Final Major Project, the installation…

With my garment complete, it was time to install the work!

Before installing work we were asked to write an artist proposal; this is what all artists must complete when wanting to exhibit work in a gallery so it was good practice and ensures that you get that best possible place for your work to look professional and sleek when fully installed.

Within my art proposal I stated that I wanted my work hung and that I needed enough space for six plaster cast hands to be evenly spread when attached to the wall.  The space also needed to be big enough for an audience to be able to gather in order to be able to watch my performance.

Although the installation of work can be quite tedious it’s great to have it completed and for the work to be shown in the best possible way. I began by asking for help from the technician, driftwood was attached to the wall at approximately a 45 degree angle, so that the garment could hang but not against the wall and could still be clearly viewed by the audience. As well as the garment I also hung a mannequin leg within the garment, this was to communicate the idea of metamorphosis and the moment the Little Mermaid is gaining human legs. Both the leg and the garment had strips of dyed aqua film attached and wrapped around them as to achieve a fleshy look and to add texture.

After this was completed the cast hands were attached to the wall with approximately 40cm between each hand and then the black wigs where hung on the hands.

These are some photos of the progression of the installation, final images of the installation coming soon:

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Final Major Project, still going…

Having completed my garment it was now time to start thinking about how my work was to be exhibited. With having an interest in performance art I had thought of having a live aspect along with my installed work. With my not only concentrating on fairy tales but also the relationships within them, I looked back at the Hans Christian Anderson version of the story and remembered the Little Mermaids relationship with her six sisters being the most prominent. This was particularly expressed within the scene when the sisters sacrifice their own hair in order for the Little Mermaid to get her tail back so that she can live her 300 hundred years life span with them.

I felt this was the best relationship to express in my work. I then came up with the idea of having six hands cast (which would be attached to the wall, protruding towards the audience) each representing a sister and each holding some hair. I really liked this idea, but it just needed to be refined…

Back to the idea of a performance aspect, I had originally thought of something pulling the fishtail apart, may be fishing lines and reals? as to link with the under sea theme. With some development of ideas I came up with a solution, by which I would actively use the objects within my installation to re-enact the scene in which the sisters sacrifice their hair to the sea witch for their sister the Little Mermaid.

As like my previous experiment of a paper wig, I had thought of making six paper wigs in which to incorporate into my installation. I decided against this as I felt they didn’t achieve the effect I was looking for and looked quite clumsy. I therefore bought six fake wigs which looked more serious for the atmosphere of the piece rather than comical.

Wig making development:

Unfortunately I have decided to keep exactly what I am doing in the performance a secret until it is performed at my final show exhibition. All will be revealed!

Final Major Project, full steam ahead…

After creating my final designs it was full steam ahead for my final piece. I started the process by sewing a basic garment, which was based on an original Little Mermaid design. This was done in a light weight cream voil fabric as the fabric draped well (as this may have been nessassary when it came to installing the work in the final exhibition). Once intact I began sewing into the aqua film material with differing shades of red thread. This had to be heavily embroidered as when the aqua film came in contact with water the sewn threads would be what remained. As well as embroidering the aqua film I also stitched tucks/gathers into the material as like a previous fabric experiment in order to create a scale like texture. This process took the most time, I used the embroidered aqua film to fil in purposely ripped/torn areas of the garment therefore to create a fleshy look. Once the garment was completely embroidered, using some very watered down red ink I immersed the gament into the water, the aqua film dissolved and left the fabric very slimey and sticky. The fabric was also dyed a light pink, which only added to the goriness of the piece.

When the garment was dry the fabric and threads were stiffened by the stickiness of the wet aqua film and made the piece more sturdy.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Final major project, final designs…

So I had my ideas, experimentation and research… now for final designs. Having been making drawings throughout the experiment and research process, I then researched some illustrators for some illustrative inspiration. I looked at the work of Daniel Egneus, Mathiole and Florian Nicolle. All of which I think are fantastic illustrators, their styles are so beautiful.

Although my illustrations aren’t to the standard or beauty of the researched illustrators, I was pleased with them as I feel I am developing my own style successfully and for the story and scene they are based on they express the emotions well.

