it is described as women’s natural consequences. 3-400 years ago, all written documentation about women was written by men - ideas of the natural woman came from those that were not a woman! Men then used this further by refusing to grant women any sexual pleasure and making her work like a beast of burden! Bouvoir is trying to say give people the freedom of choice to be whatever they want.

Specific ideas of Myths of women as a social construct include Princesses; Love Island; Mothers; Hip Hop singers etc. All of them are determined by men about women.

Judith Butler wrote Gender Trouble 1990 - talks about the distinction between male and female - is there a problem with that? Ties in with Foucault. Are individuals who do not identify as male or female wrong and do we press our judgement on to them? Butler says to think more fluidly, and variance does exist. What is dominance? I.e. What is right? If it is the majority, it is not necessarily correct nor is it the only way of living. “Gender is not something that one is it something that one does. It is an act (Key Point), a doing rather than a being. There is no gender identity behind the expressions of gender identity (What you choose to wear, physical image, what you do)” Gender is very flippant - i.e girls do this; boys do this etc.

Butler also relates to David Bowie; Prince is good examples of demonstrating arbitrariness they are masculine but very effeminate in their looks. Society constructs gender within clothes; biological factors; gender expression; generations allow for inheritance. Butler says people should be allowed to express themselves, individuals. Legal requirements also need to be adhered to.

Power and Race - Kwame Anthony Appiah, an Oxford philosopher, wrote Race. Current affairs and Political tendency’s - Race and ethnicity - white = race; British = ethnicity.

“Differences among people like differences among communities with a single society play a central role in our thinking about who we are - in structuring our values, (ideology) and in determining the identities in which we live. In the last century and a half, racialism and nationalism (think about how they both coincide with one another), so often bound together that one can hardly tell them apart, have played a central role about how we think about these differences and since one of the contributions of modern nationalism has been to see literature as central to national life, race has been central to literature and thought about literature throughout the period.” Literature is about Art - the whitewashing of any art scene you can see how these have cross applications as well. I.e. white actors play black characters. This demonstrates the particular powers of privileges operating within the film industry.

How do Race and Power intersect with the arts - procreation - while artists drawing from black culture and using it as an innovative idea? It has a different role to playing despite the fact that others have done this for years. Things like censorship and expose come out as well. Who are the artists? Who do you refer to for points of reference? What art movements? Who do they represent? Do they want to explore ideas of forms?

Where did ideas come from? The story of O.J. - Jay z 2017 - Street rap music became the push back at establishments 1970-1980 white America was leaving young black men as though they were criminals, and no one would employ them - what did they do?

Jay Z used cuts of overtly racialised animations caricatures to add to the message. In 1940s animations the similar imagery came up. Artists, illustrators and animators who draw others have the power to impress on others how one sees the individual. Although Jay Z is a black artist in 1930s it was not a black artist, therefore, it was how the white artist wanted to portray the black individual.

What De Bouvoir really talks about is an opportunity and how you could bring something innovative from your field similar to Virginia Wolfe’s - Room of One’s Own - what women need to create great literature is the opportunity to do so. Space and financial freedom to make one’s art. Historically women have not had this. She relates to “Daddy’s Office” - the father gets a workspace whereas the mother does not have this luxury.

De Bouvoir talks about Freedom - the freedom to produce “Indeed for one to become a creator, it is not enough to be cultivated that is to make going to shows and meeting people part of one’s life. Culture must be apprehended and taken through the free movement of the transcendents. The spirits with all its riches must project itself in an empty sky that is its to fill. But if a thousand fine bonds are tied to the earth its surge is broken. Etc.”

Take the sentiment that people should be allowed the freedom to explore who they are and produce art. Apply it is everyone, class, wealth and ability, gender, race, age, etc. Literariness a series of letters written from a boy to his mother who cannot read. Explores the strength they have through literariness. Thinking about the role that Art plays. There are ways of resisting these structures and they do not have to be adhered to without question should you wish to do so.

Resistant Art- Childish Gambino - viral sensation and what that does to the role you play in history. Do viral things remain?

The Weather Project - photograph - the people are the audience observing the simulated sun in a locked room - questions of the environment and the sun being the ultimate source of power. Climate change. 

The Blindfolded Man - brings to mind political situations. Police brutality in America. 

