Gesamkuntwerk – Project Brief

 

Artist, Designer: Maker Research Project Level 6 a cheeky bit of …….

GESAMKUNSTWERK : Ideal Work of Art, A Total Artwork, An all embracing art form.
IDEAL: a conception of something in its perfection.
This is a short research project to get you started for your third and final year. It’s time to get ambitious….. so let’s strive for the ‘ideal’.

What would be your idea if a GESAMKUNSTWERK? What typifies your ‘ideal’ object?

The Collection:
Begin by selecting a series of objects (10 min-20 max), which have some of the characteristics you seek in your own ideal object. Ideally visit museums and galleries to experience these works in the flesh. Imagine you are a collector, amassing a great collection of artifacts which epitomize your values, how would a curator present your collection of objects, what conclusions would people draw about your interests from viewing your collection. What themes, values unite your objects?

Evaluate why it is you are particularly drawn to these objects:
Concept… what are the ideas/concepts informing theobject?
Function…what does it do, or did it do… is this ofinterest to you? What is its purpose?
Material… are you drawn to it because of the material it is made of?
Craftsmanship…. Is it the virtuosity of skill evident in the object?
Process…
Expression… does it speak to you, move you…if so how?
Innovative…. Does it inspire? Does it challenge?
Is it beautiful? And if so, why do you find it beautiful?

You need to able to research these objects, who made/designed them, when, where were they made and for who? What makes them successful as objects?
Perhaps there is a specific museum, gallery or collection, which appeals to you to explore, consider specialist museums as well as your local or larger museums. Consider if your objects are part of a family of objects? If so, how do they compliment each other, how do they differ? Your objects can be incredibly disparate, spanning time, cultures and contexts, draw inspiration from many sources.

Once you have selected your objects you must look at different ways of creating your own interpretative response to your collection… in essence we want you to strive for your ideal object, distilled from the GESTAMKUNSTWERK of others. You must try not to be derivative, as what we are looking for is for your own creative voice to shine through.
In your first week back you will be required to present your collection of objects in a Pecha Kucha style presentation to the group,

Pecha Kucha Rules for this task are as follows:
Powerpoint with 15 slides – Each slide is to be a singleimage no text allowed.
First 10 slides: your collection
Last five slides : your ideas for your Gesamkunstwerk.
Your presentation to be timed for 15 seconds per slide.

Presentation will not exceed 4 mins per person. The idea is that Pecha Kucha is fast, furious and informative. To help with this task consider the 5 main areas of the
creative process that you will need to address.
1. Concept/ Idea – how is this triggered and developed
2. The form giving process – how do we derive the
shape, scale of the thing
3. Material use – what materials are to be used and why
4. Production method – how is it made
5. Audience/user response – what response are you
seeking?
6. How do you know if it’s good?

As this is a research project only, you can be ambitious in your ideas. Please be sure to document all the processes on your blog under the subject category. Please be mindful that the research for this project may also feed into your dissertation module.
All Pecha Kuchas need to be ready for presentation on Monday September 25th .

BBC Stool Project 4 (Retrieval)

BBC stool Project 3 (Retrieval)

BBC Stool Project 2 (Retrieval)

Examples of stool development.

BBC Stool Project 1 (retrieval)

Sketches in Rhino playing with the caernarfon design.

Make Your Mark Reflection (500 word summary – Retrieval)

Make your mark has been a fraught affair for me with various distractions, dead ends and a huge amount of frustration. However I feel I have now moved into a place where I can see the wood for the trees and present a fairly concise idea as to what it is I have been trying to achieve in the last few months.

Over the last 2 years on the Artist Designer: Maker course I have learnt so many new skills and had so many positive experiences that actually trying to distill that down into an outcome for Make your mark was extremely difficult as I didn’t feel i’d managed to tie down exactly what it was I wanted to do. Indeed some of the skills I learnt in the open house sessions this term which included some basic coding opened a whole new pathway that muddied the waters further.

