mhansenmajorone2022 - Tumblr blog

[mhansenmajorone2022]

FINAL PIECE

Notes towards an Educational Tool / Installation 

Digital platform access via https://readymag.com/u52735395/4104967/ Full length of videos here. 

[mhansenmajorone2022]

REFLECTIVE STATEMENT

For my Major One project, I wanted to explore further the ways in which I can develop my own art practice. The project was self-directed and therefore gave me the opportunity to explore matters that relate to me as an artist. In link with my extended essay and my independent project from second year, I wanted to continue my research regarding racism and whiteness. The project started off researching educational structures within the Danish school system through conversations with teachers and students. My aim was to be able to create a learning tool, using moving images, to demonstrate Denmark’s colonial history. Well aware at the beginning of the project of the subject's scale, my process led me to conclude that I was unable to take on, at this stage, the position of a teacher and collect enough research that would allow me to cover a massive part of history. Understanding the problems and questions that arose from the process of making the impossible, ‘Notes towards an Educational Tool’ emerged. 

As an artist, my work is inspired by and based on what is happening in our society. Through my process of working with subjects surrounding different problematics, I have understood the difficult task to try and take a standpoint from someone else. I have explored how we are able to speak with and to instead of behalf of or for, and therefore, for this project, I am using my own personal experience to guide through the message I want to convey. 

Inspired visually by artist William Kentridge and his exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts in London, I wanted to adapt to the method of collecting different pieces, which works individually, but once experienced all together, the pieces allow one to understand the bigger picture. Theoretically, I was inspired by methods used by the Theatre of the Oppressed and how you are able to use questions rather than answers and allow conversations and discussions to happen within the space.

The project is presented through an installation and a digital platform. It was important to me that I would be able to invite the audience to be part of the process and discussion. I created a space that would allow that by using different screens set up in a space that allow the audience to walk around and experience the pieces all together and one by one. The installation is using different methods to interact with the audience. One piece, the audience is able to click on a mouse in order to flip the pages of a book. One of the videos can be read without sound but as you take on headphones, you are able to get a more intimate experience and allow a focus towards that specific piece. The digital platform is adapted for the personal experience and portfolio. 

‘Notes towards an Educational tool’ explores how much we rely on school structures to teach parts of our history, asking how has the technology surrounding it changed, and can we make something more nuanced and engaging. Even so it is engaging, it asks if anyone even cares and how do we make them care. It is part of a process of understanding how we can use an educational tool, but also part of a process of how I, as a white artist, can work around racism. This, which I believe, I have accomplished.

[mhansenmajorone2022]

TECHNICAL ASPECTS / EDITING

Editing I have used procreate and photoshop for the animation and edited in Premiere Pro. 

Sound I want to create a sound scape that is independent from the videos. I have added a voice over on the video; notes from my mind but in the installation it is an option to hear so because the sound will come through headphones. It allows a more private and focused listening and experience for the viewer. The sound scape will intimate the classroom sounds - allowing the audience to place themselves into this environment and to make them reflect on what this experience mean to themselves. The soundscape will have elements from each video; flipping through a book, writing on blackboard, classroom ambience, children in school.

Use of screens  Initially, I thought of using a projection for one of the videos but after experimenting I found out the importance of my images being clear and contrasty. Therefore I have chosen tv screens, 16:9 format, to make sure you are able to see all the details in my animations. 

[mhansenmajorone2022]

FINAL PREPARATIONS AND THOUGHTS

After experimenting with the set up of the installation, I have been able to make a clearer sketch to plan out from.  Consider:  What space am I creating? How should the audience engage with the piece? Should there be chairs or how does an open space work? The book will be an interactive piece as the viewer can click to flip the pages.  I am going to include a presentation of the work on the day I am presenting the work. As this project comes from personal experience, it makes sense to bring myself into it and also engage in the conversation that I wish to have. The space is a learning experience and the conversations between the audience become part of the soundscape - because the piece is asking us to talk about it!  I am going to try and contact groups within the university who knows and work around decolonising within education and invite them to the viewing. This allows the piece to build on the idea as a work of progress and with new inputs, my work will continue to grow. 