Does it have to be political or resistant? It can be realistic and show the persons’ ideal image. Realistic - what is visible around the world. Art & realism are difficult to think through together. Subject to a lot of forces that will affect it. Documentaries are believed to be factual but can still be very political. Personal can still be political. Great art perseveres i.e. Shakespeare plays. Although people still wish to adapt and alter to modern-day, elements and themes will persist.

What is Art? Why is it of interest? Personal, Subjective and allow for criticism and political scrutinise.

[imonclouddesign]

Year 2 PDP

For the task, we have been asked to find idea’s for a paper-based portfolio and choosing what we would like to include in our portfolio. They will be looking at the design, layout and construction not so much on the content as we will be adding to it over the year. The bit of content they will look at will be if it is relevant to where I would like to end up. I have been asked to look at inspiration on how I would like to design my portfolio. The work I can include doesn’t have to be all graphic design it could be anything that I think is relevant to my future. I have chosen to include in my portfolio some of my college work as I believe that the designs which I did are very strong. I’m going to make my portfolio as eye-catching as I can, and include as many different designs as I can. But not to over-loaded as I don’t want to look like my work is too busy.

[imonclouddesign]

Production, Value and Taste Task 2

Walter Benjamin- The Work of Art in The Age of Mechanical Reproduction

For this task, we were asked to create a comic strip for the culture. I chose to complete this task in illustrator and I looked at how developing art has developed over time from being paintings to letterpress then to printing from a computer. Also, it has become a lot easier to copy and produce mass productions.

[imonclouddesign]

Human Being, Doing, Thinking, Making Task

Gender Illustrations

What does it mean to be a body in the world?

For this task we were asked to find an example of an illustration or creative practice where people have tried to answer some of these questions that this lecture addressed. Questions about gender, phenomenology, everyday life, lived experiences, or how we perform our lives.

The Artist I have researched  is Daniel Arzola he tries to answer the questions about gender that came up in the Human Being, Doing, Thinking, Making lecture.

These are some of the illustrations he produces to bring awareness to gender and sexuality, the ‘invisible made visible’

As Ru - Paul says - We are all born naked the rest is just drag.

This links to the Lecture Human Being, Doing, Thinking, making because in the lecture it mentions about a person gender can only be male or female which is being shown through Daniel Arzola illustrations. It shows you don’t have to be straight and as its ‘not mandatory’. On all of pieces of illustrations says ‘I’M NOT A JOKE’ which shows this is something Daniel Arzola is passionate designing. He also says that as it should be taken seriously as this area he is talking about isn’t a joke. This all links back to the lecture in so many different ways from standing up for gender neutral to how serious this is within everyday life. How this affects people in today’s day because it’s gone back to gender spilt.

[imonclouddesign]

London Trip

V&A

For this trip we went to London to go see the Victoria and Albert museum as we was designing a poster for them and we needed to no what type of design they were after. For our brief as we as designing a poster we needed to think of an artist which we could use as the artist for our design. We had to promote an advertising poster, leaflets for our chosen artist who we could see having there work put up in the V&A. I really did enjoy looking around the V&A as it was all different kind of art not just painting or drawing, there was some photography and how photo’s developed over time.

After visiting the V&A we split off into groups to go see a Graphic Design agency which was called Dalton Magg, going there was really exciting as I have never been in an actually Graphic Design Agency. The Agency we visited was a typography Agency, we learnt a lot about how they worked and how they produced their work. I found it very interesting because typography is a skill that I have had very little experience with.

[imonclouddesign]

Materiality Session

Amanda’s session

Explore contemporary design & advertising.

Finding examples where dominance in society is represented.

How might the language used in your findings contribute to our perception of the world and how it impacts on our lives?

I think this is about two things’ mainly one of them being sexism and the other being inviting the ‘target’ audience to take part or get what they are selling.  The language that suggests that women should be the only one being parent to a baby is stereotyping women to be the house maid sort of to look after the children while the husband is off at work. As a Graphic Designer this is something to keep in mind as this is happening in the everyday world. We need to make sure it is very clear that we aren’t doing the opposite as it will make us look like we are only trying to make things worse.

[imonclouddesign]

Human Being, Doing, Thinking and Making Lecture notes

The empty space

“I can take an empty space and all it a bare stage. A man walks across this space whilst someone else’s is watching him, and this is all that is needed for an act of theatre to be engaged.” – Peter Brook, The Empty Space

Peter Brook (1925)

In 1969, Peter Brook was director of the Royal Shakespeare Company.

