The Last Part (Unit No.3) - a very delayed post!

I've just found this as a draft in my post list (from December!) so I thought I might as well publish it, I think I was waiting for a photo to choose itself.

So now I start the final leg of my MA - the Final Major Project and I am extremely excited... shall it be the culmination of something? I doubt it...I truly believe it is only the start. This whole experience has changed my life and my outlook on art, design, creativity and thinking. 

So after a restful weekend spent going to see 'The Lady in a Van', wrapping Christmas presents, making special cards and eating chocolate with my feet up behind my new double glazing (I actually can't feel the wind in my living room anymore) I am ready to start Practice 3. This is what I am going to do...

'My rationale is to bring together people, place and politics through carrying out work in situ in Chernobyl and presenting a video of this as a major piece of work. 

And produce a large-scale exhibition piece: ‘What Once There Was’ (working title) using life-size interior pieces for maximum impact and real human emotiveness which essentially will bridge the gap between space and time, between 1986 and now and between the Ukraine and here. It could be an immersive installation that will intend to convey the emptiness, the fear of what has happened there, what could happen here, allowing the viewer to connect and (only) imagine loss of this magnitude.'

This is how I am getting on - i.e. 'not well', it could be a major waste of time/disaster but who knows what will happen before I finish it, it is by working on it that I am generating new ideas, all the time :)

                
via GIPHY

MA Show 2015 Manchester School of Art (2 short reviews)

Jat Biring

MA Textiles for Fashion

Benzie Building

Jat Biring

One stand out, impactual piece tells the million stories of a million individuals. Jat states it is ‘an abstract illustration of fearlessness’. I see fear, but true it lessens as the eye carries upwards, a journey through and then overcoming anxiety perhaps.

The stark, huge, black and white drawing gets to the heart of the matter, an intense portrayal of lines and tension and adrenaline- the knots are very clever.

A 2D response that ‘feels’, with a 3D form, movement and in the solid areas – stillness, just black.

On the curation:
Hung in a window the white space had a reflective positioning, giving a different effect daytime/nightime… however the white space of the piece was not that pristine whilst it felt it should have been. Attention to detail was also slightly lacking at the edge, giving the work an ‘in progress’ working document feel which may have been deliberate I don’t know.
 

Eleanor Mulhearn

MA Animation

Holden Gallery

My ultimate favourite, Eleanor’s work was sooo beautiful. She uses discarded objects and flea market finds (<3) and gives them a new, more interesting life. Each piece was exquisite with it’s own personality, well observed and highly sensitive, beautifully made. I haven’t even seen the animation and I love it already.

Eleanor's statement describes these pieces as a reinterpretation of the miniature and a destabilisation of a once personal object. I appreciate how she has not made them 'perfect' but they are created with chips and crevices so you can see into an empty inside, to me they are intrinsically perfect.

On the curation:

Perfect; on unobtrusive naïve shelves, totally in keeping, against a stark white wall, carefully arranged. From a distance and close up, they just looked right. Stand back and take in the original plaster frieze, ornate and historical and sculptural and they look even better, in juxtaposition (had to put in that word).

Eleanor Mulhearn

 And in other news, or rather images:

Deborah Harrington - MA Photography "What Remains' series

Nicholas Young - MA Graphic Design and Art Direction 'RMBK1000'

Steve Oliver - MA Fine Art 'Tiny Hands'

To present (in a formal and ceremonious way)...

I present...

A research study project on a (local) contested territory.

On a productive and painless morning, the last session with my lovely group, we surveyed our (very hard to get) exhibition space and then went and played a game to generate a jumble of phrases to describe our joint 'production', it was a great idea which luckily worked first time, whether anyone else will be able to understand it is debatable (though not that necessary) but it's conceptual and fits with the theme! I will be really sad not to be in this class anymore. I am thinking of going to do a 'Contested Territories' MA instead.

Contested Territories Selection

So then, I had to centre myself and focus on the 'presentation' of my work to 2 lecturers. It went much better than I had hoped, because they were nice. It was very positive overall although my blog should be more academic and my final piece should really have been more minimal/abstract. I can live with that. I think I may even pass but only if someone lovely irons my exhibit before it gets hung. I am grateful it's getting hung (and wafted).

Now just to electronically submit and turnitin. Then on with the Practice 1 module (after Paris of course).   

In the library...

It was assessment day, not for me but I thought I would get a sneaky preview of the full time students work before it's my turn in May, no such luck - we were barred from the studio early doors so I accordingly attended my Contested Territories lecture on Contested Memory... and it was really good/thought provoking. It was all about interesting stuff including Holocaust Memory and the power/politics of what is chosen to be remembered and what is chosen to be forgotten, the eradication of collective memory and how artists/photographers etc. portray and/or 'aid' collective memory. 

Then my plan was to use the time of banishment to work on my CAD files for the Brother embroidery machine and come up with something amazingly beautiful, after a quick trip to the library.  So after a short and useful meeting over lunch (well a banana), I duly went to the library. I spent 3.5 HOURS writing a conclusion for my CT research... 1.500 words; I think the whole project should have been done in that many. Then I spent 35 extra minutes looking for books to support the mornings lecture, numbered and in a 'system', should have been easier - out of a list of 9 (available) I found 4 that were there, but minus one as it was too heavy.

So no amazing embroidery design but a DVD for the weekend:- 'Eichmann', the trial of a Nazi war criminal. Can't wait.