Today I have been experimenting and printing off copious amounts of patterns and clothing from the American Apparel range as well as trying to organize two shoots within the next two weeks. I tried booking a studio for Thursday morning (an arranged time that my photographer and model can do) but was told that the list was booked up until January, which means I will rent out a lighting kit and have to do the shoot at home. This doesn't pose too many problems except for space. I can do the shoot in my living room if I move the furniture and also I will get the added bonus of having the "home" feel to my shoot much like the ones in American apparel. Their shoots mainly consist of home like environments or basic studio set ups. I can also create space in the garage as there is a large white wall that can be used too.
Again I'm not too worried about this, and have sorted my shoot for this coming Thursday with my male model. I chose my male model because I have worked with him before, he is a friend of mine and not a professional model (but probably should be!) This was an easy choice as I know him very well, he is really easy to work with and will fit into the American Apparel Aesthetic very well.
For my female model I have been having a few problems finding one. I have been looking on Model Mayhem a lot and contacted a few models that I thought would be good for the shoot and that live in similar areas, however they have not responded and doubt they will. I then did consider ringing up an agency for new faces models but hesitated until the last minute because I do not want a typical looking model with the perfect body etc because this would be completely different to the American Apparel brand. I would rather use a friend or amateur model who has something different about them and unique that could go towards the brand.
That is when i remembered an old friend I used to work with who turned into a budding model. I have worked with her before on a shoot and she is a ethnic model who is also a ballet dancer. A dancer is perfect for the American Apparel brand because other than the basic clothing, they are known for their dance wear. Selina used to be a professional ballet dancer and she is also comfortable with a raunchier shoot. I think I have found my perfect models! For this shoot however I have to do it next Friday as tat is the only available times and also find another photographer, which I used to collaborate with at Solent university who lives near by.
Make up wise I can do this myself as I have a background in basic makeup and hair from my degree. I am going to keep the make up very natural anyway, as this is how American Apparel models appear. More like the girl next door. I will also keep the hair very natural.
The advantage of doing the shoot at my house is that I will have all the resources I need with me in order to have a smooth sailing and perfect shoot. I will rent out the lighting kit, I have experienced photographers who know what they are doing, all my work and research with me. This will help me to explain poses and ideas for the shoot and also I can provide a changing and make up and hair area for my model.
The next stage of my project is to create a lot of mock up ideas and collages to show what I am trying to put across and an accurate display of the shoot I would like to do. Also this will help convey my ideas in our group crits. I will use existing pictures of the models as well to show what they may look like in the shoot.
For the shoot, clothing wise I am going to purchase a few key pieces from American apparel in White, from the advice Justyna gave me in order for me to overlay my illustrated patterns over the top.
Monday, 3 December 2012
Exploratory Progress so Far..
Project 2
For the second project on our MA FPI course, we have been given a choice out of three different brands and we have to create a proposal based around our areas of interest. I have chosen the brand American Apparel, and my idea is to create an advertising campaign that will help to rejuvenate the brands existing campaigns and to reel in a broader more creative audience. I have chosen to combine my skills of styling and illustration in order to approach this assignment.
I first started researching American Apparel's existing campaigns and started to deconstruct the way in which they deliver their brand. I have found the brand to be quite 'raunchy' in their approach to advertising and slightly risque. Analyzing and taking apart the advertizing campaigns is just the first part in visual analysis, and the second part is to read around the brand itself. Whether the articles are good or bad, I need to gain a real feel for the ethos of the brand and the way in which they operate. I have been researching a lot of controversial articles and blogs that discuss the way in which American Apparel is being perceived to the public. There are for and against ideas that run alongside the brand. A lot of negative press comes from feminists, discussing how the brand overly sexualise women in a taboo kind of way, sometimes they have used models who look younger than they are, which resulted in critics accusing the brand of sexualising children.
I want to keep within the constraints of the brand's identity and do nt want to stray too far from their ethos, because then this won't be effective advertising and could turn their already young audience away from the brand. So I need to find a balance and gauge the opinions of my peers and advise to help my ideas form.
At the moment, I have been sketching and researching many different artists and have been inspired a lot by collaging and illustrations. This, I hope, will enhance the skills I have around this subject and add to my portfolio. I have a pretty clear idea as to what my outcome may be, but as I am going to have a tutorial with Justyna, I hope she can establish if this is a god enough idea of not and help me develop.
