'THE MAN WITH A CAMERA'

Watched this film about the camera man in the early part of the 20th century. All about technique ect. The last projects ‘The Overlook’ and our own mashup have been a big realisation for me. The work that I do making costume and being a hairstylist is so labour intensive & time consuming. So doing all this new stuff with the computer & camera once I’ve got my head around the technology (getting there slowly) it’s so quick and easier to get a professional result. So not so time consuming and as I have so little time it seems to be an answer to my dilemma. In the film they were saying that the first projector camera was originally made with parts of the sewing machine. I find it profound that I’m going from costume making with the sewing machine and progressing into film & photography.

READING CLASS 'BEING AN ARTIST'

In our reading class this morning we were asked why we were here and wanting to be artists. This really stumped me as no one has ever asked me that before. I’ve never really thought of myself as an artist although my family & friends call me an artist. I’ve always been artistic from a young age, and indulged in it for pleasure & relaxation I never realised that you could make a proper living from it that seemed unattainable only for the exceptually talented & privileged.

So I’ve gone from job to job and the art has become a kind of by product of my work that I’ve chosen to do. I’ve ended up where I’ve never thought I could be, making a reasonable living from selling my talent. That’s everyone’s goal isn’t it. Except although I’m more or less there it doesn’t feel like Nirvana. I have more work then I can handle making things for other people realising their designs for them. And even when I make my own designs its for a commission so I still don’t own it. I have loads of ideas but no time to do them so they get shelved. Everyone seems to want my time so as a result I have none left for myself. Although I love what I do I no longer make art for pleasure or relaxation. I need to keep making & teaching it to finance my life but that part has completely taken over.

I guess I’m here to learn how to relax learn how to say no occasionally and do my art for me, I’m not bothered about recognition (it’s a nice feeling when it happens) only that I can finance my life so I can feed my compulsion, art.

Found this quote from Robert Sabastian Native Artist '........go with your instinct towards feelings that you have, don't paint for other people, don't paint for the dollar, paint for yourself. Others will realize the spirit in your painting, then you will survive.'

Costume Show

Some images from our costume show this friday. 2nd & 3rd Yr Interpretation & Design students.

Good turn out

THE OVERLOOK PROJECT

The Overlook Project

This project was a mashup loosely based on Stanley Kubrick’s ‘The Shining’ and Strimbergs ‘The Father’.

These were theatre areas that our Tutor Douglas O’Connell was researching, so in response we collaborated as a project for our MA Visual Language for Performance class in order for him to be able to realise some of his ideas. I think this was very brave of him to trust us with such a large area of his research. As a group we brought a diverse range of skills, knowledge and experience to the table.

We came together to discuss the theme with Douglas as mediator and final court of appeal. As a collaborative group you start to feed and bounce off of each others ideas, everyone brings their own perspective to the creative situation.

Initially I wanted to contribute by doing something new rather than my usual costume making skills, although I was happy to act as support for others to make the costumes by teaching and guiding, so that they had a better informed path to follow.

But being the only part-timer, and only available two half days a week made this impossible. Douglas anticipated this and decided that I should do the costumes, as I could do this individually while still contributing.

Unfortunately I couldn’t attend all the meeting as they were not always on my core days and as the project needed to gather momentum I contributed to the project by passing my ideas to people so that they were brought to the table second hand. I was glad to notice that a few of my ideas were realised. I contributed more by helping other people with their parts of the project by sharing my knowledge and experience.

My main realised contribution to the project was to make the main character Jack Tarrance’s costume and to help Jessica, Daphne and Veronica with their costumes and puppet.

Jack is old school male chauvinist, dominant male with the younger trophy wife. Even with the confinements of such a marriage and trying to be the perfect text book wife, Wendy is younger and more technological and through this is in her own way independent.

Jack is also frustrated middle aged man who hasn’t realised his potential in life, an unsuccessful writer the opportunity presented by the job of the Winter Caretaker for the remote Overlook Hotel and the isolation it promises for the winter seems to be the catalyst for a last shot at fulfilling his dream and the chance to write a great novel. But the inevitable happens, locked up for long wintery months in isolation he develops cabin fever and slowly loses the plot and madness begins to settle in.