[mhansenmajorone2022]

DIGITAL PLATFORM OR INSTALLATION?

Installation ideas

Link to digital platform : https://readymag.com/u52735395/4104967/ (ALL WORK IS ON THERE) I created a digital platform as it helped me visualise the different ideas I had and how the different fragments would work together. I think the platform works very well as a portfolio of the project and to explore by yourself. I think presenting the work to a group, the digital platform will not show the potentials of the work and the engaging part might be lost. Therefore the digital platform will work for me as something to document the project on but I want to create an installation to invite the audience to be part of the process.  Giving the audience to explore the project by themselves within a space, gives it intimacy that the platform won’t do. I want to think of it as a gallery space and imitate the classroom space to give the audience the opportunity to think about their own experience of learning.  I have sketched out some ideas but I am going to try and set it up - using different methods to see what works best and be within the space myself. 

[mhansenmajorone2022]

RESEARCH

Readings: Constituting an Archive by Stuart Hall A Duty of Care by Holly Graham

[mhansenmajorone2022]

NEW EXPERIMENTS / ADAPTING TO NEW PROPOSAL

I have started working on a new style and adapting to the new direction my project has taking me. My inspiration behind in the visuals comes from Kentridge and the use of chalk on blackboards which was used in school (before the whiteboard). As it is a work in progress, I think sketches works very well in that space. I feel more confident doing this style and it allows me to be more playful and investigating. I read a text by Holly Graham and I have referenced a section that really connected to my own process and thoughts about recreating these scenes of slavery and what meaning it has to it. 

[mhansenmajorone2022]

ARTIST RESEARCH: WILLIAM KENTRIDGE

We went to see William Kentridge at the Royal Academy of Arts in London. He works in and across mediums of drawing, writing, film, performance, music, theatre and collaborative practices, to create works of art that are grounded in politics, science, literature and history, whilst maintaining a space for contradiction and uncertainty.

The exhibition was very inspiring and emerging. It was a mix of large scale projections, different sounds, drawings and performance. His charcoal drawings that he has created into animation by erasing and drawing on top of it was very fascinating. At the time of seeing it, I didn’t think I could relate it to my own project but as I my project has evolved, it has really helped me to look back at the exhibition and think of the space and how the different projections and imagery works together.

All the pieces are fragments that in the end of the exhibition they connect with each other and gives you a wider understanding. I have also felt a bit lost in my visual style but his charcoal drawings has given me ideas to how I can adapt to that. 

[mhansenmajorone2022]

ARTIST RESEARCH

Ian Waugh: Notes to an unmade film An ongoing photographic series.  “With a desire to escape the confines of filmmaking and explore the emotion of the land alone, I soon found my lens could not escape cinema and an unknown narrative began to appear. Perhaps these fragments will one-day reform within a finished film. Or maybe they belong to a film that should always remain incomplete, continuing to expand beyond the edges of the frame, emerging apparitions of a story in flux” This project relates to my own ideas of a process that is ongoing. I thought the way he described his project was very relatable and helps me a lot to think in new ways of it’s okay that not everything is going to be resolved now. There is beauty in the process as well and where can the process take you - rather than rush to an end result. 

Theatre of the Oppressed Created by Brazilian visionary Augusto Boal. Theatre of the Oppressed is a form of popular community-based education that uses theatre as a tool for transformation. It is encouraging critical observation and representation of reality, envisioning the production of consciousness and concrete actions.

“Pedagogy of the Oppressed, T.O. invites critical thinking. It is about analyzing rather than accepting, questioning rather than giving answers. It is also about “acting” rather than just talking. In T.O., the audience is not made of spectators but “spect-actors”. Through the evocative language of theatre, everyone is invited to share their opinion on the issues at hand”

The method behind Theatre of the Oppressed gives me plenty of ideas of how to construct a space that invites the viewer to engage with my piece. It helps me understand how to construct a space to talk about difficult topics and instead of saying - this is right and wrong - it allows a space for conversations and maybe thinking beyond what you thought in the first place. We might not have all the answers now but if we bring it up in an open space - where will it take us?