Tutorial with Justyna
Whilst having my tutorial with Justyna, sh was slightly confused with what I was trying to achieve at first, maybe I didn't explain it well enough, but however once I explained it again she understood. She said that the ideas was good and that as long as my illustrations from the patterns and fabrics that American Apparel use were really on point and perfect the the idea will work. She also suggested to me that instead of having the models just in their underwear, that I should dress them in white shirts and bottoms, so that I can overlay the illustrations with the natural creases and lines of the clothing, to give the illustration a more realistic approach.
So the next step is to experiment with existing images and research into the brand even further. I have found one male model and am trying to organize a female model for the shoot as well. This way I will be collaging the images and putting them together to explore the unisex ideas and also to promote each of their signature items.
I have decided to create images for:
Disco Pants (female model) AND/OR Printed tye dye leggings
Unisex Hooded jacket (Male/female collage)
Unisex Patterned Shirts (Male/Female collage) x 2/3
Basics (male) Block colours - paper collaging, screen printing?
Dancewear (female)
Skills I will be utilizing:
- Photoshop and computer aided design. - I plan on creating a series of illustrations to accompany or work on top of my photography. These skills will include transferring illustrative sketches onto Photoshop and combining it with the photography from my planned shoots.
- Illustration and drawing. I will be using the patterns from the American Apparel designs and creating my own version, which will then be applied to the original photography as the clothing.
I found this theory blog post about collage and theories behind the postmodern age. I thought this would give my work surrounding collage some context.
Theory Now.
M. Cameron Boyd.
http://theorynow.blogspot.co.uk/2007/01/appropriation-collage-and-cultural.html
"Appropriation, Collage and the Cultural Condition
Administrator's Note:
This is the first in a series of guest essays by current or former students of my Theory Now course at Corcoran College of Art + Design. In her insightful essay, Rebecca Jones unveils the rich history of appropriation, from collage to the Internet, citing from a variety of sources to engage in cogent connections that reveal the ongoing theoretical "substance" in the "style."
Appropriation in art has become so widely used today that the once radical and overt political tones of collage have come to be commonplace in the lexicon of American culture. Appropriated materials were first employed in Picasso and Braque’s collages using chair cane, oil cloths, objects of the real world, in their still-lives, challenging preconceived notions about representation in artwork. The Dada artists took collage and appropriated materials and made them (along with their violent juxtaposing of the images) the main focus in the work, as a reaction to the irrational and horrific nature of World War One. Duchamp’s “Readymades” was about art being the actual act of selecting a pre-made product and presenting it as an artwork. The surrealists, Rauschenberg, the fluxists, and Pop Artists all used appropriation and collage in different ways for different purposes. Surrealists, for example, created work that would use pieces from the real world in their compositions to create a play between the real and the unreal. Most of the post-modern and contemporary work that uses appropriation uses it in an act of recycling, arranging, and combining the endless fragments and bits that make up our culture. This artistic act is not unlike participating in the information/digital age.
The use of an appropriated material or image immediately brings up questions of representation in art. Plato’s assertion is that art is an imitation of an imitation, and so three times removed from real (the real being the “forms” themselves: perfect, permanent, ideas of objects).(1) Once the industrial revolution and “mechanical reproduction” began to rule the Western culture, Jean Baudrillard used the idea of simulacra as the extension of this idea, brought into a modern artistic context. Baudrillard discusses simulacra as the phenomenon where a copy of a copy of the original gets made so that the last copy stands alone as its own form. The reproduction and reinterpretation of earlier products and works is becoming more prominent in art, which coincides with the amount of reinterpretation and reproduction that is occurring commercially and culturally. Today, the internet makes the amount of times something can be copied infinite. The capitalist consumer culture of the western world is at a climax. Production of materials and ideas is growing and progressing faster than it has anywhere at anytime, which makes the tools for artists working today that much more plentiful.
The age of the internet is a fast paced conglomeration of sounds, images, thoughts, and communications presented in formats that are becoming increasingly more indistinguishable from reality. Participants in this culture are constantly being engulfed by the infinite amount of information that is being produced and therefore being completely overwhelmed by this fragmenting (or shattering) of reality. For a better understanding of how collaged works are symptomatic of a culture dealing with fragmentation and new types (and extreme amounts) of reproduction, works from this newly digitalized world can be compared with those of the newly industrialized, post World War One German Dada movement.