My outcome for make your mark is a conceptual process rather than a finished piece and in all honestly coming to that has taken a lot of thought and research. It is by far from finished, but at a stage where I can demonstrate the principles  of creating furniture forms through analog parametric design and get the principle across succinctly.

However their is a lot left to do. Before I can make the analog version of the machine work I need to experiment with different mechanisms to make the fabric former’s for the & I need to create some more maquettes in order to prove that the concept is fully capable of functioning as intended.

secondly i need to buy the various composite materials and experiment with the laminating processes in order to achieve a professional outcome. I am in touch with a number of people who are helping me to make this a reality  so I am aiming to get this all wrapped up before my return to University in September.

On return to university I would like to speak to Aidan in the electronics department to see if I can move the furniture former from analog to digital however I have come to realise that this isn’t fully necessary to create the furniture for my final degree show but would be great to have in the future and is something I could possibly look at academically in the future after I have completed my degree.

If this module has taught me anything it is that I am moving further & further into the realm of designer & maker and that it is a place I fell comfortable. I enjoy posing questions and trying to come up with a creative answer to them and I really enjoy and feel truly at ease when I am in the process of making something.

 

Field Reflection (Summary 500 words – Retrieval)

On the face of it Site, Spaces and Public Place and  tcejbO:Object are two very different projects but both had elements that crossed over and gave me a rounded appreciation of objects and how to place them within various spaces. Both modules looked at the narrative of the placement of objects within the environment.

I have had the opportunity to think big with the Site, spaces & Public places module & look into the minutiae of an object with the tcejbO:Object project. I have been encouraged to think about manufacturing objects and their associated costs, health and safety when working with the public and learnt how to put myself forward for art commissions within the public realm.

Whilst I found the lectures by Andre Stitt fascinating and some of the interventions that he presented were really intriguing, I have to admit that time based media and public interventions just really aren’t my thing. I really tried to get into the fine art aspect of it but I found that ultimately my interests lie elsewhere and while it was interesting to learn someone else’s artisitic methods it’s not something I will be rushing to partake in in the future.

As always it was a really great experience being able to discuss ideas and listen to different view points from my peers who are doing other courses around the university. being able to work with students from different disciplines is an enriching experience and is one that has helped shape some of the ideas that I have bought back into my subject modules in particular the make your mark module.  All of this has helped me to realise that I am less of an artist and more of a designer & Maker all be it one who has just gained a whole new skill set.

Professionalism has been a key part of the lesson taught in both modules & I believe I achieved a decent level with the tcejbO:Object project, unfortunately the same cannot be said about the final site space and public places project presentation.

The final presentation for the site, spaces & public places was embarrassing as best and looking back at that module I can see that I got completely distracted & bogged down in the construction of the object I was proposing & completely neglected to look at the bigger picture & fully consider the spaces, and commercial aspects required to make the project a reality.  On reflection the final presentation lacked the professionalism that was required & in all honesty I was surprised to get a basic pass. If I had turned up at a professional commission interview I would have been laughed or booed out of the room.  Having said that I now know what is required and have definitely learnt from the mistakes I made at the modules final presentation.

Both Modules have been valuable lessons in preparation for my 3rd year degree show and have taught me how to look at objects, and the spaces these objects inhabit in a new way.

 

tcejbO:Object (reflection 500 words- Retrieval)

After having to cancel my trip to India I was very unsure of which field option to take but after some agonising I chose the Object course run by Craig Thomas. When I arrived for the first session I had very little idea of what I would be expected to achieve but after the field trips to London and several group sessions studying the possible meaning behind objects I began to feel at ease with the subject matter.  Working in groups was incredibly interesting and listening to other students propose different meanings or purposes for our objects was really intriguing and fun.

There were many different ways I could have taken the project brief but after the trip to London looking at the Hunterian museum, the John Soane’s museum and the design museum I settled on using the roller skates to create an object display. The London trip was really a eye opening if slightly gory (hunterian) in places and bizarre (John Soane’s) in others, but the myriad of different ways to display an object was really quite inspiring.