-Multi award winning

-Innovator of theatre at the time.

-Wrote ‘The Empty Space’, in which we analysed theatre as a sign system.

-Defined for types of theatre:

Deadly Theatre

Holy Theatre

Rough Theatre

Immediate Theatre

The Deadly

“Deadly” theatre in this instance, means bad.

The Rough

“…. The happening effect – the movement when the illogical breaks through our everyday understanding to make us open our eyes more widely.” (1968:101)

The Immediate

“Cinema, flashes on to screen images from the past.” (1968: 111)

The difference between a live performance. Call me the difference is a feeling, and understanding, the phenomenology of sharing a unique moment in time and space.

The holy

‘invisible-made-visible’

Rhymes and shapes in performance can refer to the words, movement of the performance. Through arranging these in a particular way, we can make me in for an audience.

-The human condition (which is invisible) is made ‘visible’ to the audience. They ‘feel’ it and experience it. That is the phenom part.

Tony Kushner’s Angels in America (1991/ 1993)

-Pullitzer Prize for drama

-7 Tony awards

-Drama desk award

-Two parts play that examines homosexuality and the AIDS crisis in 1980s America

-Metaphorical. Often symbolic

-All-star cast in HBO’s mini-series (2003)

“Art is the imposing of a pattern on experience, and our aesthetic enjoyment is recognition of the pattern.” -Alfred North-Whitehead

We recognise certain experiences, emotions, dichotomies of characters as our own.

Phenomenology is the philosophical name for the method of investigating or enquiring into the meanings of our experiences as we get them. The method is phenomenological reflecting on the pre-reflective all lived experiences.” – Max Van Manen

Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1908-1961)

-French philosopher

-The constitution of meaning in human experience.

“We must therefore rediscover, after the natural world, the social world, not as an object or some of objects, but as a permanent field all dimensions of existence.”-Maurice Merleau – Ponty

Performativity

“In saying something or by saying something, we are doing something.” -JL Austin (1962)

-As Austin (1962) suggests in his publication How to do things with words, words are performance.

Richard Schechner (1934)

-Theatre director and critic

-Performance theorist and author

-A founder of performance studies – proposed a broad-spectrum approach

-Professor Emeritus at the Tisch School of Arts, NYU.

-Editor of TDR: The Drama Review

Key works

-Essays on performance Theory (1977)

-Between Theatre and Anthropology (1985)

-Performance studies (2002)

Broad spectrum approach – The study of performance in ritual and social contexts, interactions, sports, politics etc.

“If we recognise that virtually all human behaviour involves performing, then we can think of the theatre as a kind of laboratory where actors and directors stage experiments to help us better understand ourselves.” – Henry Bial (2010)

The secret service (2013)

The secret service is a performance work I made in 2013. I asked on social media, for people to anonymously submit secrets that they have never previously divulged. Among other things, I was interested in the idea secret (the invisible, intangible) having an existence in own right, a certain materiality.

Vito Acconci (1940-2017)

-Following piece (1969)

-Artist randomly selected a subject to follow around NYC.

-The stalking would cease when the subject entered a building.

-Documented his process and the art making itself.

Other works of the everyday:

Spy Project (1969)

Blinks (1969)

Sophie Calle (1953)

Research based projects: intervening everyday life: The Hotel (1981) To Follow (1980)

Calle worked as a chambermaid for 3 weeks, secretly investigating analysing and documenting the belongings of the occupants.

How do we perform culture/identity?

-Traditional Practices – Dance, ceremony, festivals, holidays

-Traditional costume

-Mannerisms/ Behaviours/ Etiquette

-Body language/ Representation

-Styles of Dress

A (very) Basic outline of sex vs gender

A person’s sex is either of the two main categories’ (male and female) into which humans and most other living things are divided on the basis of their reproduction functions – Oxford Dictionary

A person’s gender is either of the two sexes (male and female), especially when considered with reference to social and cultural difference rather than biological ones. The terms is also used more broadly to denote a range of identities that do not correspond to established ideas of male and female.

The difference??

-Gender is cultural and is the term to use when referring to women and men as social groups sex is biological; use it when the biological distinction is predominant.

-Sex refers to the biological and physiological characteristics that define men and women. Gender refers to the socially constructed roles, behaviours, activities, and attributes that a given society considers appropriate for men and woman.