The Dada movement in Berlin made use of the new art form of photomontage. This was exciting to many artists active in the movement because the photograph provided a more precise image closer to reality that could be juxtaposed in the composition. The affinity towards a truer realism can be seen in works being done today, a time when digital and virtual reality is being experienced almost as much as the real one. The idea of fragmentation is integral in the preciseness of the digital image itself. As differentiated by Douglas Davis, the analog reproduction of an image comes out different every time by the nature of its process. The digital reproduction process works by way of uniformly breaking down the image into tiny, precise fragments so that, when put together, a more realistic copy or created image that’s the same every time (unless manipulated) results.(2)
Post-Modernism was once described in a virtual symposium as showing a “deep skepticism regarding structures of authority and authenticity.”(3) The way that many post-modern and contemporary works deal with both the formats of highly influential systems in our society (such as the internet and consumerism) and with appropriation support this comment. Furthermore, the Post-Modern condition is undeniably about the loss of hope for a single universality emerging through the many opposing viewpoints and the aggressively advancing possibilities of technology, which results in a fragmenting of reality (hence, Pluralism). The information age has taken these contrasting viewpoints and possibilities to a constantly increasing amount. The internet, which most prominently feeds this constant growth without restraint or structure, thus becomes an anarchic network, which only acts locally as series of networks, but acts on a macro level as an infinitesimal growth of unfitting puzzle pieces. Participants are confronted with an incomprehensibility for the number of pieces every time that they “google.” The hope, or even need for, a single universality is undoubtedly lost.
However, just because the potential for universality gets lost in this complex society, that is not to say that the potential for connection at any level gets lost. Obviously, globalization and communication has increased incredibly in the information age. But still, McLuhan’s “global village” will never be integrated in the type of harmony he predicted for several reasons. For one, the digital world produces separate pieces of information (and deconstructs previously existing information) as quickly as interconnections occur. As well, the “global village” that has been created is set in a world that’s in an extreme point of financial tension right now. The growing digital industry is connecting together the privileged but separating underprivileged from that “global village” more and more, and will only continue to be based on the economic trend. And so simultaneously the world connects and spreads apart.
Many contemporary artists have unsurprisingly chosen to use these many strains and bits, and issues being raised because of them, to compose new works. As Gregory L. Ulmer discusses in his essay, “The Object of Post-Criticism,” collage work “intervenes in a world, not to reflect but to change reality”. He quotes Bertolt Brecht’s remarks that the mechanics of collage contrast the “organic model of growth and its classic assumptions of harmony, unity, and closure.”(4) These statements very well explain that piecemeal works being done today act as part of the culture rather than a comment on it. Work that uses pre-existing images, forms, and ideas and leaves the new works open for interpretations and associations from the viewers, acts as an active experience rather than a static idea or form.
This sort of fragmentation that is a result of the information age has created the opportunity for artists of the time to investigate the many elements that they and their society are experiencing. This is undoubtedly what has lead to a common thread in many contemporary works, being the use of combinations of large varieties of pre-existing materials. Works such as these reflect this reality full of the appearance of randomness, chaotic juxtapositions and bombardments of images, usually for commercial use.
Oliver Herring constructed a series of life-sized figurative sculptures (Gloria and Patrick, both done in 2004) made from pieces of digital prints of the people. The models are positioned in a few poses for the photographs and then constructed in one particular position. They become three-dimensional photographic portraits, with a direct relationship to cubism. These sculptures demonstrate an interesting play with the precise qualities of digital photography and its freedom as well. The glossy photos and pieced together construction make reference to the look of a magazine or advertisement with its overwhelming number of images. In this sense, Herring brings the personal experience one has with a magazine, into a more confrontational and human space.
Jessica Stockholder’s installations create spaces that resemble American interiors, often using actual objects that might be found American homes. The arrangement of these objects and materials, however, are irrational and serve no function. In works such as Nit Picking Trumpets of Iced Blue Vagaries (1998) a huge variety of commercial products are composed together. Some of the materials used are 34 stacks of blue plastic buckets, various pieces of hardware, carpet and oranges. In color and spatially the work has the look of a shed or storage room. With its irrational organization of all of these consumer goods, the installation mocks the absurdity of the excessiveness present in America’s extreme consumer society. Stockholder’s work presents issues of relationships and inconsistencies. The unrestrained, grand arrangements refer to abstract expressionism. Due to the materials used the work does not, however, remain solely in the realm of internal emotion. The installations are dually about personal handwriting and the shared American experience.
