PE Task 2

This year has been so different to anything I've done before. I've not only been away from home, around different people and in a different environment, but also the structure of university has been so different from school and college. Textiles design for fashion was the first project I did and was quite challenging for me. Initially, I worked very carefully; restricting myself to what research I collected and my drawing. I cared too much about and how “pretty” my work looked and this held me back. Nevertheless, my tutor soon realised and pushed me to experiment more. This is where I started to enjoy and appreciate the project. I experimented with print designs and technical drawing. I've never done technical garment drawings before; it took me a couple of goes to get my head around it, but it soon clicked. Everyone else found it tedious and boring but I secretly loved it; there was something about having a neat, finished garment flat sitting on the page of my sketchbook. 

Tip Final Design Board

The second term came more naturally to me; I felt more at home and I had more direction. The print unit made me think about colour palettes and motif placement. Initially I found it difficult to pick colours out of my images; for some reason I was doing it completely wrong. However, my tutor explained where I was going wrong; after this, I could pick colours for my palettes quickly and accurately. I didn't enjoy working in the print room as much; I found it really stressful! I couldn't seem to get my dyes correct, and as a perfectionist, I found this very difficult. I didn't enjoy being in that environment either; I felt slightly claustrophobic. I would love to specialise in print next year, however I don’t think I’ll be using the print room as much; I find using digital print more inspiring and enjoyable. Nevertheless, I will still have those techniques in the back of my mind, as I will always be able to bring my digital prints to the table and work on top of them. 

Collection of final digital prints

I haven’t enjoyed Unit X as much as the other projects; I found it quite slow and difficult at times. It was hard to get the entire group together; nonetheless in the last couple of weeks we worked really well as a team and produced a good final piece. I do think it has been useful to experience working collaboratively as this is what it will be like in the industry. At the minute, I would really like to specialise in print and eventually become a print designer for fashion. I find it fascinating how one simple idea or drawing can turn into an intricate print. However there are many aspects of my work, I want to focus on and improve next year. When finding visual research, I need to look further; I sometimes find myself pulling myself back scared of jumping ahead. Also, even though I didn't enjoy working in the print room very much, I think it would be wise to experiment a little more, as there’s so much I still have to explore. Finally, I really want to find my own style within my work, but this will come with time.  

Who will come to see it?

With our exhibition finished and up, all that was left to do was to be around for when the public came to see our work. I was quite surprised as to how many people turned up to the venue to have a look. Most of the people were students or tutors from the university however we did have a few members of the public coming in. It was nice to hear good comments about our work and to see that people appreciated it. 

Even though waiting around for a few hours got a little boring towards the end, it did go quite quickly and Gabi and I had an interesting chat with and man called Marcus Lord. Marcus works at MMU as the business development manager of art and design. He was asking us what we thought of the unit as a whole and what the background of our work was. He went on to explain the ideas behind Unit X and I think something clicked in mine and Gabi's heads. Marcus explained that when he had  meetings with companies outside of the universities, they would always say that, yeah graduates are great, but they have no experience with working collaboratively, getting their points across,  explaining their work and the list went on. Marcus went onto to explain that this is why they believe unit x is so important; it gives us so much experience for the working world and also puts us in a better place for getting jobs- employers will actually want us. Next year, unit x is all about working with others who want to go into the same industry/area as you. I think this will be really interesting and extremely useful. 

Even though this unit hasn't been my favourite, I now know why we're doing it and I truly believe that it will help us tremendously for our future. I think if we had Marcus introducing the project, we would have come away wanting to get on with it and understand why we were doing it. 

Evaluation

I've never done a project like Unit X! I've had a mixture of feelings about it! At first I was very confused as to what was expected of us and what it was all about. I then met my group and we started  to discuss ideas; this is when I started to do research, get inspiration and started to enjoy the project. I enjoyed developing my drawings; experimenting with shapes, motifs and colour. I also enjoyed working on our concept; at first I thought it was going to be focusing on sketching portraits but it was much more. It was interesting experimenting with what motifs I could get from the initial image of a face. I didn't want it to look actually like a face, I wanted it to be an interesting shape from the lines and detail within the face. 

