THIRD YEAR/Bolton/Public Art

Monday - Public Art in Contemporary Practice
Wednesday - Advanced Practice & Theories In Context
Thursday - Research in Context 

My first module at University is 'Public Art in Contemporary Practice'. For this project I need to create artwork that will engage and allow the public interaction. This will lead to the public becoming an essential part within the artwork. For this project it is important that the audience see themselves contributing to the process and outcomes.

We formed groups to begin brain-storming possible ideas and directions we could take this project.

Group - Me, Chloe, Calum, Georgia & Jody. 

We began to question the role of social media in conjunction with our identities. With social media and technology now a major part of everyday life we began to query how this creates almost two separate identities - our external identity and our screen/social media identity.

Mind Map- 

Our projected developed throughout group discussion and we decided to call it the 'Secret Selfie'.
Our concept was to ask public participants to write down their confessions or secrets on to a paper bag, which we were going to then wear and photograph. Instead of the usual selfie, our concept was that the secret would be the individuals identity. It will be interesting to read some of the comments that are to be displayed on the bags and once placed on our heads I believe the composition will be intriguing. The idea being that us wearing the bags will aid in the secrecy of the project.
Trail Run in the Studio-

Before we could trial our idea, we had to create the bags for people to wear. To do this we watched a youtube video which showed a quick process to do so using a single piece of paper and a glue stick. The bags turned out successful and once the other students had began to write there confessions down, they started to depict interesting individual pieces, which could also be displayed as our final outcomes, along with photographs. 

Chancellors Building-

 
To progress the project we decide to take the bags across to the Chancellors Building where we asked other students to participate. Some students were reluctant to take part, some students found it humorous and some students had taken it quite seriously. We offered a variety of coloured pens which  could possibly subconsciously link to the participants mood, confession etc... We spent a few hours collating the confessions onto the several bags and by the end of the day we had gathered a sufficient amount of work. 

Outcomes- 

Once we had collected the bags, we took some quick photographs for evidence and began to see how we could progress them further. To see our figures wearing the bags covered with random confessions from people where surreal. The images we had taken were defiantly a possible direction for us to push the outcomes.
Data Collection-

The next section of the project was to collate the information we had been given so we could create visually interesting info graphs. To do this we focused on the type of confession, the size of the writing and the colour in which it had been written. My choice of research were what colours were most popular. I choose this because I believe colour does link subconsciously to our individuality and i believe that was an important aspect of our project. 

Infographs-

Photoshop 

 

To explore with my info graphs I wanted to keep them as simplistic as possible so the outcome was easily understandable. I decided to focus on a bar chart to depict the popularity of the colour. Within my exploration I wanted to place the charts over the photographs we had already taken as they were already successful images. utilising the colours layered ontop, my aim was to bring the graph and the image into on coherent compositional layout. 

Final Outcome

For my final outcome I opted to display a series of the selfie portraits. Each depicted the colour schemes, and 3 different selfie shots. As a series they are visually interesting to look at and the coloured blocks add a feel of shyness, facade and disguise.