In 1969, Joseph Kosuth stated in “Art After Philosophy” that ever since Duchamp’s “readymades” the focus of art changed from the form to what the art is saying. He went on to assert that a work of art is only art if it questions and redefines what art is or can be, due to the major challenge that Duchamp set up for art after “The Fountain.”(5) This new work that is being produced steps towards real everyday life experience, instead of continuously following a format of representation that only takes the art object farther away from reality. The work questions and redefines art in each piece because there is a cognitive experience the viewer has that resonates through the entire piece.
One of the main texts written on this subject is “Postproduction” by Nicolas Bourriaud. Bourriaud explains the prominence of work being created today based on reinterpretations, reproductions and re-exhibiting as a response to “proliferating chaos of global culture in the information age, characterized by the increase in the supply of work and the art world’s annexation of forms ignored or disdained until now.”(6) This is an interesting point that brings up the fact that many former works may be being looked at again today because of the added access to viewing them or criticisms of them online or even the added advertising of artworks and shows. Examples of this might be Mike Kelly and Paul McCarthy’s or Marina Abramovic’s “covers” of Vito Acconci’s performances. Bourriaud uses other examples of contemporary artists who work in the manner being discussed such as Rirkrit Tiravanija’s use of appropriating cultural rituals, such as having people over for dinner, through performance pieces. Bourriaud discusses this type of work in the language of semiotics explaining that these new works “produce original pathways through signs.” He says that all contemporary work that deals with appropriation testifies “to a willingness to inscribe the work of art within a network on signs and significations, instead of considering it an autonomous or original form.” He compares working in this manner with searching the web and the masses of information that abound in our culture.(7)
It seems that this current art movement is the first ever to coincide in process so closely with the process of participating in the culture commercially. The Dada movement was fueled by the new mechanical reproduction and rising industrial age. The movement introduced new conversations about art through dramatically juxtaposed elements as had never been done before. In reference to collaborative virtual projects being done today, Eduardo Kac once commented that if the art object and the artist are eliminated (taking off from Duchamp’s questioning the art object) then the art comes to be about relationships and interactions within a network.(8) It’s very evident that it is these interactions between members of or pieces of a network that are the main focus of works being created today in response to the cultural condition of the western world. Certainly a strong tendency in contemporary work is the “thread of reinterpretation and interpretation.”(9) This is a thread that can go on as infinitely as the world expands. Both the digital and mechanical age confronts society with this overwhelming truth and incites people into a cathartic purging of these many elements, however they may do so. "
Grimes
Grimes is an experimental musician, who creates enchanting and imaginative music. Her videos and style pays homage to the 90's club raver scene with creepers, platform shoes, braided hair and anime/manga style outfits. I really enjoyed listening to Grimes' album, because of the experimental and magical nature of the music itself. I'm always a fan of listening to new music with something special and different about it. Her vocals create their own sound scape and take the audience to a different world that isn't reality.I can easily listen to her music and be inspired whilst illustrating or creating something.
Lykke Li
Lykke Li is another experimental musician that specializes in electronic, indie rock with and element of pop. Her music is extremely contemporary as she is able to combine these different genres to create interesting songs with multiple layers. The more i listen to her music the more i like it. The drum beats and electronic sounds give different depths to the music and make her work really intriguing.
Kim Gordon - Sonic Youth
Kim Gordon was not only the vocalist and bass player in the alternative band Sonic Youth, but also own her own fashion line, has a career in art curation and also is an actress. She dabbles in lots of avenues of the arts and enjoys being creative on all levels. Personally I am not a huge fan of the music Sonic Youth create, but so appreciate the influence they held over the 80s/90's. Much like Nirvana this progressive rock holds emotion and a grungey style of music.
Stephanie Flanders- Economist
Stephanie Flanders is a well known economist, speech writer and adviser to the treasury secretary. Currently working at the New York Times as a reporter, her frequent posts analyze the fiscal years and economy. She provides a familiar and friendly character that relays information a lot may not understand or want to hear in a comprehendable manner. I looked through some of her reports and found this one to be relevant to the fashion industry and possibly to the way in which people shop at American Apparel.
