I started off by creating the mock up of ‘Star of the Show’ a piece I was creating for a one of installation at Prettys within the space, working with dimensions of 3 x 9ft canes I was working well up into the rafters of the large roof space, and the weight of the materials started to sag into the space. Thanks to this research I decided to double the thickness of canes, and built the actual piece flat outside the building, so that the material inner panels gave it support when lifted. My tutor jane came into see the mock up and commented that she ‘preferred it before she knew it was a star…’ one of the remits of my work after Concepts & Concepts was to create some ‘shit work’ let go of outcome and stop creating work to a high finish and be guided by the materials themselves, so in that sense I felt the piece was a successful experiment in letting go of outcome.
I had promised a star and that was what I delivered, even if the piece wasn’t critically acclaimed academically. Ironically the staff at Prettys didn’t want me to remove it after 24 hours, saying ‘oh that’s in our newsletter!’ as I was disassembling it, and I got very positive feedback from the client, I think the spectacle was the important part of the piece along with the human interaction, moving it across the town installing it on the day.
