I have begun to experiment with designing leaflets. I’m using a floor plan of our studio space, which will be where we display our work, as a cover design. The leaflets will be presented as a guide to the show and I’m also playing with instructions and rules that will go in the leaflets. I’m trying to use what I observed of people’s actions in the National Gallery to come up with rules that exaggerate element’s of people’s behaviour. For example, ‘please be sure to nod and smile at each piece of work’.
I have also thought about how the gallery is separate from the outside world, and have created rules related to this, such as, ‘please remove your shoes’. I am going to come up with lots of different rules and instructions and play with different combinations and ways of phrasing them.
Elsewhere, we haven’t really done much more with planning our show. We still haven’t got a title, hopefully that issue will be solved next week. I haven’t thought too much about which objects to choose as representation of my practice for the ante-chamber room. Probably lots of maps, gallery guides and books about the gallery.
I’ve been thinking more about the tutorial I had with my tutor a couple of weeks ago and how she saw my floor plan ideas as one sided and felt that my gallery guide idea was the stronger of the two. At the time I felt it was the other way around. But going around the galleries and looking at the film that I shot at the national gallery I think that she was right. Gallery guides and maps are where most of this work started from, and the floor plans seem to be moving away from what it was that really interested me, the control of the visitor within the gallery.
What is clear from looking at the film I took in the national gallery is that I was trying to focus on people’s actions in the gallery rather than the layout of the rooms. It doesn’t help that for our degree show there is a very strong feeling that what we show our work in is our studio and not really a gallery space. As well as this, the space is a lot smaller than the spaces I have looked at in my research. The floor plans just won’t quite work as part of the degree show.
What I can use to show my ideas though is the gallery guide. That would not be so out of place in the show as a design alluding to an actual gallery where there is none. They also have far more in common with the work I have done at the beginning of my third year and throughout my degree. There is a degree of participation about them that my work, and my dissertation, has often focused on, and the floor plans do not.
As it is people’s actions in the gallery that interest me then instructions and guides seem the way forward. I have been looking at artists such as Yoko Ono and Erwin Wurm who have both used instructions in their work. I’m thinking of linking these guides with the idea of the gallery as a secure place. I have touched briefly upon this in past blog entries, describing it as a safe place where people feel comfortable to follow a stranger’s instructions.
Before the beginnings of the Easter break I had a tutorial about my plans for the degree show. My tutor suggested that I needed to go galleries over the holiday and work out what it was that really interested me or annoyed me about gallery spaces. I hoped that doing this would help me focus on the intent of my work and choose between ideas for the degree show.
On Friday I went to the Gillian Wearing show at Whitechapel Gallery, Jeremy Deller and David Shrigley shows at Hayward Gallery and to the National Gallery. I will go over the first two shows later. While at the National Gallery I decided to secretly film people looking at the work (not sure if this is actually allowed…). This is meant as a form of research and not as a piece of work. It was interesting to compare different groups of people, tourists, school groups, lone visitors and groups of visitors. I have not reviewed the footage very much yet but I want to compare these groups, how much time they spend looking at work and what they look at.
Whilst at the gallery I decided to follow the advice in Thomas Hoving’s book so that I was visiting the gallery ‘the way the pros do’. I went straight to the shop and bought a postcard of Holbien’s The Ambassadors which I at one point ‘waved’ at a guard to find directions. I also looked at what I didn’t like and listened to music. Hoving even recommends what music to listen to, so I might repeat this exercise keeping more strictly to Hoving’s guidelines. I filmed myself asking the guard directions. Hopefully I can use this footage as a way to find focus in my work.
The following is a proposal of my work for the degree show. We each presented our work so that we could have an idea of work that could be invasive and keep track of what each person is doing. Everyone seemed happy that this plan was not as invasive as my first ideas, and is a stronger idea too. Unfortunately I then had a tutorial and my tutor prefers the workt hat I have been doing with gallery guides. I shall keep working on both and decide after easter which I would prefer to do.
My work recently has focused on the directional nature of the gallery space. I have looked at how architectural design of the gallery is a major tool in the direction and paths of visitors to galleries, particularly with newer galleries such as the Tate Modern. The use of directional devices seems out of place to me in a space that, in the past, was considered a place to stroll, a place to wander and discover new things, as well as a space to see something specific. I want to get lost in a gallery, to make my own discoveries. These ideas are influenced by visits to the Sir John Soane Museum, a maze of a house full of a variety of types of artwork and artefact. I find that in becoming lost in a museum or gallery you become more immersed in the work that is displayed there.
My floor plans aim to explore different gallery layouts that intend different experiences for the visitor. These include being directed around a space, encouraged to get lost amongst the space, and emphasis on the differences of work on show.
For the degree show I want to draw one of these floor plans, in actual size, onto the floor of the studios. This could be either 207 or 206 or ideally throughout both. The aim of the floor plan is not to curate the works in the exhibition; that would be done however the curating team decided. The aim is to show the possibility of a different type of special layout, which would offer a different experience of a gallery.
Practical Considerations:
• I shall probably use vinyl tape to draw the design on the floor, but I need to find out if this is achievable.
• I do not know what colour it will be yet.
• It will not go on the walls.
• The condition of the floor is something I need to discuss with Sina as well as with everyone in the group.
• Maintenance of the work, I am not sure what I will have to do during the degree show to maintain the piece, if anything. I will know this when I know what material I can use to create my drawing.
Our degree show is progressing well. On Wednesday we presented our ideas to each other so that we can have an idea of space and any issues with intrusive work (such as mine, and works involving sound and light etc.) We have not yet settled on a title for the show, this will probably happen in the week after Easter. What we have decided on is a concept for the show. This involves having an antechamber through which visitors to the show must pass before entering the main gallery/studio space. The antechamber shall work in a similar way to the cabinet show in that each person will provide objects and books that represent or have influenced their practice.
In the same way as the cabinet show the objects will not be labelled and it is up to the individual visitor to connect what is in the antechamber to work that is on display in the main space. After Easter we should each have 10 objects that may go into the antechamber space.