Judith Bulter (1956)

-An American post – structuralist philosopher

-Queer Theorist

-Identifies gender as a performance

Performing Gender

“There is no gender identity behind the expressions of gender; that identity is performatively constituted by the very ‘expressions’ that are said to be it’s results.” -Bulter (1990) Gender Trouble; Feminism and the subversion of identity.

Drag- Majority male. Different to transsexual. Sometimes referred to transvestitisms or cross – dressing. Drag queen’s specialism in caricature of femininity. A break from dominant cultures’ assertion of what it means to be male/females performative.

[imonclouddesign]

Capitalism/Marxism

Humans have an emotional attachment to buying things because it feels good to purchase anything.

Marxism, Hegemony and design and advertising.

To understand Marxism you have to understand or explore capitalism.

Capitalism is the concept of someone being on top and one at the bottom.

Capitalism is an economic and political system in which countries trade and industry are controlled by private owners for profit, rather than by the state.

Marxism was created by Karl Marx he created it from terrible working conditions suffered by mass.

-Conflict between the rich and the poor.

-Especially it was and still is a call for equality.

-A Marxist viewpoint assumes target audience is passive.

-Marx took no account of gender differences.

-False consciousness - Marx argued that the working class would not know that they were being exploited.

-Feminist and Marxist views are very similar.

Antonio Gramsci:

1897-1937

Hegemony - Leadership or dominance, especially by one state or social group over others.

He argue’s that force and consent is used in advertising.

Hegemony Task - 

Explore contemporary design and advertising and find examples where dominances is society is represented: How might the language used in your findings contributes to our perceptions of the world and how it impacts on our lives?

[imonclouddesign]

Community derive session

We went for a walk in a small groups to discover the meaning of non places.. we walked past the back of Plymouth College of Art and found plenty of places that could be considered non places, walk ways through the back alleys around the college, the queue in the coop and jakes chip shop amongst many other places where nothing much happens. I noticed that everyone was busy rushing about taking no notice of anything going on, just going from place to place thinking about the next thing they were going to do that day.

[imonclouddesign]

Time, Space And Everyday life 

Task 1

I think these are non places because when your in them nothing happens or no one speaks to you really. You only really notice your there if something big is happening. I have chosen these as they are local to me and part of my everyday life or I pass them. 

[imonclouddesign]

Semiotics 2

The 5 W’S of Context Who, What, Where, When, Why?

Who is the designed aimed at?

What is the aim of the design?

What process was used?

What materials were used?

Where will the design be used?

In what environment or setting and why?

When will the design be needed?

When was the design produced?

Why was the design created?

Why did they use that technique as opposed to another?

Why was that image used?

Why were certain words used?

Context Quake Presentation/Poster: ISMS/SHISMS

Produce a group presentation, with accompanying poster and associated artefacts in the style of the ism your group has been asked to research.

Include your reflection on the group presentation project, including a critical analysis of the ism you covered, and any artefacts you made for presentation.

In this lecture we learnt the meaning behind semiotics and isms. We also looked at their effect on marketing. Semiotics play a key role in determining the success or failure of any achievement or goal, semiotics involve studying behaviours, language and sensory effects particular advertising strategies can have on the targeted audience.

We chose this Red Bull Advert to discuss what it signified.

Red Bull isn’t known to be the healthiest drinks, however showing them as batteries is a metaphor for energy. Most people understand what the meaning behind the battery metaphor. Red Bull gives you power, a boost when you’re feeling flat. It is clever advertising. The Red chosen for the Bulls on the logo signify power and danger, also the colour red what is used in bull fighting. The sun is setting... usually when you would start to feel a bit tired but with the power of Red Bull you can continue to feel powerful and energetic. Using this type of advertising can convince and influence people to want to buy a particular product. And the tv adverts for Red Bull says about ‘Red Bull giving you wings’ to power through the day.

[imonclouddesign]

George Perac 'Approaches to what? Here is my quick response to Approaches to what... I have chosen to base this sketch on the film 'bird box' bird box is slightly different in context I think it can be interpreted in many ways but overall I feel the film represents fear of confronting different things in life and blindly ignoring things that are right in front of you which is what I took from the lecture about Approaches to what?

