Blog

This Blog is all about my 3rd year experience in Plymouth university and all that will be spoken about is the projects I'm doing and how its coming along

Week 1 - Date 18 September 2023

So a project I’m creating is based on my critical practice which is an essay and I thought to myself well what is my critical practice I do like to use stories during painting and all this so where can I start from.

So I decided to think of narrative stories that I know of that I could do my project around like Disney stories or Greek mythology and the only one that’s all of stuck with me and his influence me to sort of do this is the saying ” don’t fly too close to the Sun or your wings will melt“ and this meaning links to the fall of Icarus in the idea of don’t push yourself too much otherwise you will fall to the consequence.

Initial idea was to do a couple of paintings and drawings just to convey the story of Icarus‘s form when thinking about it I sort of struggled with the idea of how to do this and then I thought to myself while talking to my tutor Laura hopes she brought up performance art and I said wait a minute I know how to dance and I know how to convey a story in dance so I’ve decided to do a performance piece on the fall of Icarus.

Week 2 - Date 27 September to 11 to 17 October 2023

For my project work again I’m sticking with narrative wanting to do drawing painting and maybe a performance piece I decided to stick with Amys that is linked to Plymouth so this will be linking back to my Roy dog series and so I had a look round and there’s a lot of myths in Plymouth but I think the one that stood out for most me what’s the white lady as her story seems to change with who she met up with Whats a lover or a maid or her friend And I want to really convey the story of how she sort of snuck out of the house met up with a friend and then the tragedy of how she died and maybe like a little ending of her hauntings around the area and I did do a site visit to Whiteladies Road in Radford and Plymstock even though at the start of the journey I was certain that I was going to the right place and then when I got to Whiteladies Road I didn’t look anything like it would so I decided to go for a walk and there was a lake in stream nearby so I started taking pictures just to get an idea of what it would feel like and then when looking back at my pictures I was quite happy to realise I was in the right place so it was a happy accident.

Week 3 - Date 21 October 2023

I’ve decided to take Both this pieces to performance art but still keeping in mind I will be doing photography and film with the help of Kim who is in my class but I was also given the idea by my tutor that there is an aquarium in Plymouth that I can go to so I could do underwater shots of Icarus‘s form and the white lady is drowning so I think it will be really interesting to try if I can get the equipment and the accepting what I’m also going to try and do is almost go to the beach and do it if it’s not too cold but that would be one way of doing it or I look for reference pictures into sort of drawing that saw image of how Icarus fell into the ocean and then again how the white lady fell into the river so the theme is with these two it’s a lot of drowning unfortunately which please do not get worried about me I just I will get really involved in the miss and I want to do it to its right to the to how I understand it.

Week 4 - Date 27 October 2023

So I went to a talk about the facilities that i can use within the university of plymouth especially in 3D art. This talk initially did not interest me as i'm not into doing work in 3D or have a machine make it with loads of digital stuff in between it would just confuse me but what did interest me was the laser printer as i could use a glass like substitute and laser cut an image into it glass like thing to get an image that i could shine a light on and it reflect the image a bit like cyanotype.

My idea is i could have an image of the white lady printed on this glass thing and then reflect the image onto a coloured image that will be printed of white lady road and the river she died in.

Week 5 - Date 7 November 2023

Today I got to use the dance studio for two hours to work on the fall of Icarus this space was amazing I felt like I could get a lot of movement in and get my ideas out onto the dancefloor.

I felt very free.

I also in the dance you got a lot of videos and analysis done of what I did in the studio.

Here are the links to the videos that day.;

Video 1 - https://youtu.be/zY8yxtuCE-o

Video 2 - https://youtu.be/H-TDBQx7m40

Video 3 - https://youtu.be/QpQ60oCeOd8

Week 6 - Date 13 November 2023

Letter press

I found letterpress quite fun and I thought to myself I could use that oppressed in retelling the story of the white lady so re-writing the story in my own words and then making it into a letter press which I could print over an image of white ladies Road but this again is one idea that I can do.

Week 7 - Date 14 November

Today the dance for you for two hours I focused on the white lady as I haven’t really worked in her dance very much and I did two dances and I found them very interesting and how I told it because in both pieces I had to elongate the sort of escape from the Manor as well the sort of her being out in the open away from the safety of her own home.