I found working in a group fun but very difficult at times. It was very rare that every single person came to a tutorial or group meeting.  It has only been the last couple of weeks where I have seen everyone at the same time. It was very disappointing at times and it made me a little down. At some points I would think to myself why do I even bother. I feel that I do so much work but a couple of people won't even bother or will do it eventually but will be rushed and sometimes unfinished. I think when you work as a group, you need to be organised and for me as a very organised person (sometimes too much), I never understand when people can't meet deadlines and be on time. Quite a few times we would set deadlines and tasks for ourselves within the group and most times a couple of us would turn up to the meeting with the work but nearly everyone else wouldn't.  I don't think that's fair. I would feel so guilty if I hadn't done the work as your group are relying on you. Most of the time we couldn't develop and move on as a group because most of the peoples work wasn't there. We were meant to be doing a collaborative piece, so without seeing the others development work, the group as a whole couldn't develop. Don't get me wrong, there were some really good days, where I would come out of a group meeting or tutorial and think, yeah we've got some good ideas. But there's a difference between ideas and doing the actual work. Maybe I'm too much of a perfectionist and too organised but I still believe when you're working within a group, you should always be on the ball, on time and do the work. I found myself throughout this project, having to take control of the group with a couple of other members, just to get things moving. At first I didn't want to seem bossy etc but as the project went on, I gave in and started to come out as one of the leaders of the group. I haven't necessarily got a problem with that, but when you all get on well, it's difficult to take control and tell people what to do, especially when you like them. I'm sure there are a few members of the group who found me irritating at times, but at the end of the day, a couple of people had to do something about organisation! I just wish our group could have worked together as hard as we have the past couple of weeks. We've been working like a well-oiled machine at times; getting a lot of work done and at a good speed because we've been working together. 

Having said all of that, I like everyone in my group; I get on with them so well and they're all lovely people. We always have a laugh when we're together and it seems quite natural. I hope I stay close with everyone, as I've really enjoyed spending time with them. I think our  Facebook group has also worked really well. We will communicate basically every day on the group; letting each other know times of things, if someone can't turn up to a meeting, pictures of our work etc. So in that case, we have worked really well as a group, but I just wish we worked that well in person. 

We still have no idea what happened to the two film & media students we were meant to have in our group; they never showed up. We did try to get in touch with them and we told our tutors, however we never saw them. At times I felt the unit could have been organised a bit better (no offence to anyone). A lot of the time I didn't get emails and notifications that other members of my group got. I think this is maybe because they are all fashion students, but I'm still part of Unit X too. I do understand that there are so many tutors involved with this project so communication could have broken down at points, but maybe this could have been prevented somehow. I'm the sort of person to need a time and place to be in advance; I'm not very good at dealing with last minute adjustments, so at times I found this quite difficult. If I had a problem, I honestly didn't know who to contact; I'm not sure if we had certain tutors to help our group...I'm just not sure.

On a happier note (sorry for being so miserable) I really enjoyed actually producing the work. Like I said before, the development, sketching and experimenting with placement got me more engaged with this unit. I'm pleased our groups theme/concept was so interesting and I truly believe that when it came to our theme, the journey was clear. I think this unit has made me prepared for working life; I'm going to come across people who don't work as hard as me and I'm going to have to deal with it. Also there may be a lack of communication within a job, and again, I would have to deal with it somehow. All in all I have enjoyed this project and I'm really pleased with my groups exhibition, I've produced work I wouldn't usually produced and worked with people I wouldn't usually work with. 

It's up and finished!

After the stress of yesterday, we all went away to sew the small acetates together. We decided to have them in lines of 4,5 and 6 as it would give different levels and wouldn't just look like a curtain. So this morning we made our way to our space to put them all up. As the tutors were meant to be coming at around 10.30am, we went earlier so everything was up and they could see it finished instead of being all over the place. It didn't take us too long to hang them all up, we just decided where to put them and then got on with it. The owners of the shop had already got spot and standing lights out for us, so we explored where the lights would work best. We wanted light to shine through the acetate and fill the room with colour so we experimented and finally  found a place we were all happy with. I'm really, quite pleased with our exhibition. It looks powerful; the acetate faces in front of the boards add more distortion and the stained  glass effect with the light shining through adds warmth and mood to the room. 