In response to this story we set the era and colour pallet in the 1970’s for the set and costume. Douglas initially mentioned his preference for earthy colours suggested by the era, the oranges, browns and purples presented a good stylised backdrop for such a tale of the comeuppance of male dominance. For this could be said to be the last era of the all dominant male. Jack being older and an-twacky I made his costume 1970’s with some aspects of 50s, another era of male dominance. He started off appearing normal with his shirt, tie, blazer and waistcoat all very respectable and smart. But as the plot unravels so does he. I wanted to represent this fact with Jack slowly starting to put layers of clothing on in disarrayed, dishevelled manner. The layering up of the clothing showing the slow layering up of his madness. During the production I broke down the garments so that they appeared disarrayed and totally different to the respectable items he wears at first.

When you’re exposed to abnormal behaviour long enough it becomes the norm. This is what happens to Jack and Wendy. As he descends she has no sounding board to measure just how far he is going. A phenomena that I know oh so well on a number of levels. To quote Tim Burton:

‘One person’s craziness is another person’s reality.’

Near the end of the production he puts on an overlarge overcoat, this is to portray his rapidly encroaching madness slowly engulfing and consuming him. His madness is like a big old grizzly bear that has been woken up from hibernation.

We found all of Wendy’s costumes and the main bulk of Jack’s from charity shops. Within this a few bits needed to be dyed to fit into the colour scheme. However I made Jack’s trapper hat and also made the leather waistcoat which I wanted to create as a symbol of a misspent youth that he was still clinging too, which was later broken down.
The overcoat was the ultimate garment representing Jack’s descent into madness, I started by breaking the coat down to make it look old and worn then put primitive cave drawing handprints onto the back with spray paints as madness is a primal coping mechanism. I then overlaid a moiré print to replicate water working from the lower left going diagonal across the shoulders. This was to show how the madness was washing over him and engulfing his sanity.

I used latex with inks and printed hand prints using numerous people to get a variety of sizes. I again did this with puff binder and ink which I treated with heat which makes it swell. This all created a 3D effect giving it different dimensions, as madness works on a number of levels.
On the shoulder I put a hand print with two fingers saying ‘f’ off as Jacks final salute to sanity, which I worked to look bloody this worked great in the final scene where Jack gets his head bashed in with a bat by Wendy. Douglas overlaid blood spatter for the viewers on line so that the media and the print work worked together, and the blood just landed in the right place. This worked really well and was a good finale for the online viewers.

Wendy costumes were of young hippie chick and this highlighted the age difference between the two characters. She’s young 70s whilst he represents old 70s, we used these stereotypes of the era to highlight the stereotypes of the characters.

In Wendy’s costume we used stripes and zigzag patterns which mimicked the television monitors and projection when the machines are on standby. This was to show that she was more technological than Jack and was leaving him behind. Later on whilst Jack’s costumes changes with the introduction of his madness Wendy’s stays the same to show and accentuate the contrast between them and their path through the play. The distressing of these costumes therefore was paramount to amplify this.

I felt disconnected from the team as I was working as an individual, but I was very aware of the group clashes, which is unavoidable when groups collaborate. So many egos in one room all wanting to shine. You just have to learn to let it go over your head and compromise or take a stand. As the project came closer to the deadline, the group became closer together but at the same time a more stressful working environment.

Once the play began it seemed a lot more communal and everyone pulled together, I was able to contribute more to what was happening within the production than during the build up. I was able to give Douglas some insight of how his character should act out his delusions as I have had considerable experience working with people with mental illness. I also helped a little with the camera work which was a completely new experience for me and although very short-lived it has given me some insight to different aspects of digital media, which I would like to explore more at a later date. I became mum as usual to everyone as caterer, cleaner and puppet first aider.
Working as a collaborative you become part of a unit so you lose your identity as an individual within the project. You have to all gel fluently for things to run smoothly. You soon find out who you meld with and who you don’t.

As individuals within a group you take away an experience often completely different from your colleagues but you also have the collaborative experience which is accomplishing something that is on an immense scale, one that would probably be impossible to do as an individual because of the time scale and the individual knowledge that would take a fair chunk of your lifetime to accumulate.

Each collaborator’s skills and knowledge may not seem significant individually, but by bringing a number of skills together they significantly contributed to the perfection of the performance.



Jack loosing it.





Danny, Jack & puppetmaster

Wendy Torrance with Danny

These are the two stories that I chose for my mashup.