Here are the links to the videos that day;

Video 1 - https://youtu.be/wS-46XZrvsk

Video 2 - https://youtu.be/SjEbkS21jT4

Video 3 - https://youtu.be/x2GWOTMGRvE

Week 8- Date 21 November 2023

So I went home for a little bit so I live in Weymouth as my full of vision for this piece is based in Weymouth in smallmouth as I feel like this sort of place so shows and suggest the image of the fall of Icarus and I got to filming with an old friend of mine who is an ex graduate in media so he knew how to use a camera which was very interested in using.

Week 9 - Date 28 November 2023

So I’ve got a video just focusing on the white lady and I decided to do in the costume and I felt this really brought the piece together as a help me focused on her in particular as well I can see the movement as of the progress and feel the movement as well which to me was quite interesting.

Here are the videos from that day;

Video 1 - https://youtu.be/1Gyi8QtbIQo

Video 2 - https://youtu.be/VKU5odE7wCk

Video 3 - https://youtu.be/llukAT9dpvM

Week10 - Date December 8 2023

Today I went to Radford Park again to retake some photos, but this time I went with a white dress that I’d be using in the performance piece. While being here, I put the dress up in different ways around where lady Radford would live, or the white lady, and I found this very interesting to see where she actually popped up and where the dress would hang and how the dress would be,

One of the things that was said to buy one of my lecturers, Karen was to dip the dress into the lake. This actually really hurt me because this to me has a very sentimental background as this was my last performance for Razz in this white dress, so doing this really hurt me and the results of the dress sort of moving in the lake. I couldn’t really move it as much because I don’t want to lose a dress, but sort of just swaying it round a bit and take the pictures of it in the water Had a feeling of the house it drowned.

Week 11 - Date January 11 to 15 2024

This week was all about handing, so this was my dissertation, work or the Icarus project and in with the video and bookwork with the essay.

Also, what else was handed in was the first part of my white lady project for my lecturer to know how I was doing.

Week 12 - Date January 25 2024

today was a weird lecture experience because I had to travel home the day before because of today we’re going to Lyme Regis to meet up with our new lecturer Melanie Jackson and we went to her house which she lives in an old Victorian safe house as it were, as she lives lives next to the church basically what we were told to do is look around our house as she’s sort of made a house into like this art gallery of collected items that just go with the idea or not an idea, but more to the lines of what artist would sell when they have an exhibition, so like artist, books, T-shirts postcards napkins mugs those sort of things, so this sort of trip today was all about thinking about our final sort of publication about what sort of items would be going along with the work that you could sell or giveaway to viewers.

Week 13 - Date January 29 2024

today was a very eventful day. I had my friend Curt Walters come up from Weymouth and we headed to Radford Park and decided to film the actual white lady piece today, so we took multiple different shots of either dancing or the white lady showing up and reappearing and sort of just had a sort of walk around. Just basically had a little bit of a play with the amount of footage we had. This was very successful as we got loads of loads of footage that I could use for when I put these together or when he put these together, but unfortunately he doesn’t have it so I’ll be getting the training to do this.

Week 14 - Date February 5 2024

so before the group I quickly the day before was set up. My mini Little exhibition is what I’m calling it and as well I figure out how to edit my videos on my laptop for free and really easy to do so I managed to get my first practice video together which was very good.

The group credits today was a very weird experience as I’ve never done this sort of thing before like mixing with the other year or other groups, but I found this really helpful as when I saw a start explaining my work I had a lot of good feedback from my work they sort of understood where it was coming from and one common that really stuck out me is” I felt like I was in the peace by watching this video” and this really stuck out to me because this is exactly what I want. I want my viewers to feel like they’ve been submerged they’re in Radford Park when watching this video so this is really good feedback to learn from. Also one of the suggestions was to do an audio piece next to it, so it helps. Tell the story a lot better instead of having someone there or having to read something so having an audio piece over the video would help the telling of the story, and as well with the audio, it could be my own writing, so my own words to make it more personal as well.