[imonclouddesign]

Semiotics 1

Amanda’s session Charles Pierce was an American Philosopher who studied a parallel study of signs called semiotics Triangular mode SIGN OBJECT  External reality referred to by sign INTERPRETANT The concept of sign is different for every person who sees it because our interpretation depends on our experiences, culture, age etc The process of Interpretation comes from semiotics, every time we interpret a sign we begin to understand what it signifies whether consciously or unconsciously we are using the tools of semiotics to understand the meaning STURKEN ET AL (2001) A sign is made up of two different fundamental elements Signifier Signified We have discussed in Amanda’s semiotics lecture, the signifier is an image/sound/word such as statue of liberty. Signified is our understanding- meaning - emotion such as – Statue of Liberty- Freedom – Human Rights.

[imonclouddesign]

Production, Value and Taste Part 2 Lecture Notes

Production and Value

1.Artistic production the creation of beautiful or significant things

The most silent and swift and also the most complete and comprehensive revolution in history: it changed everything. But-and this is an important element of revolution-the technological and Advances introduced the notion of change, interjected nations of novelty and processes in society.

Industrial design

Constructivists propose to replace arts traditionally concerned with composition with a focus on construction.

The term industrial design refers to the design of maths-produced, Machine -made goods.

Constructivist textile design (1924) Lyubov Popova

-Popova first emerged as an impressionist painter, but she was later drawn into constructivist and supremacist circles. By 1921 she had abandoned painting to pursue the constructivist ambition to leave behind traditional art forms and to make work for mass production.

The magnificent cuckold (1922) Vsevolod Meyerhold/Popova

-Popova also designed a theatre sets for Meyerhold, a constructivist Director and play a writer who revolutionised theatre and performing by using movement and the actor’s bodies to create meaning. The body as a machine.

Little dance aged Fourteen (1881/1922) Edgar Degas

-First made in wax sculpture then later cast into iron, which is the statue on display at Tate Modern.

Nuclear waste Encapsulation (2007) Taryn Simon

-Simon’s photography captures the eerie Reminders from the production of Nuclear Energy.

“Production is at the heart of making art. Artists and theorists have you long acknowledged it’s important as both an artistic action and an idea to be explored. And as the role of production has shifted in our lives, so have the ways in which artists foreground production as a tool, others use their work to explore ideas around the production we might otherwise overlook.”

Production

Marilyn Diptych (1962) Andy Warhol

-Using her signature silk-screen technique, Warhol found a way to mass (re) produce images.

Reproduction

Warhol Marilyn (1965) Elaine Sturtevant

-going are you by her last name, Elaine Sturtevant was a master of appropriation who re-created works by iconic 20th century artists in order to explore and authenticity, artistic celebrities, and the creative process calling her approach “repetition,” she began making deliberately inexact copies of the work of predecessors and contemporaries in 1964, repeating pieces by the likes of Andy Warhol, Keith Haring, and Marcel Duchamp.

Ways of something-Lorna mills (2014)

“for me, it opens up the question of whether contemporary ‘network culture’ is a distinct from ’mass media’ as ‘mass media’ it Was from its old antagonist, ‘high art’.”

-This is a reproduction of the original ‘ways of seeing’ doc alongside visual and audio clips, also reproductions.

Water Benjamin (1892-1940)

-German philosopher, cultural critic

-Member of the Frankfurt School

-Wrote ‘the work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction (1936)

-A critique of the authenticity of mass-produced art.

The work of art in the ages of mechanical reproduction-Walter Benjamin (1936)

“The uniqueness after a work of art is inseparable from its being embedded in the fabrics of the tradition.”

The work of art in the ages of mechanical reproduction

-In the past, works of art had been produced and reproduced by hand.

-Mechanical reproductions of art revolutionised…

-Graphic art was made mechanical reproducible by the woodcut, lithograph and later photograph and film.

-Even the ‘Best’ reproductions lack a presence in time and space.

-Unique existing of work of art is replaced by multiple copies.

-The original work has an ‘aura’ which is created through its time and place in history

“The unique aura of distance, however, close it may be.”

Does sculpture have an aura?

Even though duplicated colour the artist Touch and the location play into its uniqueness.

The work of Art in the art of digital reproduction.

When you artwork in a gallery setting you share an attachment with their whole experience. When you scroll online and come across the artwork you went to see in some gallery then it can become a numb sensation; it becomes another image lost in the thousands of images that populate their ever-growing achieve of the Internet… the social interaction of being able to share thoughts and ideas with one another over and the artwork is something that is lost when viewing an artwork online.”