When waiting for Eleanor and Robin to come and see our work, I tried to keep myself busy as I was a little nervous, therefore I took quite a few photos. I think our work looks even better photographed as you can focus on certain faces  and blur the rest. But I eventually had to face the tutors...THEY LIKED IT!! Success! I was so pleased that they liked our exhibition;  after last weeks tutorial I was half anticipating they would come in and make us take it down! However, they didn't, they actually liked it!! The only thing they commented on was that they thought we needed a sign and a bit of information about our work, maybe put it on a blank wall to fill some space. Apart from that, it was good! 

Even though I had  already made posters and they were put up in various places, I decided  to make another one tonight. I wanted to use a more powerful image from today as it could draw more people in. I've emailed it to tutors, inviting them along and also sent it to members of the group to put up. Last week we produced a facebook,event so I think we've done quite well with advertising.  We'll just have to see how popular it actually is!

Getting our exhibition up.

Yesterday, we decided that the plan for today was to meet in the art school with our 15 panels and 25 small acetates printed out ready. We would then go to the A4 & more store in the art school to get 12 A4 foam mounting boards, mark out where the work would go on the boards, stick them down and take them to our space and put them up. This didn't exactly go to plan. Not everyone had printed their work out for various reasons. This was a bit frustrating as we wasted a lot of time. A few of us had to sit around waiting for people to turn up and print their work out, which was really not what we wanted to do. After getting a bit twitchy we decided to just go and buy the foam board and do as much as we could with who and what we had. We started to explore how many panels we could put on a board to make it look effective. We decided that we would fill the board; panel to panel. At first I wasn't sure, as I thought it looked very cluttered, but then realised that it could look quite powerful when all the boards were next to each other. 

We had to wait a bit for others to print everything out, but finally we got sticking everything down. Working as a team, some of us spray mounting and some used double sided sticky tape (depending on what  paper was used) and before we knew it, we were all done. This was probably the best part of today as we finally got to see all of our work together and...it looked good!

Even though we didn't want to admit it, Eleanor was right; four A1 boards would have looked pathetic! At that moment we realised that, yeah, it was going to look quite good!

So with our boards finished, fueled up and ready to go, we trooped off to Incognito. Last week, Gabi and I were told that the space would be clear and cleaned, however this wasn't the case. Everyone else, who hadn't seen the space were a bit shocked at the state of it, but we knew that we just had to get on. We moved everything out of the way, swept the floors, removed all rubbish and finally started to get everything up. It took a  while to decide where to put each board as we wanted the "good" boards at eye level and also in a straight line. We used strong foam sticky pads to put them up and they worked really well. At one point we had to take a couple of boards off the wall and move them, and it was quite difficult to pull off! Nevertheless, after moving the boards about a bit, they were all up in no time. It was good how well we worked as a team today, although some people needed some encouragement to get a move on and help, we did all put the boards up; it wasn't just a couple of people. 

As some of the group hadn't printed and cut out the small acetates, we couldn't hang them up today so we went back to uni to sort that out. We divided them up, so when we came to sewing them together, we all had a selection of faces. I'm not so bothered anymore about not being able to hang them up today, as we have time tomorrow morning before the tutors come to check on us. All in all, a productive day!

Busy weekend!

This weekend has been VERY busy. It's been made up of producing 15 A4 panels, 25 small acetates and non-stop group updates on Facebook  It's been good that we've been keeping each other updated on Facebook as it's meant that we can share ideas and also keep people positive through a hard weekend. I'm quite pleased with my panels; I've used both mine and   members of the groups images, included motifs and also made every one look slightly different.  I have made sure that each panel has included drawings of my own; whether that was motifs, exaggerated fine liner sketches or cut out typography. I got the idea of typography from a member of my group. Gabi had the idea of including feelings through words; she collected many different feelings, typed them out and used them within her work. When I was talking to her, we decided that the typography could work within my panels as well. I really enjoyed working with this idea; I printed the sheet of words out onto acetate and used them within my motifs and also as separate elements. A couple of members in my group used stitching within their work, therefore I decided to use the typography but cut them and use them as thin strips, to replicate stitching. I think that it's been really good that we've shared and used each others ideas; it truly shows that we have worked collaboratively. 