Week 15 - Date February 7 2024

Today we had an artist talk with Emma Cocker and she is sort of a videographer and she works with a lot of publications and books and writing works with the idea of writing and sort of ads video into it if need be, but today I’d tell it to have a sort of tutorial with her just for her to see my work and see where I can push even further for the exhibition, and she suggested that I definitely definitely play with video audio and sound and as well with the video is how like if I wanted was pop-up Words that sort of go with the peace, so I’ll see the white lady drowned so I have a big word drowned in the middle of the thing and then it continues playing the video and she did suggest you like the idea of her disappearing and reappearing all the time, so to create a separate video of this, but her main sort of comments start playing with video and projecting it

Week 16 - Date February 12 2024

Today I sat down with my class with my lecture talking about what is happening with the exhibition, so we need to split up the jobs so I’ve gone into the publication but what I’m gonna be doing is a social media platforms as I’ve done this last year for way of college I sort of took charge of the Instagram and had help with the Facebook and sort of timetable Who uploads or who I need to upload in anything any comments that needs to be added to these pictures. So I feel like I’m quite ready for this job and I’m working alongside people that I’ve sort of done this thing before so I can go to them for help, and I feel like I will be going to them for help with communicating with the class about what sort of things need to be sent to me picture wise, so like their work little bit of writing maybe some videos for the Facebook and Instagram.

Week 17 - Date February 19 2024

Today I officially made the Instagram and Facebook page and sent it to all of my classmates on the WhatsApp group chat and made a Google Docs specifically saying what I’d like them to sort of put into the Google Docs like a teaser to their work. Sort of writing a teaser of image, then working videos. Sort of anything that they can that they think would help. Sort of explain they were a bit, not give it away in a short sense.

Week 18 - Date February 26 2024

today I decided to fix my website, because last year I tried to add some videos of my blog of me, dancing to Icarus and white lady to my website and it somehow I didn’t realise that you had a certain amount of data or stuff that you could add onto the website and I completely screwed around with it so I sat deleting stuff which I shouldn’t have done so today I spent the time just fixing the website and adding in Icarus as work as well with adding it, I added links to my new YouTube channel which is just something that adds to my blog a lot more as it shows my work and sort of what comes where and as well with the YouTube channel, I’m able to show the full length of my Icarus piece, and this is something I have to keep in mind for when I post my white lady piece.

Week 19 - Date February 27 2024

today was a bit of a weird one we had an external examiner. Sort of zoom call us and sort of asked questions about how we are. What type of work we’re doing and start asking questions we didn’t get much time with her because there wasn’t well wasn’t many of us in, but we didn’t have enough time with her, but sort of questions she asked me were a good ones. I can’t remember them top of my head, but it was good to sort of talk to someone externally and sort of talk about what I want from my work and my ideas towards it.

Week 20 - Date Febuary 19 to March 7 2024

This blog is about me practising what projectors and space I should be using for my installation.

So the first test I did it was with a projected that didn’t show a very big image, but I had clear view of the video so I tried this in a white space and a black space and I think for the exhibition the installation I think I want it to be in a white environment because the project is called the white lady so I think it’ll be best for it to be in a white installation And for the projector, I want the projection to be bigger at the image, more blurred to give it that most like sort of serious vibe, that’s something happened, but no one knows what it is until they watch and hear the video piece itself.

With the sound what are use is smaller speakers just so I can get a feel for the sound so I can use it and not take up the entire space and not filling it with the my audio so that I’m not drowning other sound pieces out.

So this week I again focused on how the video would look in a white space and I got a newer projector that was recommended to me by Laura hopes my teacher And I love this projector so this is one that I will keep using and will use for the day as it was so big and then I spoke to Karen about where the projector should go and she recommended. It should be hanging from the ceiling, because if I have it on the plinth on the floor, the viewers unlikely to go into the space and interact and become within the environment which is what I want, but with the projector in the way it means that they have to stand outside the box And that’s not why I want so for the exhibition we’re going to be putting the project on the ceiling and will be putting speakers with it so I’ll be testing out speakers very soon about how louder can be.

I also tried in the space was having the dress Almost layered on with the video, so the video plays on the dress and I thought this was a good vibe and something that I can still think about until the day, but I’m still undecided about if I want to take this step or had the dress hanging separately to the video But these are all ideas.

Also within this week of setting up what my project will look like we had an artist come in called Mark Leahy and he’s a performance artist and he has suggested to me to further. My video is focus more on the audio, so do three types of audios, but all different so one would be if I would tell the story to a child One a friend and one more formally and see what sort of changes what added what’s taken away and sort of play with it and see what sort of sticks into how to tell the story.