[mhansenmajorone2022]

FEEDBACK FROM GROUP CRIT AND IN PROGRESS THOUGHTS

I was feeling a bit stuck in the process of developing the learning platform for the children. During the crit, we discussed that the process behind making the videos and the conflicts that occurs are as well as interesting to take into account. I am aware that it is a huge amount of research that must be done in order to be able to make something trustworthy and acceptable to be used in school education. I knew that from the beginning of the project but throughout my process I have acknowledged that maybe not all questions can be resolved. (At this time in my process) Talking with one teacher won’t give me an understanding of the bigger picture because each teacher is different. However, I have done enough research to be able to understand the problematics there are and can be when we are talking about teaching children sensitive and brutal histories from our past. 

My project will be a work in progress. Fragments of conversations, ideas, notes and imagery. A preluded discussion. Unresolved questions.

I was suggested to think it as a museum. Why is a museum suitable for all ages. Sometimes things are bigger than the internet / a website. 

I want to talk about the digital space that school education has been formed into, the problematic of the freedom of choosing what to teach the children, the structures we have been emerged into and asking who is going to change them, it will not say what we have to do but it asks in which ways can we do - challenge the viewer to think about it.  From previous projects, I have used words to deal with difficult problematics. I have used references that helps me back up my questions. And I think I am quite strong with text so my next step is to write down all my thoughts about the process and from there start creating imagery. 

[mhansenmajorone2022]

ILLUSTRATIONS

[mhansenmajorone2022]

RESEARCH: CONVERSATION W TEACHER AND STUDENTS

I scheduled a conversation over Teams with two students, the teacher had suggested to talk with. I wanted to gather information about what knowledge they have and what ways of teaching they think works better for them to understand more complicated topics.  Points from the conversation with the students:  - They are interested in the topic. They have some understanding of how the past connects to racism today. However, it is not something they really talk about beyond the class.  - The knowledge of Greenland is good. They understand how Denmark has made Greenland independent but there could be more a focus on the importance of keeping their own culture and what impact it has done that their society structure is Western.  - They don’t know so much about West Indies and India as they do about Greenland.  - They prefer visuals over text. Like to do group work. They enjoy illustrations but also thinks that to understand the brutality of some scenes a picture will tell more if you don’t know the history. 

Consent form

CONVERSATION WITH TEACHER Before I had the talk with the students, I talked with their teacher to get an understanding of how the structure of teaching  I was very lucky to talk with a teacher who sounded very engaged in the topic and  Points from the conversation:  - He focus his teaching about how we view other people and where prejudices come from.  - He talks about racism today. Black Lives Matter Movement.  - He focus on Greenland’s history. Asks questions about their culture, independence, and Denmark’s role. He focus on how their lives are today.  - He mentions that because there is such a freedom on how you teach in DK and that they are only required to teach some extent of the topic, he is aware that it is not everyone who teaches as much as he does.  - He says, there has come more (nuanced) material available but also a lot he has to find by himself. As with more different ethnicities in schools (the school he teaches at, used to be very white) there has been more awareness of including topics such as racism and differences in school.  - He thinks, videos and visual learning works for the whole class, as text is great but for some it is harder keep up with, so he benefits from using a video to explain a topic before they start reading about it. 

He has given me access to see his course and what material he is using to tell the story of Greenland. This helps me to understand what questions he asks the children and how, as a teacher, you talk about topics such as race and what position you can do that from. 