[imonclouddesign]

Production, Value And Taste Part 1 Lecture Notes

Why do we like what we like?

“The strongest drivers in taste are occupation and education.”

“But class and education don’t always have the biggest influence on taste. In  sport, the most powerful divider is gender: in music, its age.

Australian Cultural fields project (2016)

Portlandia ‘Its over’ (2011-2018)

-Absurdist series set in Portland, Oregon, that gently pokes fun at the laid-back Pacific Northwest City.

Pierre Bourdieu (1930-2002)

-French philosopher

-Distinction: A social Critique of Taste and Value (1979)

-Cultural and social capital.

In the mid-aughts, Burberry faced an unusual problem: too many people were wearing its signature pattern. B-list actors, hooligans - they were all going around in the company’s iconic beige, red and black check; sometimes in counterfeit form. This diminished the pattern’s status in the eyes of high-end shoppers.

-Burberry burned over $37 million worth of products in a year.

-Burberry’s destruction of £28m of leftover clothing shows fashion is still all about class.

A Rake’s progress, Hogarth (1735)

The young heir takes possession of the miser’s effect

-Follows the story of the 18th-century man on a journey of social mobility and moral corruption.

-Tom has come into his fortune on the death of his miserly father.

Surrounded by Artist and Professors

-Tom is at his morning levee in London, attended by musician’s and other hangers-on all dressed in expensive costumes.

The tavern scene

-Depicts a wild party or orgy underway at a brothel.

-The prostitutes are stealing the drunken tom’s watch.

-There are signs of disease and decay.

Arrested for Debt

-Tom is saved from the debtors by Sarah, his jilted fiancé.

Married to an old maid

-Tom tries to save his fortune and status by marrying a much older, rich woman.

-His jilted fiancé is still present in the background and he eyes up the maid attending his new wife.

Scene in a gaming house

-Tom is a gambling den, pleading for financial assistance.

-Everyone is to busy gambling to notice a fire has broken out

The prison scene

-Tom is in debtors’ jail, having lost his wealth for a second time.

-Sarah and the new wife appear distressed in the scene while Tom begins to go mad.

A Rake progresses.

-He ends his days in Bethlem Hospital (Bedlam), London’s infamous mental asylum.

-Only Sarah young is there to comfort him, but Rakewell continues to ignore her.

The vanity of small differences, Grayson Perry (2012)

In his tapestries, Grayson Perry examines the different tribes to which we may belong and how our choices in dress and possessions give us a sense of allegiance or kinship.

The adoration of the cage fighters (2012)

The tapestries tell the story of class mobility, for I think nothing has as strong an influence on our aesthetic taste as the social class in which we grow up.

The agony in the car park (2012)

-The vanity of small differences tells the story of the rise and demise of Tim Rakewell and is composed of characters, incidents and objects Perry encountered on journeys through Sunderland, Tunbridge Wells and The Cotwords.

Expulsion from No.8 Eden Close (2012)

The Annunciation of the Virgin deal (2012)

The upper class at bay (2012)

#Lamentation (2012)

-Both Tim and Tom meet a pretty grisly end.

High Art or Low Art

“There is no line between fine art and illustration; there is no high or low art; there is only art, and it comes in many forms.” – James Gurney

Cindy Sherman vs. Kim K: selfies

Sherman analyses the seductive and often oppressive influence of mass-media over our individual and collective identities, particularly those of women. Turning the camera on herself in a game of extended role-playing of fantasy Hollywood, fashion, mass advertising, and “girl-next-door” roles and poses.

Cindy Sherman (1954)

Sherman’s many variations on the methods of self-portraiture share a single, notable features: in the vast majority of her portraits she directly confronts the viewer’s gaze.

Untitled film stills (1975-1977)

“I didn’t want to make ‘high’ art, I had no interest in using paint, I wanted to find something that anyone could relate to without knowing about contemporary art.” - Cindy Sherman

Cindy Sherman Instagram

“Sherman, has, of course, earned her place as one of today’s great artists by taking photographs in which she almost always appears as the only subject.” – Andrew Russeth (2017)

A private Instagram account run by Sherman featuring a new series of selfies was recently made public, creating an art world sensation overnight.

Kim Kardashian (1980)

Bodily autonomy?