I used many different materials to create my work: watercolour paints, fine liner,  acetate, felt tip pen etc. I feel that the use of watercolour worked well as it meant that the face could be seen through the design and it also added texture as you can slightly see the brush strokes at times. The sketching using fine liner also added texture as well as a slightly graphical style; adding quirkiness to my work. I like my work to have a depth about it and I believe produced this; from texture  being created through the materials used, placement of acetates overlapping images and also the  mixture of different motifs/images used in one panel, my work is interesting and individualistic.

I'm pleased I've focused on developing motifs within this project as I made sure I linked everything with textiles. I didn't want to move away from print throughout this project, as that's what I've come to uni to do. Even though Unit X is all about collaboration; exploring different areas and seeing what it's like to work within a group, it would be silly to go in the opposite direction of what I want to do. Even though I don't think it's my best work, within our group and what we decided to do, I think it's worked well. I've worked well on my panels; using time consuming techniques and also not restricting my ideas too much. 

Meeting Adriano for the first time and THE tutorial!

Gabi and I went to meet Adriano today in the Northern Quarter...it was a very brief encounter! We met hiim outside Fred Aldous and explained that we had sorted out our exhibition space just over the road. He was fine with this so took us over to introduce us to Joe, the owner...and then he was off! A very short encounter but nevertheless, it meant that we could have a look at the space quicker. I think both Gabi and I, did not expect the space to look like this...

Incognito is a quirky art shop and downstairs is what looks to be storage, staff space and a vault. They allow artists to exhibit down here so I just didn't expect it to be like this. At first we were a bit stunned, however after having a quick chat with Joe and his colleague and having a look closely at the space, we decided it could work. I think once they said that they would clear the space for Monday, we felt a bit better! Our plan is to place our four A1 boards with our panels on, on the main wall and hang the acetates off the pipes above. We think this will look quite a effective, with a bit of work and nice lighting!

Feeling better about our exhibition and a bit of time to get back for the tutorial, we headed back to uni. This is where everything went down hill. A bit flushed and out of breath, we arrived at our tutorial, a bit late but explained why to Eleanor. We told her about where we were exhibiting and our ideas for it. She was fine about our exhibition space, however described our actual idea as 'a bit thin'. She thought that something was missing from it, whether that was work or something else, she wasn't sure. We tried to explain everything a bit better; explaining where we got our concept from and our thoughts behind our ideas, however Eleanor wasn't convinced. I have to say, this was one of the hardest tutorials I've ever had!! So close to our deadline and we were getting told different  things. Last week, when we had spoken to Robin, he liked our idea for our final piece and said we were heading in the right direction, but now...I'm totally lost. I just felt a bit down after Eleanor had said it didn't seem like we had done a lot of work. I think that's because I know for a fact a couple of us have done a lot of research and development to get our ideas. It annoys me that some members of the group, just don't try enough and this can be seen clearly through our final piece so far. Eleanor said that she thinks we need more faces and work to put up; four A1 boards don't seem enough, nevertheless she likes our idea of hanging acetates up; she suggested that we did little faces and hung loads of them up. I like this idea as it will fill the space up to look powerful.

The three of us came out of the tutorial feeling a bit sick! We were shocked by the response and knew that we had to do something about it. It was very annoying that not everyone could come to the tutorial as it meant that we had to pass on the information. Gabi and I decided to get a drink and write everything down that we needed to tell our group on facebook. As we talked about it all, it didn't seem as bad, as we discussed more possibilities and ways to get it all done. This is what we said on our facebook group...

IMPORTANT PLEASE READ

Hi guys, firstly Lizzie and i went to meet Adriano, he didn't say much but we met Jo, lovley guy and we have a space in this sort of basement area, there's no windows but we think it would work well, I'll upload pics and explain ties on another post. We have more important issues to deal with.

Lizzie and I managed to make it back to the tutorial on time, only Anne showed up which was a bit disappointing but oh well. Any way Eleanor had A LOT to say. She was not impressed at all!

Basically she mentioned how we should have related this project to a fashion/textiles concept.
However its too late to deal with that now so she suggested we document this work onto our blog, and relate the work we have been doing into ideas that are related to the course and subject area we want such as fashion or textiles. And how we would use this research in a fashion/textiles project.