UK shoppers pay more, get less Oct 2012
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-19991079
There were some temporary factors driving people back to the shops last month. But taken with this week's employment and inflation numbers, we can perhaps see grounds for that "feel-good" factor - or "feel-no-worse" factor - among consumers, which city economists (and ministers) always expected to see in the second part of 2012.
As Chris Williamson, at Markit, points out, the "Misery Index" - inflation and unemployment added together - is now at its lowest level since the end of 2009. So retail sales might well continue to grow in the months ahead.
But no-one's getting too excited just yet. With the general economic picture so subdued, few are expecting retail sales - or any other part of the economy - to take off. Real average earnings might be falling at their lowest rate in three years, but they're still falling.
I mentioned the great squeeze in people's pay packets in my last post. A chart in today's release from the ONS well captures the other side of the coin - the great rise in the price of what we buy in the shops.
As the picture shows, our spending rose in the years before the
crisis, but we were also getting more in return for that cash - more
and more, in fact.
But not lately. We're still spending more, but not getting much more in return.
By my reckoning, our retail spending has risen by 12.3% since the first three months of 2008. What we actually get for that money has risen by only 1.5%.
That is the more-or-less inevitable result of the fall in the value of the pound in 2008-09, and the rise in world commodity prices in the past few years. As I've discussed in the past the world is simply a more expensive place, now, for people living in the UK. But you can see why people might not be running back to the shops.
Ted.com
Ted or Technology, Entertainment and Design is a website which collates inspirational talks on all of the intended areas. This website is fantastic as it allows everyone, not just those who are priviledged enough to attend the talks, to listen to CEO's , designers and people who have inspiring ideas and creative talent to share.
Jessi Arrington: Wearing nothing new
<iframe src="http://embed.ted.com/talks/jessi_arrington_wearing_nothing_new.html" width="560" height="315" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" webkitAllowFullScreen mozallowfullscreen allowFullScreen></iframe>
For the second project on our MA FPI course, we have been given a choice out of three different brands and we have to create a proposal based around our areas of interest. I have chosen the brand American Apparel, and my idea is to create an advertising campaign that will help to rejuvenate the brands existing campaigns and to reel in a broader more creative audience. I have chosen to combine my skills of styling and illustration in order to approach this assignment.
I first started researching American Apparel's existing campaigns and started to deconstruct the way in which they deliver their brand. I have found the brand to be quite 'raunchy' in their approach to advertising and slightly risque. Analyzing and taking apart the advertizing campaigns is just the first part in visual analysis, and the second part is to read around the brand itself. Whether the articles are good or bad, I need to gain a real feel for the ethos of the brand and the way in which they operate. I have been researching a lot of controversial articles and blogs that discuss the way in which American Apparel is being perceived to the public. There are for and against ideas that run alongside the brand. A lot of negative press comes from feminists, discussing how the brand overly sexualise women in a taboo kind of way, sometimes they have used models who look younger than they are, which resulted in critics accusing the brand of sexualising children.
I want to keep within the constraints of the brand's identity and do nt want to stray too far from their ethos, because then this won't be effective advertising and could turn their already young audience away from the brand. So I need to find a balance and gauge the opinions of my peers and advise to help my ideas form.
At the moment, I have been sketching and researching many different artists and have been inspired a lot by collaging and illustrations. This, I hope, will enhance the skills I have around this subject and add to my portfolio. I have a pretty clear idea as to what my outcome may be, but as I am going to have a tutorial with Justyna, I hope she can establish if this is a god enough idea of not and help me develop.
Tutorial with Justyna
Whilst having my tutorial with Justyna, sh was slightly confused with what I was trying to achieve at first, maybe I didn't explain it well enough, but however once I explained it again she understood. She said that the ideas was good and that as long as my illustrations from the patterns and fabrics that American Apparel use were really on point and perfect the the idea will work. She also suggested to me that instead of having the models just in their underwear, that I should dress them in white shirts and bottoms, so that I can overlay the illustrations with the natural creases and lines of the clothing, to give the illustration a more realistic approach.
So the next step is to experiment with existing images and research into the brand even further. I have found one male model and am trying to organize a female model for the shoot as well. This way I will be collaging the images and putting them together to explore the unisex ideas and also to promote each of their signature items.
I have decided to create images for:
Disco Pants (female model) AND/OR Printed tye dye leggings
Unisex Hooded jacket (Male/female collage)
Unisex Patterned Shirts (Male/Female collage) x 2/3
Basics (male) Block colours - paper collaging, screen printing?