[mhansenmajorone2022]

FEEDBACK FROM CRIT SESSION

If I am changing my proposal slightly to say that the project is partly a critic of the danish education system and how we teach about colonialism and racism and therefore the project is a draft/tool on how to propose a way of using  visuals to ask those questions.  I am not able to gather enough information / understand the full teaching aspect, therefore the project is a work in progress and more about the possibilities of moving image and how it can be used in a educational way and what methods I can use to engage with the viewer. Therefore by creating a platform were you can click around and ask the viewer to be in control of the direction of learning, I will with animations and illustrations together with informative text and ask questions, be able to create the foundation of further thinking and discussion that can be used in class. 

I will have to make sure to inform that it is a structural issue and it not only in DK this is happening. 

[mhansenmajorone2022]

IN PROGRESS - WEBSITE

Link to website: https://readymag.com/u52735395/4021827/

I have thought about what could be the best way to engage with children. How can I make it interesting? And what can I do for them to learn the most? I have decided to build a learning platform in form of a website where you as the viewer take part in the history by scrolling through the different areas DK once occupied. There will be illustrations and videos you can click on and watch that describes the story of the specific area. I have also included - as an idea at the moment - to each section an archive and dictionary icon. My thought was to have a place for the archive pictures that gives the opportunity for the children to look through by themselves and can invite for a further discussion with the teacher. The dictionary is to have a list of the words that will be mentioned in the video that might need further explanations or be looked at again. 

[mhansenmajorone2022]

ILLUSTRATIONS

I have started on making the illustrations so while I am continuing my research and putting together the script and story board, I can start visualise the project. Creating these illustrations have got me thinking about my previous project and the conflicts it can create when you are talking about colonialism.  Its important for me to understand my position and I am talking on behalf of the white history which I am part of. I conflicted me to illustrated slavery - am I in position in doing so and should I really be recreating these images?  My first thoughts were that I wanted to recreate because I wanted to “modernise” what is available for students. I don’t want to use old drawings because a lot of times the faces of black people are kind of a caricature of how they saw them (animal looking). As with the invention of the camera, there are archive photos of slavery from the end period and to be fair they are more brutal than my illustrations. I don’t want to glorify this period of history because visually I am very neat. Illustrations are good if you are already aware of the story but will it have the same “shock effect” as if you saw a photo? I need to consider this. 

[mhansenmajorone2022]

ARTIST RESEARCH

Nalini Malani: Can You Hear Me? (2019-2020) Nalina Malani is a social activist and artist. Through this piece she gives voice to the marginalised through visual stories which often take the form of multi-layered, immersive installations, exploring themes of violence, feminism, politics, racial tensions and post-colonial legacies. 

I thought this piece was very interesting even though I haven’t thought of my own project to be an installation. First, exploring being an artist and activist and using art to convey your message. Second, the question of speaking for others and fighting their cause (what is her own background?). Third, using animations which is a format I really like as well and planning to use for this project. 

World of Matter http://worldofmatter.net/ World of Matter is an international art and media project investigating primary materials (fossil, mineral, agrarian, maritime) and the complex ecologies of which they are a part. It was created by different artists and scholars. The projects was created on the basis of wanting to respond to the need for new forms of representation that shift resource-related debates from a market driven domain to open platforms for engaged public discourse.  The website works as you are able to click on different images and each represent a different story. It relates to my project in the ways of which I can use a digital platform to engage and formulate my message. 

Filming Revolution https://www.filmingrevolution.org/

Created by Alisa Lebow. Lebow went to Egypt after the revolution in 2011. She talked with filmmakers about the way in which their practices may have changed as a result of their participation in these events. She interviewed different filmmakers, artists, activists, and historians and put it all together on a digital platform for the viewer to click through the different stories.  This project also gives me inspiration on how to build up a digital platform. How you are able to click one one story and it connects to another one. She has made a map out of dots and it’s engaging with the viewer to click around and choose your own path. It’s up to yourself what direction you are taking and what stories you choose to hear. There is a lot of information and I do feel like it is easy to get lost. Maybe that’s the point. But for my own project, it needs to be more constructed and help to lead the way to make the children follow. 

[mhansenmajorone2022]

ANIMATION EXPERIMENT