THE DREAM

Lennie pleaded, 'Come on, George. Tell me, Please, George. Like you done before.’
‘You get a kick outta that, don’t you? Awright, I’ll tell you, and then we’ll eat our supper…’ George’s voice became deeper. He repeated his words rhythmically as though he had said them many times before. ‘Guys like us, that work on ranches, are the
Loneliest guys in the world. They got no family. They don’t belong no place. They come to a ranch an’ work up a stake and then they go inta town and Blow their stake, and the first thing you know they’re poundin’ their tail on some other ranch. They ain’t got nothing to look ahead to.’ Lennie was delighted. ‘That’s it – that’s it. Now tell how it is with us.’ George went on. ‘With us it ain’t like that. We got a future. We got somebody to talk to that gives a damn about us. We don’t have to sit in no bar room blowin’ in our jack jus’ because we got no place else to go. If them other guys gets in jail they can rot for all anybody gives a damn. But not us.’
Lennie broke in. ‘But not us! An’ why? Because…because I got you to look after me, and you got me to look after you, and that’s why.’
He laughed delightedly. ‘Go on now, George!’ ‘You got it by heart. You can do it yourself.’
‘No, you. I forget some a’ the things. Tell about how it’s gonna be.’
‘OK. Someday – we’re gonna get the jack together and we’re gonna have a little house and a couple of acres an’ a cow and some pigs and …’
‘An’ live off the fatta the lan’,’ Lennie shouted. ‘An’ have rabbits. Go on, George! Tell about what we’re gonna have in the garden and about the rabbits in the cages and about the rain in the winter and the stove, and how thick the cream is on the milk like you can hardly cut it. Tell about that, George.’
‘Why’n’t you do it yourself? You know all of it.’
‘No … you tell it. It ain’t the same if I tell it. Go on… George. How I get to tend the rabbits.’
‘Well,’said George, ‘we’ll have a big vegetable patch and a rabbit hutch and Chickens. And when it rains in the winter, we’ll just say the hell with goin’to work, and we’ll build up a fire in the stove and set around it an’ listen to the rain comin’ down on the roof..........

THE PLOT

George & Joe have met up and decide to realize their dreams together as Rizzo & Lennie are both dead. But your dreams are never like you think they will be!

They both have their own idea of own place so I’ve chosen an island as it’s remote & contained so no one to bother them (It’s their dream, no one elses).
Dreams are usually surreal so I’m making the main object from Lennies’ dream (the rabbit) out of proportion, the cave is shaped like the rabbit which they are sitting inside of, his guilt over having to put Lennie down like an animal). is consuming him.

They are living in this cave so they have a fire which they are sitting around and reminiscing about the old days. The stories they tell will be told at random as they will take a piece of text out of a jerry can (in what ever order they come out). So each time it is played it will be slightly different

Here is the process I went through making my island I used MDF for a base then foam board to build it up by layers. After my first attempt with the pond curling up around the edges because I just used foam board. Lesson learnt I then used puff binder which is a print agent with inks to colour it for the water and also for texture on the rocks. I've added heat from a hairdryer which makes it swell and bubble. An easy quick affect. I've added fabric with PVA and also toilet paper for more texture (Blue Peter). Used scenic grass ,moss and gravels and from garden and kitchen brown sugar , sand , branches, pebbles rocks. painted it with acrylic and used uhuto glaze over the water make it look wet. I put a tea light sunk in ground for flames from fire. I'm quite pleased with the result as I've not done this before. It took two days to make , I enjoyed mucking in and doing it, unlike sketchup which took me ages mainly because I'm just getting my head around all this computer lark.

Sound Class with Carolyn Downing

We had a sound class with Carolyn Downing a Sound Designer, who is helping us on the Overlook Project. The class was really informative & interesting as I have partial hearing. Made me really aware of how much I relie on the visual.

The night before this class I attended 'Edward Scissorhands' a dance piece, which had no vocabulary, telling the story and portraying the characters by using sound & vision. So making you read things in a different way using other senses.

I took away certain aspects that have enabled me to analyse my own projects and look at them in a more informed light. How they will be seen from other peoples perspectives.

Sorry people you'll have to wait for my block buster video as it needs compacting down before I can load it onto here. Watch this space.