Final Presentation Ideas

21stMay2014
Matthew stone is an artist that I came across when researching magazine styles for my editorial shoot, I saw some of his photography demonstrated in Dazed and Confused magazine and found it really interesting. produces objects, photographs, exhibitions, performances and social events advancing the proposition, quoted in a gallery news release, that optimism is “the vital force that entangles itself with and then shapes the future.” His photographic-sculptural hybrids illustrate that thought literally. They consist of muted photographs of entangled, youthful, nude bodies printed on plywood panels, which have been cut into triangular sections, reassembled with hinges and displayed as folded constructions. Stone takes 2D images and translates them into “3D photographic sculptural forms”, He uses his prints in an unusual way by transferring them onto fabric and geometric sculptures. In his series of work that interests me greatly “Optimism as cultural rebellion” he demonstrates experimenting with abstracting the human form “I like the idea of trying to make something that has some solid ground, but then has the potential to move. I like the idea that it is almost impossible to re-install the work in exactly the same way.” 

(Imagery taken from art shaman blog, post about Matthew Stone, Series of work Optimism as cultural rebellion)

25thMay2014

I am really interested in displaying my work in an unconventional way so that the idea is turned into something completely different, I want my final piece to not only be beautiful, but I want it to intrigue people and have a thought provoking sense to it. Ive enquired about using a projector for my final piece, but it seems that my idea is too time consuming and ambitious for the time and space we have. Now that the projection idea isn't possible the combination of the projections and Stone's work seems more achievable. Before moving on to a final idea I tried experimenting with alternative ways of displaying some sort of projection. I filmed a piece of fabric on my washing line blowing in the wind. The fabric had an identical image of my final photography on it, so in order to demonstrate how the projection would look I edited the film and the still image together at a 50% opacity. The imagery and film works really beautifully together once slowed down, it has an angelic elegance to it. I initially used ballet music with the moving image but soon after realised it didn't have much relevance to my initial concept of contrast. In order to relate it to my work with more relevance I added a personal touch to it. I edited together snippets of  audio from one of John L Gardners fights. This soundtrack seemed to work much better in my opinion due to the obvious contrast between elegance and masculinity. It also added an obscure nature to the film, beautiful, floaty, angel-like imagery accompanied by the sounds of cheers and punches, which I think is a unconventional and  less obvious choice. Although the idea of projecting the moving fabric onto a still image is not possible for my final presentation, I am still really interested in capturing movement in one more dimension other than the overlapping photography. After looking at the work of Mathew Stone and adamant I incorporate this third dimension, I came up with an idea that could potentially work. I decided to put the fabric used in the film to good use. Instead of solely creating a sculpture or creating a projection of movement, I thought of combining the two ideas and creating a 3D image that had an element of sculpture and projection. I began to think of aesthetically pleasing ways of doing this. I thought of photographing the material gathered on top of the image creating a second overlap. But then I came up with the idea of strategically pinning the fabric onto the image to create a more 3D, waterfall-like aesthetic. As you can probably imagine this concept proved difficult to achieve. I mounted my image onto MDF board and began to place my fabric over the top. Of course when lying down the fabric has a very different quality to when lifted up horizontally. So after pinning my fabric down once, I had to then remove the pins, stand the board up and start again. I managed to cover up the majority of the holes created by my first attempt. Other than a few minor problems with creating the final presentation, I am really happy with the final outcome. I think that it translates my initial idea of contrasting masculinity in boxing and the not so obvious feminine/elegant side to it.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           (Authors Own, Small films representing idea for presentation) 

Test Film

17thMarch2014

Following on from the previous post, this is the short film I produced in conjunction with the documentary style photography. Unfortunately the short film wasn't finished in time for the group crit, so I didn't have time to listen to my peers views and opinions on what I had achieved, nor did I have time to add in the ideas I was given. I am not entirely satisfied with the final outcome of this film, for example some of the clips run for too long and can be repetitive or boring, but the main focus when producing this film was to obtain skills to use equipment needed to produce a film e.g. Camera skills and practicing with editing software. The film hasn't been completely  useless due to the footage I have collected and the fact I have gained useful and transferable skills. As well as this I feel like the downfalls will help me choose what will work well together and what wont, and how long to preview certain clips for to keep my audience engaged. The film is not conceptual enough for a final piece but I think it would work really well for an Adidas [logo mostly present throughout] or a promotional boxing advertisement. Something perfect I can make use of from this film is the soundtrack I have chosen. It has a close connection to the boxing world as it has been used for many fighters 'big entrances' and used in many short boxing films. I think this part of my project has taught me the biggest lesson so far, and I am really happy that I have seen this process to the end this early on in

(Authors Own, Experimentation film - Learning how to use software and equipment)                             my project, because now I feel fully prepared and extremely excited to tackle the final film piece.