Dancewear (female)
Skills I will be utilizing:
- Photoshop and computer aided design. - I plan on creating a series of illustrations to accompany or work on top of my photography. These skills will include transferring illustrative sketches onto Photoshop and combining it with the photography from my planned shoots.
- Illustration and drawing. I will be using the patterns from the American Apparel designs and creating my own version, which will then be applied to the original photography as the clothing.
I found this theory blog post about collage and theories behind the postmodern age. I thought this would give my work surrounding collage some context.
Theory Now.
M. Cameron Boyd.
http://theorynow.blogspot.co.uk/2007/01/appropriation-collage-and-cultural.html
"Appropriation, Collage and the Cultural Condition
Administrator's Note:
This is the first in a series of guest essays by current or former students of my Theory Now course at Corcoran College of Art + Design. In her insightful essay, Rebecca Jones unveils the rich history of appropriation, from collage to the Internet, citing from a variety of sources to engage in cogent connections that reveal the ongoing theoretical "substance" in the "style."
Appropriation in art has become so widely used today that the once radical and overt political tones of collage have come to be commonplace in the lexicon of American culture. Appropriated materials were first employed in Picasso and Braque’s collages using chair cane, oil cloths, objects of the real world, in their still-lives, challenging preconceived notions about representation in artwork. The Dada artists took collage and appropriated materials and made them (along with their violent juxtaposing of the images) the main focus in the work, as a reaction to the irrational and horrific nature of World War One. Duchamp’s “Readymades” was about art being the actual act of selecting a pre-made product and presenting it as an artwork. The surrealists, Rauschenberg, the fluxists, and Pop Artists all used appropriation and collage in different ways for different purposes. Surrealists, for example, created work that would use pieces from the real world in their compositions to create a play between the real and the unreal. Most of the post-modern and contemporary work that uses appropriation uses it in an act of recycling, arranging, and combining the endless fragments and bits that make up our culture. This artistic act is not unlike participating in the information/digital age.
The use of an appropriated material or image immediately brings up questions of representation in art. Plato’s assertion is that art is an imitation of an imitation, and so three times removed from real (the real being the “forms” themselves: perfect, permanent, ideas of objects).(1) Once the industrial revolution and “mechanical reproduction” began to rule the Western culture, Jean Baudrillard used the idea of simulacra as the extension of this idea, brought into a modern artistic context. Baudrillard discusses simulacra as the phenomenon where a copy of a copy of the original gets made so that the last copy stands alone as its own form. The reproduction and reinterpretation of earlier products and works is becoming more prominent in art, which coincides with the amount of reinterpretation and reproduction that is occurring commercially and culturally. Today, the internet makes the amount of times something can be copied infinite. The capitalist consumer culture of the western world is at a climax. Production of materials and ideas is growing and progressing faster than it has anywhere at anytime, which makes the tools for artists working today that much more plentiful.
The age of the internet is a fast paced conglomeration of sounds, images, thoughts, and communications presented in formats that are becoming increasingly more indistinguishable from reality. Participants in this culture are constantly being engulfed by the infinite amount of information that is being produced and therefore being completely overwhelmed by this fragmenting (or shattering) of reality. For a better understanding of how collaged works are symptomatic of a culture dealing with fragmentation and new types (and extreme amounts) of reproduction, works from this newly digitalized world can be compared with those of the newly industrialized, post World War One German Dada movement.
The Dada movement in Berlin made use of the new art form of photomontage. This was exciting to many artists active in the movement because the photograph provided a more precise image closer to reality that could be juxtaposed in the composition. The affinity towards a truer realism can be seen in works being done today, a time when digital and virtual reality is being experienced almost as much as the real one. The idea of fragmentation is integral in the preciseness of the digital image itself. As differentiated by Douglas Davis, the analog reproduction of an image comes out different every time by the nature of its process. The digital reproduction process works by way of uniformly breaking down the image into tiny, precise fragments so that, when put together, a more realistic copy or created image that’s the same every time (unless manipulated) results.(2)
Post-Modernism was once described in a virtual symposium as showing a “deep skepticism regarding structures of authority and authenticity.”(3) The way that many post-modern and contemporary works deal with both the formats of highly influential systems in our society (such as the internet and consumerism) and with appropriation support this comment. Furthermore, the Post-Modern condition is undeniably about the loss of hope for a single universality emerging through the many opposing viewpoints and the aggressively advancing possibilities of technology, which results in a fragmenting of reality (hence, Pluralism). The information age has taken these contrasting viewpoints and possibilities to a constantly increasing amount. The internet, which most prominently feeds this constant growth without restraint or structure, thus becomes an anarchic network, which only acts locally as series of networks, but acts on a macro level as an infinitesimal growth of unfitting puzzle pieces. Participants are confronted with an incomprehensibility for the number of pieces every time that they “google.” The hope, or even need for, a single universality is undoubtedly lost.
