3 “Newish” designs for my work.
1. In this design I wanted to bring in the painterly side of me into the installation work – and was trying to figure out how this could be achived. With this particular design all aspects on the walls is to be painted, with shelves later attached to the bookcase to provide space to create a 3 dimensional feel so that I can also add objects that I have been collecting over the past few months.
(Looking back to my John Berger post earlier in the blog) – Tokens are used in enclosures for animals to make us (the viewers) feel a little bit better that these animals are in their “natural” habitat within the confines of the zoo. With this design in particular I wanted to replicate this – to give the performer/viewer tokens of their life through recreating a living room/bedroombut solely through painting and then providing them with minimal objects – so a chair and a few objects on shelves to interact with.
2. In this design I wanted my viewer to be able to wander through the piece and almost become the animal. Going from bottom to top of this design … the viewer would enter through the doors (marked in red) and would enter a smallish, cramped cell like structure with a bed, a table and chair and, in this design, a TV is providedbut in others I have drawn board games, puzzles, books. The viewer (now participant) would be able to interact with the pieces of furniture and play at being the animal in the enclosure … in later designs cameras have been be placed within the enclosures and linked to screens outside the space so that viewers can view the “animal” as if at the zoo.
The participant then exits the enclosure into their outdoor area – with real grass, an area for relaxing (a paddling pool is designed here – but a slide could be included) so that like animals in zoos they have both an inside area and outside.
3. Two designs of enclosures that I have been thinking about – do I use a cage and ask my viewers to either interact with the cage (or possibly include a performance piece) or do I create solid walls so that the viewer has to peep into the work and see participants/performance in the space – recreating a zoo…
Most recent question of thought is … What do I want to do ? Do I want my viewer/participant to feel ? …
