Overall Evaluation

Overall, I feel our group site specific exhibition turned out to be a success with only having a few minor problems to deal with, which we solved very quickly. We tried to make our space look as professional as possible to transform the space. We did this by hanging black material over the excess space that was unusable within our exhibition, although I thought this looked effective to an extent, in retrospect I now realise that a lighter coloured material would have been more appropriate. Towards the beginning of the project we were told the whole space was available for us to use, however, as the exhibition dates approached we were made aware that the tables and chairs could not be removed from the room so we did our best to stack them on one side of the room out of the way of the exhibition space. Unfortunately this meant these were at the entrance of the exhibition which caused a big distraction to our viewers/guests. These could not have been moved to the other side of the room as they would have blocked an emergency exit.

We spaced out our work and composed it together as best as we could to make our pieces look as visually interesting as possible, which I think was very effective. The work itself I thought was very impressive and looked visually interesting whilest working well together to grab the attention of viewers and passer-byes. Our initial idea for this site was to create a timeline of history and events involving the Cross Keys Pub which I think worked well even if it was a loose fitting timeline, it still showed different happenings in different times of the Pub’s life.

As a group – We worked really well as a group as we were constantly meeting up in our space to plan out the exhibition as well as to bounce ideas off of each other to gain new perspectives on our work. Towards the end of the project one of our group members lost contact with us and we were unsure how her work was progressing. However, we had a group meeting and was able to discuss our problems calmly and solve them quickly to be able to progress with our work as a team. Apart from some of these minor problems, I feel we worked well as a group, keeping each other updates and constantly communicating. Overall, I enjoyed working as a group as this was a new experience for me and is something I would definitely consider doing later in my practise.

I feel my blog is effective in showing my thought process of how my piece and ideas developed over time. Also how my researh, artist research and experiments has aided my work and journey throughout this process. I feel the amount of research I have provided is a sufficient amount given that we had quite a short time period to complete the project as a whole.

Personally, I think my exhibition piece turned out really successful and created an other worldly space for the viewer to step into given that we were in quite a cold looking room of four white walls. I had really positive responses from many of the people who viewed my piece. I also thought there was an obviously strong link between the installation piece and the article that inspired me. I am glad I went with my initial instinct of projecting onto the black material as I thought by projecting onto a plain white wall was too over powering for the lightbox sitting below it. I also liked how the lightbox heated up the toast and there was a faint smell of baking bread captured within the “tent” which I think added to the surreal atmosphere already created by the installation. It also interested me how by imprinting on the bread created a film negative effect, this is a medium I have never used before but is something I plan to use and experiment with outside this project.

Overall, I feel this whole project was a success and our group worked well together to create an effective outcome. Working in a group was a new experience for myself and is something I will definitely consider working this way in the future. I also feel the work created was visually interesting. The only thing I would change is the way we set up the room by using pale curtains rather than dark and also taking how much space we have to set up into more consideration.

Exhibition day

Although the exhibition didn’t open untill 11AM we decided it would be wise to gather at The Cross Keys Pub early (around 9AM) to make sure the exhibition was set up properly and to give us time to solve any problems should they occur. During this time I set up my own exhibition piece and made sure the projector and laptop were both in working order and made sure the projection was in place with the lightbox. I also helped Rayhannah secure her banner to her stand to ensure it was straight and in the center.

On the day we found out that the pub’s internet had still not been fixed so once Caitlin’s piece had been finished Rebecca and herself went on a hunt to find a dongle to provide Wifi for a short period of time and although hitting a lot of dead ends they eventually managed to buy one in a phone shop. So Rebecca was able to successfully set up her exhibition piece. Jadey also came in and set up her piece between the two televisions showing Rebecca’s revolution facebook page as we thought the poem used to recruit members for the revolution would have a nice link together.

Images of the exhibition:

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I was aware when setting up my piece that I would be projecting black and white images onto black fabric. I asked Caitlin to hold up a white board for the projection and although it made the image clearer I feel the image became too bright and distracting from the lightbox below it. I feel it looked more effective on the black fabric as it had a more subtle effect which I thought fitted in with the surroundings more effectively. The reason I set out the projection in this way with the toast and lightbox is because I wanted the onlooker to view it as a grave layout which I thought looked visually interesting and linked well with the theme.

