February 2016 – Naming is Quite a Pain

Dream Box

So last week I presented this idea of “Dream Box” to Prof Louis. Well.. Im pretty hung over the idea of dream, and emotions, and feelings, the act of questioning what really is reality, and what is there? However Louis is right bout the usage of space though. A box will only be a box in a space.

Well Louis asked me “why are you so fixated with this dream idea?” And I replied, “because dreams are taken too lightly, they are in fact another alternate reality” and Louis asked “and this project is going to make us realise that?”
Haha.. damn… that’s true…. :/ So I was thinking about it and was trying to figure out how am I going to challenge this notion of reality?

While talking to Louis, I remembered “Whispering Table” this artwork I found earlier in this semester.

http://thegreeneyl.com/whispering-table

Reasons why I thought of this installation again is that maybe is this idea of a whisper, of spirits talking, of something unseen but yet you hear it, of something there but isn’t. But the cool side to this is that this changes according to culture depending on where you place the bowl. So that’s pretty cool.

But with regards to my dream box I am at loss at how to translate it to space.

One Hundred and Eight by Nils Volker, 2010

One Hundred and Eight

Nils Volker

2.40 x 1.80 m
fans, plastic bags, MDF, relays,
countless screws and a microcontroller
Summer 2010

For something as cheap and easily available everywhere, this artwork is sick. It make something so simple, beautiful and captivating. However of course, he had the use of relays, MDF and individual air vents for each plastic bags to simulate the “breathing” of the plastic bag. The smartest thing of all is that it is creating patterns. (click link for the video)

In any case, back to my project, I do not think I am able to simulate this at this scale neither am I attempting to. However, this work allowed me to see how I can use plastic bags as breathing lungs, that an inanimate object can be so interactive and intriguing. From this project, I will start to think of how air can interact with plastic and how I can arrange them in ways that will allow viewers to see it as neat, messy, as clouds?

Plastic Bags in A different light

And so I’ve picked plastic bags for it’s colors, and the possibilities of colored lights and it’s translucent quality. I searched around online and found how plastic bags can be used in different scenario.

Balloons

Making aware of the environmental factor

Appropriating the plastic bag onto trees, re-decorating the trees with rubbish.

I love this the most ^ The colors illuminating the plastic bags bring about an atmospherical quality that I was looking for with my “Dream Box”.

Re-Thinking, re-looking, re-questioning

I thought and I re-thought about my idea about the “dream Box”. As much as I would love to pursue it, I felt that I wasn’t learning or applying the lessons I learnt with regards to space and experience. That I was about to jump the gun to be an “artist” but yet not have my fundamentals sorted out. So I scrap that and went back to the drawing block. I had to start somehow with material, something flowy, something translucent, something that can be found just about anywhere. I thought of a few items initially,

But I decided on plastic bags. there is a potential for sound, capacity, colours that I can explore with. So for now, I see plastic bags (white) as many many clouds, rattling and moving as you pull a string. This engagement is just still a matter of play only. I have more to think about.

So after researching on the net for a bit, I found other artists that also uses plastic bags in this fantastical style.

It seems like repetition might just be the way to go to emulate and occupy a space.

To be honest, this is out of my comfort. I’ve always created projects I wanted to do, so it was always the idea first. This time around, I’m considering first the material or an object and then with that the environment.

In search of “same same but different”

I have found a pair of toilet in ADM that are almost identical (mirror image of each other).

So my first concern was could I replicate the space of the ladies onto the gents, and the gents onto the ladies? check out the youtube link for my very rough try-out to see if mirroring works. And I think it does. This is just invert girls but normal boys.

Other than that, the internal space of both female and male toilets are actually quite similar except for a few distinct difference for obvious reasons. I found it interesting that the “forbidden place” of the GENTS actually looks similar except for the urinal.

I was worried that someone would walked into me in the toilet videoing. But guessing that the time is too late, I relaxed and it occurred to me that this “worry” I had was taught/ initiated by people/ society. Because space fundamentally is just an area of ground. It holds nothing more.

But yeah, I had fun in the toilet tonight.

I hope my post doesn’t spoil too much fun we will be having in class or experiencing it.
Fun fact: It was actually quite hard to find almost identical toilet in ADM, I think the architect made all the spaces very irregular (even our rooms). Interesting.

Signs

I was thinking of the perception of private space. It can be man fencing up a certain area and claiming that it theirs now, that we have names on doors and then the space is mine, that what is actually a neutral public area has turned private. I’ll make an attempt on toilets because it is universal. My inspiration partly derived from the dormitories’ toilets. They basically occupy the same layout on each floor but each floor differs in gender.

I am interested in how the different signs on the door (semiotics of female & male) thus affect what goes on internally despite having the exact same space and/or layout.

How that suddenly a neutral space becomes limited to only females or males?

Having A Third Eye III

So viola~ Here’s my two phone holders with a small slit just for the camera so that we can see.

Below is a screenshot of what you are supposed to see. Your “back” and a small window for your “front”. I can’t manage a screen record because the microphone is used for skype.

And here’s a video on how it is gonna on up on the head. Thanks Issac for helping me video.