This could be a really important, fundamental (and in this instance is deliberately provocative) concept. Unconditional, universal bodily autonomy. Performing Power and Statue. These images are described as nude and seldom ‘naked’.

Selfish (2015)

“This black section of the book is its biggest statement. Among the fleshy, lip-biting, bra-tugging shots, she writes nonchalantly, ‘I wasn’t intending to put these in the book but saw them online during the iCloud hack, I’m not mad at them. Lol.’ It’s the most brazen ‘Lol’ ever typed.” – Amy Cliff (2015)

[imonclouddesign]

Stuff And Things Part 2 Lecture Notes

Materiality

Oxford English Dictionary

1: The quality of being composed of matter:

‘The exhibition explores the materiality of the body’

2: A material quality of or thing.

“Giving a materiality to space.”

Merriam - Webster:

1: The quality or state of being material

2: Something that is material.

The material

Material is material. Material can be considered physical. It can relate to matter, anything that has weight and takes up space.

Vs.

The immaterial

The term “immaterial” is used to define the realm of the physically imperceptible; sometimes considered spiritual or intanglible.

Consider what philosopher Dr. Peter Kreeft fittingly named the ‘dead cow argument’: Imagine you come across two cows – one is alive, and one that has just died.

What is the difference between these two cows? – Craig Payne, quoting Kreeft, explains “there appears to be no material difference (e.g. in size or weight or colour) between the two cows. Yet something is clearly missing. What is it?” The obvious answer is that the cow is “clearly missing” its life – its sole or anima, in other words, it animating principle or form, that which causes the cow to live and develop as a cow.”

So the living and the dead cow, at this point, are still marterially identical.

Everyday objects, Ted Talks Ziyah Gravic (2014)

How have the ‘value’ or significance of these objects/artefacts changed?

It has increased as it is part of history we don’t know

The double-ness of things

“Brown describes the uncanny doubleness of things – the affective, sensuous appeal of things and their ascribed cultural value.” – Lori Merish (2004)

“Artefacts as culturally expressive object lesson.” – Lori Merish (2004)

What happens to objects when they are placed out-of-context?

They become transcribed with new meaning. New meanings are made by the people who observe the objects. This communication can be considered immaterial.

The found Object

A found object is a natural or man-made object, or fragment of an object. That is found (or sometimes bought) by an artist and kept because of some intrinsic interest the artist sees in it.

Readymades – Duchamp.

“An ordinary object [could be] elevated to the dignity of a work of art by the mere choice of an artist.”

Marcel Duchamp used the term ‘readymade’ to describe his sculptures made from manufactured objects. His infamous ‘Fountain, 1917,’ an upturned urinal, shocked that art world, raising questions about what art is and the role of the artist.

Mark Dion – Tate Thames Dig (1999)

“Each is a material witness, performing the same function as a historical proof.”

Claude Levi – Strauss (1908-2009)

-French anthropologist and ethnologist

-Key in the development of the theory or structuralism and structural anthropologist

-Material things are ‘good-to-think-with’

We can think about, analyse and investigate our lived experience through our relationship with the physical word. The object.

Bill Brown, The nature of things

Thing Theory (2001)

-When object because ‘things’

-Discusses how inanimate objects transform us, in the art and life.

A Sense of Things (2003)

-Investigates the relationship between human (subject) and object in American literature

-Takes a broader look at how Americans came to define themselves through material objects

Keys and Krates Feat. Katy B – Save me, (2015)

-Under a motif of forbidden love, the video profiles the exaggerated inanimate relationship as it evolves from suppression to unabashed celebration. Those feelings we may have toward inanimate objects is satirised in this work.

Phenomenology

“Phenomenology is the philosophical name for the method of investigating or inquiring into the meanings of our experiences as we live them. The method is phenomenological reflecting on pre-reflection or lived experience.”- Max Van Manen.

Maurice Merleau- Ponty

-French philosopher

-The constitution of meaning in human experience

“We must therefore rediscover, after the natural world, the social world, not as an object or sum of objects, but as a permanent field or dimension of existence.” - Maurice Merleau-Ponty

Invisible-made-visible: Phenomenology in performace

Peter Brook

-Wrote ‘The Empty Space,’ in which he analysed theatre as a sign system.

Defined four types of theatre:

-Deadly Theatre

-Holy Theatre

-Rough Theatre

-Immediate Theatre