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Assessment Update

The group decided to pursue the use of 'glitch' in the form of sound art. Our main idea is to transform the environment of a room through the feedback created by two laptops in a skype call. The sound will then bounce between each other and interfere.

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Research The theme my group has chosen to pursue for our event is 'glitch and interference'. Glitch in art can be represented in various mediums but is mostly pursued visually. Phillip Stearn is a New York based artist who works with electronics and media to create corrupted art. By intentionally destroying and manipulating the circuitry of elctronic objects, he rearranges the objects intended use, creating a whole new artwork. A notable example is his series DCP (2010 - ongoing) where he rewires and corrupts the circuitry of old low resolution kodak cameras, making them capture the render of raw data instead of capturing an image. In conclusion, Stearn describes the DCP series as "exploring the algorithmic unconscious at work behind the discipline of digital photography" and "catching a glimpse into what the camera sees when it peers into its own mind". Check it out here: https://phillipstearns.wordpress.com/projects/dcp_series/

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Final Work - ‘Celebrate’

The final work made out of recycled products, with inspiration taken from Yuken Teruya’s paper cuttings.

Concept Statement

The relationship between humans and the environment can be considered as love – hate. Human actions impact it greatly, which is why I wanted to commemorate this relationship through the creation of a flower bouquet.

Flower bouquets are often used as a symbol for celebrations such as birthdays and weddings. However, they also facilitate reflection through mourning. This is the binary of ‘Celebrate’, imagining the human as both the ‘creator’ and ‘recipient’ of the bouquet, in regards to the environment. The human can create the bouquet; choosing to recycle products, sustain and reduce waste, while they can also ‘receive’; consuming materials from the environment. Through the composition of particular materials and the aesthetic of a flower bouquet, ‘Celebrate’ spans many concepts.

By using a mixture of cardboard and plastics from disposable packaging, the un-valuable ‘trash’ is turned into an object of value, also reversing the cycle of man – made interference, transforming the un – natural back into the natural. The use of these man – made materials also allow the meaning of ‘Celebrate’ to span context and time. The materials used do not break down fast when compared to the wilting of flowers. This contrast of material decay also emphasises the impacts of human influence on the environment, with the effects being slow to realise, just like the decay of a plastic bag.

This also comments on the use of resources and sustainability, the ability to consume outweighing the ability to produce. Consumerism and the demand for the ‘fast’ creates an excess of perfectly usable products that end up in landfill, deemed obsolete by materiality. For example, Apple’s production of a new phone every few months encourages society’s ‘throw away mentality’ disposing of products that perform the same function. The demand for the ‘fast’ can also be seen in Fast food corporations such as McDonalds. By prioritising efficiency, the care for the impacts of trash created by consumerism are completely overshadowed by sales. ‘Celebrate’ also challenges the ability to produce and foreshadows the future of the environment and ecologies.

Every year 18.7 million acres of forest is lost every year due to deforestation. This bouquet was also made with inspiration from Yuken Teruya’s work Notice:Forests, where the work acts as a memorial for the environment, paying homage to all that is lost in the process; the trees, wildlife and the ecology that surrounds it.

Reflection

In a world which prioritises speed and efficiency, the making of ‘Celebrate’ contrasts the material itself, created by commercial manufacturing processes. Handmaking the flowers and composing the bouquet took care and time, a guide and reflection of the stance society should undertake.

 Bibliography (references used throughout project)

M. K. Korsu, ‘The Albedo Dreams Kite Making Workshop’ , http://www.artsufartsu.net/the-albedo-dreams-kite-making-workshop/, 24 Feb 2013

Av - Arkki, ‘Mari Keski - Korsu’, http://www.av-arkki.fi/en/artists/mari-keski-korsu_en/, 2013

The Queensland Government Gallery of Modern Art, ‘Yuken Teruya’, https://www.qagoma.qld.gov.au/goma10hub/artists/yuken-teruya, 2007

Y. Teruya, ‘Notice - Forest’, http://yukenteruyastudio.com/projects-1/notice-forest-1.html, 2017

World Wildlife Fund, ‘Deforestation’, https://www.worldwildlife.org/threats/deforestation, 2018

Live Science, ‘Deforestation: Facts, Causes & Effects’, https://www.livescience.com/27692-deforestation.html, 2018

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Created multiple flowers from different recycled materials. I then glued a bamboo skewer to each of them for the base stem. I also created some leaves made from plastic and cardboard.

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Started cutting more petals out of different materials now. Used pamphlets, plastic egg cartons, cardboard boxes and paper bags. Now it’s time to assemble everything together!

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Experimenting

I cut up plastic in the shape of petals from a plastic rice packet and hot glue gunned the petals together to form a rose. Since this test was successful, I might use it in the final work!

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Experimenting

The option to create a memorial flower bouquet for my final work seems promising. Luckily this box from my pile of recycled materials would make a perfect ‘vase’. The hole on the top would make it easier to stick the flowers in. I then had to cut it shorter using a knife and patch up the hollow sides with more cardboard.

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For the final work I am leaning towards the idea of a flower bouquet. They are colourful and symbolic, making it an interesting object to develop as it can hold many different meanings and challenge the assessment 2 prompt.

