A plea for comments
Okay if you’re reading this I would like to ask a small favour of you, which is leave a constructive comment/critique of my work on this post. And if you do I’ll leave one for you as well. On thursday as I laid in bed trying to summarise my first presentation/critique of the semester, I realised that the only comments I got were that people liked my work (thank you Vimal, ZT and Jo!) and the feedback on my crossword puzzle one (thank you Joy!) and felt that something was missing. I’m not saying I didn’t put in effort for this project nor am I implying that I handed up half-assed work, but as someone with almost no formal design training and a freshmen at ADM my work is almost by definition bound to be really shitty. My work has to suck, and it is through countless critique sessions that I can learn and become a better designer/artist. I’m not saying the ones that liked my work were insincere (I hope not) but I feel that people are either too nice, too shy or just really sleep deprived (which I was too but I still gave some comments). So yeah I hope I get some comments (even if you outright hate street-art and it’s just a personal thing I want to hear it too as it contains insight which can contribute to my growth as an artist, just be tact) and we can all grow through commenting on our ideas! 🙂
On that note I would like to thank Siqi, Eugene, June and Junyuan for giving me feedback, which I will post at the end. I would also like to thank everyone that helped me while I was working on these ideas (like Xinyi Charlimae, Jacob and Kuangjun) and giving tips on how to improve them (more notably Charlene and Zhouyang who really helped develop the Hollywood star idea)
The first 2 compositions are traits of myself (using common objects with minor and non-drastic changes to their original nature for reflection) and the last 2 are goals and ambitions which I project onto the world (thus using street art)
Hi my name is Andrew and I’m interested in many things but not enough to be an expert on them
My interests define me to quite an extent, be it my taste in music or books, and I have a wide range of them. However even though I am interested in things ranging from martial arts to philosophy, I am only casually interested in them and don’t know enough about them to be a expert/die-hard fan. This composition aims to let viewers experience what I mentioned above by recreating a messy poster wall, but this time with nicer aesthetics and almost zero meaning/content (using dummy text). I chose posters/a wall of them because they are things that were made specifically for attracting attention even though they contain quite little information, and that middle ground between initial interest/hesitation to find out more is what I wanted viewers to experience here. Thus the posters and their colours are more eye-catching/appealing to people, but the dummy text/lack of information will give them even less of a reason to find out what they’re about. Misalignment of alphabets hints at how various topics don’t really ‘fit’ together.
Hi my name is Andrew and I’m still finding myself
Pretty straightforward idea, act of finding ‘ANDREW’ is highlighted by numerous pencil strokes on paper and eraser dust at the side. Was debating between using the picture above or this
but stuck to the above one as it showed more of the eraser dust.
Hi my name is Andrew and I’m a rebel that doesn’t know when to be serious
Graffiti breaks the law and thus expresses rebellion, and the color pink/playful font/diagonal alignment is used to make fun of the very serious intentions of the sign (caution sign to stay away from high-voltage equipment). New spray painted text also gives the symbol of a man getting electrocuted a different meaning when viewed together, a sort of retarded dancing/behavior for example.
Hi my name is Andrew and I want to be remembered for being different
Originally wanted to use obituary/tombstone/honorary signs but then Zhouyang suggested Hollywood walk of fame as most notable marker of a person’s legacy. Intentional misspelling of name and contrast between formal font/placement of star in toilet (hence the shoes and pulled down shorts) highlights need to be different from everyone else. Original idea was simply my misspelled name on normal Hollywood boulevard, but lacked contrast thus I thought of informal places where nobody would expect to see such a thing.
Comments/feedback
- throughout my work there is a theme of playing with personal and public spaces, as most evidently seen in the Hollywood star one, and crossword puzzle didn’t really follow that theme with the plain brown background (which was just a cardboard sheet) and thus could have been places at public spaces such as an MRT station for example
- presentation could have been more ‘street’ by sticking printouts on wall, crumpling them, picking them up from floor etc
- crossword puzzle one doesn’t really fit in with the rest
- graffiti on could have used a more zoomed-out picture to show more of the ‘WARNING’ sign below or where this place was
- not everyone knew what a Hollywood star was, could have used something more universal like a tombstone
- poster wall one looks too digitally altered (it’s not, I pasted them on the wall of the 2d computer lab but good point) and could have been on some public space for example
- toilet one was the strongest/most easily understood, good use of context
Discarded ideas