My designs…

Vivienne Westwood Semele Walk- Review

Semele Walk– Costumes by Vivienne Westwood

Music by G. F. Handel

Music Theatre by Ludger Engels

Sydney Festival January 16^th 2013

Semele Walk: a catwalk show is based on the Greek Myth Semele. Semele being a story of hatred and jealousy, by which the character Semele is murdered for being pregnant with a child (Dionysus) to the Greek god Zeus as a result of an affair. Westwood completed the couture collection for the catwalk, while the opera music was by Georg Friedrich Handel. The catwalk for this piece acted as the stage of the opera. Westwood wanted to complete the costumes for the piece, as she believed: 

“Semele’s self-destructive nature is relevant to the Dionysian society in which we live today, faced with a destruction of our own making-climate change.” (Vivienne Westwood, 2013).

Inspiration also came from a series of chapters from Ovid: The Metamorphoses (Book three) version of Semele, in which like the original myth Semele is mortal and is killed by the weapons of thunder and lighting, but differently from the myth Semele asks to be killed as to stop the affair she is having with the Roman god Jupiter. In addition to the costumes the original opera music was used, giving an atmospheric vibe as if the audience were at the theatre. Although the costumes are contemporary and the music traditional this expresses some what of a oxymoron, although the two are contrasting they emerge together to create a highly dramatic and theatrical catwalk show, which cannot be compared to another.

The photographs of the event are intriguing to look upon as the viewer realises the work of Westwood as high fashion but there is something more to the pieces for the Semele catwalk. They are wilder in style with lavish amounts of light reflecting from the fabrics used, the models hair has been extremely backcombed to achieve a wool like texture, differing characters having different flashes of colour within their natural hair colour and some with hair accessories such as feathers. Also the models within the piece are wearing stage makeup, all having powder white faces and some with the addition of badly applied red lipstick (which depicts the emotion of the character, for example lip stick used for a turned down smile) it visually communicates to the audience that the character is sad. 

In both stories Westwood has thought that the events link to the contemporary world and having made the costumes for the production she has managed to get her views on climate change across to an audience and consequently been able to start up a ‘climate revolution’ campaign. Therefore not only does she get credit for making a superb collection of costumes for a unique opera show she has also had the opportunity to communicate her views and try and spread her views in order to prevent the destruction of the world, through our self greed in doing what is causing harm to the world opposed to protecting it for future generations.

Final Major Project, further research and experimentation…

Following my mid-way critique at university my ideas and research really started to take shape. Unlike Disney, Anderson was a little more descriptive in the way he told the reader how the Little Mermaid got her human legs.

“Then the little mermaid drank the magic draught and it seemed as if a two edged sword went through her delicate body: she fell into a swoon and lay like one dead.”

This was the main research I took to drive and inspire my final piece. But when researching the story I came across a poem by Debra Cash in which one stanza influenced also got me thinking about final piece:

Hans lied. He simply couldn’t imagine

I would want to shed the blubbery tail

dragging behind me like a torn bridal gown,

that I would prefer to stand on my own two feet

and walk on my own, love or no love.

Before creating any formal design ideas I researched my theme in a broader sense. Firstly I managed to catch a little bit of the documentary Mermaids:the body found, I wasn’t watching the documentary to find out whether these scientists believed that mermaids were real or not but to see how they imagined them to look like if they were. This opened up my thinking: if mermaids were real creatures they weren’t going to look like Disney’s perception of them, although the word mermaid is defined as half human half fish, they wouldn’t literally be the top half of a humans body and a fish tail. From this I imagined a mixture between fish scales and human skin. Fish skin being quite transparent, often able to see the fishes skeleton and veins. This was like a light bulb moment! The loose ends of my project were being pulled together.

The moment I wanted to capture through my garment was when the Little Mermaid is in a state of metamorphosis, her tail is disappearing and her human legs appearing. When I first began to speak of my ideas to my tutor a suggested artist to look at was Roger Hiorns, the main piece of work I looked at was his sculptures that created foam within the gallery. My initial idea was to incorporate foam into my work as at the end of the Little Mermaid story she becomes sea foam (as all mermaids do when they die). Then it became more apparent, Hiorns work changed/transformed as like the Little Mermaid. I wanted my work to transform from one state to another, not necessarily mechanically like the work of Hussein Chalayan but able to change to express that the characters costume is physically changing her. When this was discussed during my critique, discussion found me the answer to what material I should experiment with… water soluble/aqua film, a plastic sheeting that dissolves when dipped in water. Success!

So here is my further experimentation based on the Little Mermaid, aqua film based as well as others.