(All images shown in this post were taken by myself)

Setting up the exhibition

As stated in a previous post we used this evening to begin setting up the exhibition. Here we hung our curtains up around the room to cover excess room that we couldn’t use and I also hung the curtains I would be using to set up my own exhibition piece in at the end of the room.

We also helped to begin set up Caitlin’s sculpture by helping her glue sections together, holding items into position while the glue set as well as helping her compose the piece. (images of this will be shown in the next post).

(images shown in this post were taken by myself)

More toast…

We began putting up the black curtains in our space this evening and I tried out the light box carefully placing the toast onto it to see how it would fit and realised I was slightly short and needed more toast. I came home, and thought as carving into the plaster blocks was so successful I would create a few more designs using this method to create more toast pieces. I have also decided to create some extra pieces incase of any breakage that may occur when setting up the installation. I decided I wanted to create a key design as well as incorporating more words within the bread.

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(All the images shown in this post were taken by myself)

Work in progress…

At this point in the process I feel my own work is progressing smoothly and I feel I am clearly up to date with creating my pieces of toast as well as working out how I would like to present the final outcome for our exhibition. As we have tried some of our pieces in our space it is exciting to see everyone’s work coming together and seeing the progress everyone has made. Rayhannah’s banner has been finely stitched and is almost complete, we now just have to work out a way of presenting the piece so that it looks most effective. Rebbeca’s facebook page has started to get responses, our only issue is that we have been told there is currently problems with the pub’s Wifi which could cause further issues on the day of the exhibition. We have discussed as a group the possibility of getting a dongle if the Wifi is not fixed by the day.

Caitlin’s sculpture is developing well however, she has decided it would be best to put the whole thing together properly either the day before the exhibition or the day of to avoid any breakage. We are still unsure what it is Jaydey is doing with the poem however, she assures us that she has tried many different ideas.

As the exhibition dates grow closer we will have to discuss soon how to compose the exhibition pieces so that they look their most effective.

Milena Korolczuk

I came across this artist by chance as I was searching the internet. I found this artists work quite interesting as it shows another way I could have worked using bread as a medium. The artist has created very small but incredibly detailed pieces faces out of the crusts of bread. I have included this in my blog as it interested me how much details could be put into bread and thought I could possibly try defining my imprints in my bread in an attempt to achieve more detailing. I also found interesting how Korolczuk chose to photograph her pieces with all of the excess crusts and surroundings still in shot which gives the viewer a sense of this art work being more like a hobby, as if this is something that happens in everyday life. I do find it strange however, that we are not given close-ups of the different pieces as they are so detailed, I feel quality is lost because of this.

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(the images shown in this post were taken from: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2366666/Bread-artist-Milena-Korolczuk-carves-intricate-faces-leftover-crusts.html )

Marketing our exhibition

We have used a variety of methods to advertise our exhibition including placing posters designed by Jadey Morgan up around the university as well as places around Swansea such as the Mission Gallery and others. We also set up an online Facebook group advertising our exhibition where we invited all of our facebook friends and encouraged them to invite all of their friends etc. We had our poster advertised on the campus televisions also. Invites were made to hand out to our lecturers however, due to complications we were unable to get them into university on the given date so we made a version of our invites out of the poster design. I am pleased with how the posters look although I personally find some of the text slightly hard to read. However, as a group we all went around different areas and made sure the posters could be clearly seen so that we could get good coverage for our site exhibition.

Jeremy Deller

I began looking at Jeremy Deller’s work for a few reasons. One of these reasons being because I find it interesting how Deller changes a space in quite a bold and obvious way such as moving a market cafe into the middle of his exhibition or covering a whole wall in a public space with a statement such as “More poetry is needed”. Another reason I started researching Deller was to see how he displayed his exhibitions, particularly as he uses banners etc in his own work. As Rayhannah is creating a banner for our exhibition there has been some discussion of how she should present it both in the group and suggestions given by lecturers. I looked at Deller’s work for inspiration and suggestions of how we could present it in an effective way within our exhibition.

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Although Deller’s pieces does not have a direct link to my own exhibition piece I find the way he sets out his exhibitions interesting and will look back at his work when deciding on how to set my own piece up as well as the rest of our exhibition.

(The images shown in this piece were taken from: https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=jeremy+deller&biw=1280&bih=717&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=7ZtwVJyoHqq_sQS3zoKwAw&sqi=2&ved=0CAYQ_AUoAQ#tbm=isch&q=jeremy%20deller%20artwork&revid=1225425564&imgdii=_ )