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Artist research and inspiration 

Mari Keski-Korsu creates works that revolve around the ecological balance between humans and their surroundings, providing an agency for collaboration between communities and their environment through the Albedo Dreams project. Through workshops that focus on DIY Climate manipulation by increasing albedo by reflecting sunlight through suits, car covers and kites, Korsu hopes to mitigate the effects of climate change whilst also raising awareness and promoting collaboration. One work that interest me is Albedo Kites. These are white kites which are flown to reduce climate change. My final work can be made put of recycled material which will reduce impacts on the environment.

Read more here:

http://www.artsufartsu.net/the-albedo-dreams-kite-making-workshop/

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Taking inspiration from week 8’s topic ‘value’, I wanted to analyse the role of materials in the final work. 

Recyclable products would be deemed as un-valuable, especially if the work consisted of disposable packaging, a material which could be easily acquired. However, the value of disposable packaging could contribute to the concept of my final work, highlighting how a material of no value could be transformed to one of value through aesthetic manipulation.

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Artist Research and inspiration 

I focused on Japanese artist Yuken Teruya who through his series of artworks Notice: Forests explores the relationship between human consumption and the environment. By paper cutting sculptures of trees out of commercial bags from well known companies such as McDonalds, Louis Vuitton, Starbucks and Chanel, Teruya transforms the disposable one use ‘garbage’ into an object of value, contrasting its use and exploring the topic of the depletion of natural resources. By cutting these delicate trees, Teruya also wanted to show the link between the ever growing ‘branches’ of global corporations and environmental problems.

I really like this artwork and would like to take inspiration from it for my final work as it recycles disposables bags to create something new, reverting the bag into its old form of a tree and commentating on consumer interactions with the environment.

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Experimenting

To start of the practice led research of assessment 2, I focused on the weekly topic of context and time. This required prior research of current relationships regarding humans, non – humans and the environment. Regarding the environment, I wanted to analyse the role of the human as both the consumer and the preserver amid an ecological change, that is, climate change. Extinction of species is brought about from this process, where an individual who studies and documents these extinctions do so in order gain and preserve knowledge that spans temporally. However, documenting these specimens to classify and preserve is ironic in itself. For example, museum exhibitions which display stuffed animals (including those that are endangered and extinct) to pass on knowledge to the next generation. Thus, for exploring this topic, I focused on this irony, creating my own documentation of plant life by gathering foliage from different species of plants, measuring and recording them, making the human both the consumer and the preserver.

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A sundial our group made for time and context - week 6

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Assessment 1 Final Poster As the world continues to develop, the population continues to grow and the demand for technological advancements is at an all time high. With this brings an increased use of 'one-time-use' disposable products and products which soon become obsolete as a new model replaces it. Where does all this trash end up when it is thrown away? The stimuli for this poster is question 1, where I explored the theme of the relationship between disposables and the environment. Drawing inspiration from the artist Doug Minkler, I wanted my poster to draw attention through its bright colours and decided to combine it with my favourite animal the toucan. Some species of toucan have adapted to human influences which will be perfect for the poster as they are surrounded and have become the 'trash' itself. However, their environment is still at risk due to human impact, mainly deforestation. The recycled materials used consist of newspaper, magazines, coffee cups, takeaway containers and food packaging, with the only natural material being real leaves. All man made materials used in the creation of this poster were recycled products, with the main concept being how everyday disposables have been integrated into the landscape of nature itself (the natural leaves) , that is, they have camouflaged and become the environment.

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Assessment 1 Research - Doug Minkler Doug Minkler is a San Francisco Bay artist whose art prints revolve around the subjects of poltics and ecology, with the mindset of his work 'serving the people'. His most prominent posters addressing the issues regarding ecology are 'Get a life', 'Accidental release plan' , and 'Cars kill everything'. These art prints draw attention through their comical theme and colour, an attribute I would need to take inspiration from.

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Artist Statement

My final artwork is a combination of all three experiments I undertook and includes the influence of the artist Niki De Saint Phalle and her paint shooting works ‘Tirs’. In this final artwork, my concept arose from the process of experimentation, with the notion being the question of ‘what is art?’ and ‘what makes art?’. In contemporary society, art now composes of many different mediums such as digital and audio, contrasting what ‘art’ was classified as, that being, drawing, painting and sculpture.

I wanted to include modern art such as audio and convert it into a visual aesthetic to be included in my final work. Firstly, I replicated my first experiment with my dogs pink paw prints, resulting in a random composition. Then I took influence from my second experiment and converted sections of the audio used in experiment 2 to create a wavelength image. Sections of this image were randomly selected by drawing cards. The cards also determined which colour the bars of the audio would be:

Red Heart = Strong Pink

Red Diamond = Faded Pink

Black Spade = Strong Green

Black Club = Faded Green

The food colouring was then dropped on to the paper (corresponding with bar length) and naturally dripped down the page, like Niki De Saint Phalle’s works. Finally, the papers were separated and layered digitally to create a new piece of artwork, taking influence from the third experiment, with layer priorities being determined by the chance of drawing cards.

Overall, this final work uses chance experimentation to determine the aesthetics of the work and combines both fine and media art, conveying that the term ‘art’ is not exclusive to the standard of a few mediums which were mainly made prominent by early European art.

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Photos of the process of the final artwork.