Secondly she doesn't think we have enough work compared to other groups and personally both me a Lizzie agree. Eleanor explained that it doesn't seem like we have put the sufficient amount of hours into our unit x work in comparison the the other groups and that we very noticeable in the actual exhibition. She said that our idea is "thin" very flat and looks like there is no collaboration.

We explained our ideas and how we are sharing images and she liked that ans said we should show the use of using eachothers images in more A4 sheets.

Soo.. the plan: WE NEED THIS DONE IN THE WEEKEND, ALL WORK MUST BE BROUGHT TO THE CAFE AT 9:00AM MONDAY 13TH MAY.

Gather everyones images on facebook we all uploaded 2 each, there should be 14). We need to work with each others images in order for it to be a "collaboration" This means by monday we need about 15 - 20 A4 images each (i know its a lot) but we need as many faces as possible for it to look impressive, and have a decent impact on the public.

Apart from this we also need as well as this (i know im sorry its not our idea) mini images preferably the size of 9 images on a page of A4(you know the printer settings when you set it to 9 on a page, that size) on acetate, 45 images which is only 5 sheets of A4 paper its not that much. The images can be repeated, can be photocopies or images of the original A4 sheets but smaller, close ups, sections, typography anything you can think of as long as we have a minimum of 45 each, the aim is to have a total of 175 mini pictures to hang of the pipes in the space, so that it reflects well the the light and looks more effective. Also remember to use as much colour from the pallet to make it all pop! 

I know this is a lot but in order to pull of a good exhibition we need this done, I will post time and dates and exhibition information tonight or tomorrow. have a good hardworking weekend!.

lots of love Gabii and Lizzie xxxx

So you could imagine, Friday night, our group was very stressed. Nevertheless, I knew that I could get the work done and to be honest, I think our exhibition will definitely look more powerful with more work. I just really hope everyone actually does the work! 

Tutorial feedback sheet...

Another hectic day!!

So, I got up this morning, planning to have a more relaxing day than yesterday, however once I checked facebook, that all changed. A couple of the members of the group got these emails...

Hello Ailsa,

You missed the meetings with Adriano to go through your spaces, you have Fred Aldous window you need to confirm this and meet with him otherwise you will lose it.

Regards

Robin

...and...

Hello Perform 5.

It seems that none of you turned up for your meeting with Adriano yesterday. This is unprofessional practice and disappointing.

You must all attend tomorrow; we have arranged for you to meet Adriano at Fred Aldous management tomorrow (Friday) at 3pm.

Please all reply to this message and confirm that you will attend this very important meeting; without this discussion you will not be able to install your work in time for the festival, and this will need to be reflected upon.

Best wishes,

Eleanor

Obviously we were all confused, as two members  of the group went to Fred Aldous yesterday and Adriano wasn't there so they talked to a member of staff instead. There is clearly some bad communication somewhere! Anyway...who is Adriano? We havent been told about him until now! Anyway, we went to see Susan at the tutorial, originally wanting her to look at our work and discuss our final piece however, we were more concerned about the lack of communication. Susan seemed very confused about the emails we had received, however she calmed us down by saying that it would be a good idea to find our own space and forget about Fred Aldous as there clearly isn't any space for us there. She also said that  our work was looking very good and that we were heading in the right direction. Within the tutorial, we decided that it would be a good idea to share our images with each other, so we could all work with a collection of similar faces.  We also discussed the idea of printing onto acetate and hanging the sheets up. I think this is a really good idea as the overlapping of acetate in front of our main panels, will create  even more distortion, looking very effective. Also if we place a spot light in front of the acetates, the colour will shine through into the exhibition space, creating more of an atmosphere.

Later on today, we also found out that we had a compulsory tutorial tomorrow, at the same time as a our meeting with Adriano. Once again, many people within the group had other plans, however we have arranged that Anne will go to the tutorial and Gabi and I will see Adriano. We have talked to the other group with a spare room in their space and they are fine with us using it so we rang the manager of this space (Incognito) to check that it is also okay with him and he is perfectly fine with it.  Therefore when we meet Adirano tomorrow, we can explain everything and tell him that we have a space! Things are looking up! 