However, just because the potential for universality gets lost in this complex society, that is not to say that the potential for connection at any level gets lost. Obviously, globalization and communication has increased incredibly in the information age. But still, McLuhan’s “global village” will never be integrated in the type of harmony he predicted for several reasons. For one, the digital world produces separate pieces of information (and deconstructs previously existing information) as quickly as interconnections occur. As well, the “global village” that has been created is set in a world that’s in an extreme point of financial tension right now. The growing digital industry is connecting together the privileged but separating underprivileged from that “global village” more and more, and will only continue to be based on the economic trend. And so simultaneously the world connects and spreads apart.
Many contemporary artists have unsurprisingly chosen to use these many strains and bits, and issues being raised because of them, to compose new works. As Gregory L. Ulmer discusses in his essay, “The Object of Post-Criticism,” collage work “intervenes in a world, not to reflect but to change reality”. He quotes Bertolt Brecht’s remarks that the mechanics of collage contrast the “organic model of growth and its classic assumptions of harmony, unity, and closure.”(4) These statements very well explain that piecemeal works being done today act as part of the culture rather than a comment on it. Work that uses pre-existing images, forms, and ideas and leaves the new works open for interpretations and associations from the viewers, acts as an active experience rather than a static idea or form.
This sort of fragmentation that is a result of the information age has created the opportunity for artists of the time to investigate the many elements that they and their society are experiencing. This is undoubtedly what has lead to a common thread in many contemporary works, being the use of combinations of large varieties of pre-existing materials. Works such as these reflect this reality full of the appearance of randomness, chaotic juxtapositions and bombardments of images, usually for commercial use.
Oliver Herring constructed a series of life-sized figurative sculptures (Gloria and Patrick, both done in 2004) made from pieces of digital prints of the people. The models are positioned in a few poses for the photographs and then constructed in one particular position. They become three-dimensional photographic portraits, with a direct relationship to cubism. These sculptures demonstrate an interesting play with the precise qualities of digital photography and its freedom as well. The glossy photos and pieced together construction make reference to the look of a magazine or advertisement with its overwhelming number of images. In this sense, Herring brings the personal experience one has with a magazine, into a more confrontational and human space.
Jessica Stockholder’s installations create spaces that resemble American interiors, often using actual objects that might be found American homes. The arrangement of these objects and materials, however, are irrational and serve no function. In works such as Nit Picking Trumpets of Iced Blue Vagaries (1998) a huge variety of commercial products are composed together. Some of the materials used are 34 stacks of blue plastic buckets, various pieces of hardware, carpet and oranges. In color and spatially the work has the look of a shed or storage room. With its irrational organization of all of these consumer goods, the installation mocks the absurdity of the excessiveness present in America’s extreme consumer society. Stockholder’s work presents issues of relationships and inconsistencies. The unrestrained, grand arrangements refer to abstract expressionism. Due to the materials used the work does not, however, remain solely in the realm of internal emotion. The installations are dually about personal handwriting and the shared American experience.
In 1969, Joseph Kosuth stated in “Art After Philosophy” that ever since Duchamp’s “readymades” the focus of art changed from the form to what the art is saying. He went on to assert that a work of art is only art if it questions and redefines what art is or can be, due to the major challenge that Duchamp set up for art after “The Fountain.”(5) This new work that is being produced steps towards real everyday life experience, instead of continuously following a format of representation that only takes the art object farther away from reality. The work questions and redefines art in each piece because there is a cognitive experience the viewer has that resonates through the entire piece.