(Authors Own, Documenting Street-wise gym in Loughton)

Primary Research & Trend Reports

20thFebruary2014

l have kick started my project by looking through collected newspaper clippings and saved tickets/programmes and putting them together in an aesthetically pleasing way. I started off this way because I was unclear where I wanted to actually start, creating something visual pleasing can often influence ideas. When looking at the collages I made from the clippings its obvious at first glance that the fashion and digital graphics used are very different from what we have today. Advertisements of fights are very basic, using only black and red ink and showing stereotypical aggressive portrayals of both fighters. Advertisements today are a lot bolder, with the amazing technology that is available to us we are able to create emotive pieces of art work. An example shown on the right experiments with interesting typography to create a fitting atmosphere, whereas the examples on the left show simplistic boxy typography. Another difference lies in the imagery used, in the poster for Mayweather and Pacquiao there is an electric storm or or star exploding behind both of they're perfectly molded bodies. Again the 80's references just keep it simple due to the lack of technology. I think its good to look at the different generation of design aspects because the recourse could definitely inspire future work of mine throughout this subject area.

Creating collages out of the old newspaper clippings did seem pointless at first, and I felt I was wasting my time trying to fill my sketch book with work. Although at first it seemed pointless it has fueled ideas of my own based on styling, typography, layout, photography style and headings or slogans that could help create names for pieces I will create. Whilst putting the copies of the clippings into one aesthetically pleasing document on photoshop I accidentally set the transparency of one of the images to 50% and I really liked the results that this produced. The text and imagery combined worked really we together. Although its nothing worth presenting, this accidental outcome has helped me to think outside the box, and plan for future work.

(Authors Own, Collected Imagery Scanned in)

I then created a general mood board surrounding the area of boxing, including fashion imagery, documentary style photography, tickets, newspaper clippings etc… I thought that by starting with a very broad understanding of the sport I could then begin to branch off into more specific, personal aspects and transform it into something creative. After gathering imagery I started to look at the more personal elements of my project - Family. My family have a strong link with the sport, and much memorabilia has been collected over the years. My Aunties ex-husband was the European Heavyweight Champion of the 1980's - John L Gardner - which has left me with loads of amazing primary sources that will help me to produce some really strong work in the coming weeks.2ndMarch2014

(Authors Own, Collage of Imagery found on google and personal collection)

5thMarch2014

When creating the mood board, something that really fascinated me was the obvious change in fashion. Most of my images are from the 1980's or the current 2014 period, and the drastic transformation from simplistic to glitzy and contrived sportswear is very obvious. It seems that in the 1980's things were fairly plain with iconically "masculine" / "manly" colours [Red, Blue, Black] whereas now, things seem to have derived from this idea of masculinity and moved onto the idea of fame and glamour. Below shows a series of trend reports that I created that compare the fashion of boxing in the 80's to the fashions of today. To me the results are very different and the contrast is apparent in many mediums, from materials used, fit of sportswear, colour etc… 

(Authors Own, Trend Report)

To begin with I compared the trends and fashion of the two well known boxers George Groves [2014] and Muhammad Ali [1980]. This comparison is not obvious at first, the colours remain fairly simple in both, sticking to classic blue and red, but there are really important differences in the fabrication of the sportswear. When looking at the length of the shorts it is apparent that in the 80's the design was a lot shorter than todays current design, this is just due to what was considered fashionable at the time. The high wasted design of the shorts acts as a guideline so that the opponent cannot "hit bellow the belt" - a rule in boxing is that boxers shorts must be raised so the opponent is not allowed to hit to the groin area with intent to cause pain or injury. A major change in "uniform" is the mouthguard, not only has it become easily customised, but the fabric has been improved for durability, comfort and protection. Initially they were manufactured from impressions using wax, rubber and steel springs were even recommended to reinforce soft materials. Subsequently they were drastically improved by a dentist who used a transparent acrylic resin to form what he termed an "acrylic splint". It was moulded to fit unobtrusively over the upper or lower teeth, it also meant that the athlete could talk in a normal manner while the mouth guard was in place. Now days the technology of material knowledge and manipulation has improved greatly and a simple thermo-plastic material manufactured in a pre-formed shape in various sizes can be adapted to fit more closely to an individual's teeth and gums by heating and moulding such as boiling then placing in the mouth.

(Authors Own, Trend Report)

Here I have compared the trends of the two boxers John L. Gardner [1980] and Phillip Bowes [2014]. With this contrasting trend report it is a lot more evident that fashion has changed, not only has the fabrication and fit of the sportswear improved drastically, but the colours and style have become more radical and eccentric. Despite being east London born and bred Bowes took the unusual decision to represent Jamaica at the Commonwealth Games. The fighter felt the only way he could pursue his dream of reaching the top of his game would be to swap the English flag for the yellow green and black of his parents’ homeland, and this is strongly reflected through the colours of his kit. I created these trend reports not only to get an understanding of how boxing had changed, but its also helped me to think of styling ideas for future photoshoots, and how I can portray different times or eras.