Since I started university I had mainly been looking at objects or things I had made in isolation and not necessarily as part of a wider display. learning to put objects together in a way that gives the viewer a narrative was extremely useful to learn and has genuinely changed the way I think about objects and their relationship with the environment around them.  It was also really interesting to meet up with other students and look at and discuss how they would display their objects and amazing to see how many different ideas & takes on the same project were presented at the end.

One of the other things that I learnt from this project was to not only think of the object and the way its displayed but also what is left behind. Most object installations be they museum displays, gallery exhibitions, or interventions in the environment are time based -Nothing lasts forever. As students we were asked to present a photograph at the end of the project that reflected the object installation. This was really interesting as the display was important but what was photographed was just as important as a recorded document of the installation.  Keeping this fact in mind whilst creating my final object display helped me to frame the object in the way that looked pleasing in real life and in a photograph and lighting and siting of the installation had to be taken into account to achieve the final imagery and display.

The research into the roller skates uses was fascinating and learning to create a narrative in order to create a display was a very useful skill and one that I will definitely be putting to use in my 3rd year to create a dynamic display for the final exhibition.

In conclusion a great project to have participated in and I have a new found respect for those that create displays be they in a shop window, museum or gallery exhibition – object display is difficult.

Stage 2 – Form (make your mark – retrieval)

Although the process behind creating carbon furniture with carbon fibre may be possible. How would I create the forms that in turn make the furniture or lighting?

Whilst researching ideas for the make your mark project I came across this example of ceramic production by the gt2p studio in Chile.

gt2p or Great things to people have created an analog version of a 3d parametric printer which is able to produce individual pieces of ceramic using the same process without the need for moulds etc. The images below show the process and the final pieces.

Less N°1 Catenary Pottery Printer

This beautifully realised project got me thinking about how I could create forms for furniture using an anolog style machine that uses parametric principals.

 

Firstly what is analog parametric design?

An upside down force model of the Colònia Güell, Sagrada Família Museum

One of the earliest examples of parametric design was the upside down model of churches by Antonio Gaudi. In his design for the Church of Colònia Güell he created a model of strings weighted down with birdshot to create complex vaulted ceilings and arches. By adjusting the position of the weights or the length of the strings he could alter the shape of each arch and also see how this change influenced the arches connected to it. He placed a mirror on the bottom of the model to see how it should look upside-down.

Features of Gaudi’s method[edit]

Gaudi’s analogue method includes the main features of a computational of a parametric model (input parameters, equation, output):

• The string length, birdshot weight and anchor point location all form independent input parameters
• The vertex locations of the points on the strings being the outcomes of the model
• The outcomes are derived by explicit functions, in this case gravity or Newtons law of motion.

By modifying individual parameters of these models Gaudi could generate different versions of his model while being certain the resulting structure would stand in pure compression. Instead of having to manually calculate the results of parametric equations he could automatically derive the shape of the catenary curves through the force of gravity acting on the strings

 

Commercial & Useful Contacts (Make your Mark – Retrieval)

After Looking at all the different content I could find to confirm that creating furniture and lighting would be possible within the confines of the university and my home studio; I then set about finding suppliers and anyone else who could help me.

Below is a list of confirmed suppliers – companies that I have spoken to and are sending me price lists etc and are willing to give my advice.

https://www.carbonology.com/

A one stop shop for carbon fibre matting and epoxy resins. These guys were really helpful and also training course and will advise on bespoke projects.

http://www.carbonmods.co.uk/

Whilst this company specialises in carbon fibre modifications for vehichles, they were more than happy to offer advice and sell everything that I would need.

http://www.airpress.co.uk/index.php

This company is a maker of vacuum equipment for the laminating industry and were recommended to me by both of the carbon supply companies.  Very helpful and offer solutions for small bespoke projects as well as large manufacturing equipment.

Marc Fish is a contemporary furniture designer who runs the Robinson house studio in Newhaven in east Sussex. He runs course on using carbon fibre in furniture design and all aspects of contemporary furniture design.

http://www.marcfish.co.uk/cabinet_making_tuition_carbon_fibre_composites.htm