What has happened today?!! One big blur!

We hadn't anything planned to do as a group today; just get on with working on our A4 panels and Sophie meeting up with Paul from Fred Aldous. Nevertheless somehow, everything is up in the air. I woke up with missed phone calls and many facebook messages! Basically one of the tutors had approached Gabi this morning asking where we were yesterday for our tutorial. We had a tutorial yesterday...? I check moodle and my emails everyday and I had no information about any tutorial yesterday. In fact I never know when we have a tutorial;  it seems that it's just the fashion students, getting told all this information. So, obviously I was very confused! Also one of the members had got another email saying that we had a meeting today. Once again, I had no information about this therefore I had arranged a job interview! This is what the message said:

Hello Perform Group 5

We have arranged for you to use the windows at Fred Aldous.

Adriano will meet with your group and the Fred Aldous management team to discuss plans and materials for your installation this afternoon at Fred Aldous at 3pm or 4pm.

Please bring pictures and samples to show what, and how you intend to install.

As you will be sharing the space with other unit x groups, you will also need to attend a meeting to discuss curation with Adriano and the other student groups.

Please make sure you check timetable and messages as you cannot afford to miss tutorials at this stage.

You need to make sure work is ready to install b the end of this week.

RegardsEleanor

As most of us had plans for the day, we had to somehow organise at least two people from the group to go to this meeting. After a lot of fuss, we finally got it sorted! But....

After a really weird day, we have decided to have a meeting after our tutorial with Susan tomorrow, to sort our where to exhibit. Ailsa says that another group has a spare room in their space, so it looks like we're going to have to follow that up! 

How are the A4 panels looking...?

Today, our group met up to see how we had been getting on over the weekend. Last week we decided to go away and produce two A4 panels each so we could see what our final piece could possibly look like. It was a bit disappointing, as only a few of us had brought our work along to show each other  The meeting would have been more useful if we could have seen all of our work next to each other, as we would have been able to spot things that were working  and aspects that were not. Nevertheless, with what we had, we discussed how we could continue further with our work.

I had focused on working on top of my images; placing motifs and working into them with colour. I used one colour palette, as I feel it is important for a collection to look similar in a way, and colour is  the key aspect to do this. Looking at our work together, I wasn't sure at first if it could work; the black and white images next to my colour palette looked effective, however the top left  colour, didn't quite go. We therefore decided to stick with my colour palette; some of us may use it more than others, but we made it clear to each other that it was important that, if you decide to use colour, to stick to those. I was quite pleased for the group to choose to use my colour palette, as I had spent a lot of time experimenting with the use of colour. When doing my research I had found an inspirational image; the subject within the image didn't have anything to do with our theme, nevertheless I found the colours very inspiring.

I came across this image on one of my favorite blogs; http://www.patternity.co.uk/. It's an archive of inspirational images and I found the colours engaging somehow. I don't usually use boldly contrasting colours together, however when I saw how well they looked next to each other, I wanted to use them! 

In this meeting we also discussed where to exhibit our work. We decided we would quite like to use one of the windows in Fred Aldous in the Northern Quarter. Seen as we hadn't spoken to any of the members of staff there and it was getting late, we decided to ring them. Sophie spoke to Paul; a manager in Fred Aldous and he said that they had quite a few Unit X groups exhibiting there, however he could possibly move things around. Hoping that this could work out, Sophie thanked him and said she would see him tomorrow to discuss possibilities. It finally feels like we're going to have a place for our work!!!!

Where to exhibit our work...

Today, one of the members of our group, explored the city center to see where we could exhibit our work. In the meeting with Robin yesterday, it was clear that we all really wanted to have a window space, therefore, Anne looked around to see what she could find. 

This space is 'Forever Unique', past the arena and up Cheetham Hill road. It has 6 large window displays, however it really out of the way, right next to a road, therefore not a lot of the public would be walking past it. Anne also found a deli based in the Northern Quarter, that had a really nicely sized window space, nevertheless our theme doesn't really fit with the venue. If our idea was based on food, then this would have been a perfect space, however, I think we need to think more about the relationship between our exhibition and the place we exhibit it.