One of the main texts written on this subject is “Postproduction” by Nicolas Bourriaud. Bourriaud explains the prominence of work being created today based on reinterpretations, reproductions and re-exhibiting as a response to “proliferating chaos of global culture in the information age, characterized by the increase in the supply of work and the art world’s annexation of forms ignored or disdained until now.”(6) This is an interesting point that brings up the fact that many former works may be being looked at again today because of the added access to viewing them or criticisms of them online or even the added advertising of artworks and shows. Examples of this might be Mike Kelly and Paul McCarthy’s or Marina Abramovic’s “covers” of Vito Acconci’s performances. Bourriaud uses other examples of contemporary artists who work in the manner being discussed such as Rirkrit Tiravanija’s use of appropriating cultural rituals, such as having people over for dinner, through performance pieces. Bourriaud discusses this type of work in the language of semiotics explaining that these new works “produce original pathways through signs.” He says that all contemporary work that deals with appropriation testifies “to a willingness to inscribe the work of art within a network on signs and significations, instead of considering it an autonomous or original form.” He compares working in this manner with searching the web and the masses of information that abound in our culture.(7)
It seems that this current art movement is the first ever to coincide in process so closely with the process of participating in the culture commercially. The Dada movement was fueled by the new mechanical reproduction and rising industrial age. The movement introduced new conversations about art through dramatically juxtaposed elements as had never been done before. In reference to collaborative virtual projects being done today, Eduardo Kac once commented that if the art object and the artist are eliminated (taking off from Duchamp’s questioning the art object) then the art comes to be about relationships and interactions within a network.(8) It’s very evident that it is these interactions between members of or pieces of a network that are the main focus of works being created today in response to the cultural condition of the western world. Certainly a strong tendency in contemporary work is the “thread of reinterpretation and interpretation.”(9) This is a thread that can go on as infinitely as the world expands. Both the digital and mechanical age confronts society with this overwhelming truth and incites people into a cathartic purging of these many elements, however they may do so. "
Grimes
Grimes is an experimental musician, who creates enchanting and imaginative music. Her videos and style pays homage to the 90's club raver scene with creepers, platform shoes, braided hair and anime/manga style outfits. I really enjoyed listening to Grimes' album, because of the experimental and magical nature of the music itself. I'm always a fan of listening to new music with something special and different about it. Her vocals create their own sound scape and take the audience to a different world that isn't reality.I can easily listen to her music and be inspired whilst illustrating or creating something.
Lykke Li
Lykke Li is another experimental musician that specializes in electronic, indie rock with and element of pop. Her music is extremely contemporary as she is able to combine these different genres to create interesting songs with multiple layers. The more i listen to her music the more i like it. The drum beats and electronic sounds give different depths to the music and make her work really intriguing.
Kim Gordon - Sonic Youth
Kim Gordon was not only the vocalist and bass player in the alternative band Sonic Youth, but also own her own fashion line, has a career in art curation and also is an actress. She dabbles in lots of avenues of the arts and enjoys being creative on all levels. Personally I am not a huge fan of the music Sonic Youth create, but so appreciate the influence they held over the 80s/90's. Much like Nirvana this progressive rock holds emotion and a grungey style of music.
Stephanie Flanders- Economist
Stephanie Flanders is a well known economist, speech writer and adviser to the treasury secretary. Currently working at the New York Times as a reporter, her frequent posts analyze the fiscal years and economy. She provides a familiar and friendly character that relays information a lot may not understand or want to hear in a comprehendable manner. I looked through some of her reports and found this one to be relevant to the fashion industry and possibly to the way in which people shop at American Apparel.
UK shoppers pay more, get less Oct 2012
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-19991079
Welcome signs of life from UK consumers today.
But the latest retail sales figures also show how UK shoppers have been
squeezed by higher inflation in the past few years. We are spending a
lot more than we were before the recession and not getting much more in
return.
The volume of retail sales was 0.6% higher in September than
it was in August. That means there has been a 1% increase in sales
between the second and third quarter - the largest quarterly rise in two
years. City economists think that is good news for next week's GDP
figures. There were some temporary factors driving people back to the shops last month. But taken with this week's employment and inflation numbers, we can perhaps see grounds for that "feel-good" factor - or "feel-no-worse" factor - among consumers, which city economists (and ministers) always expected to see in the second part of 2012.
As Chris Williamson, at Markit, points out, the "Misery Index" - inflation and unemployment added together - is now at its lowest level since the end of 2009. So retail sales might well continue to grow in the months ahead.
But no-one's getting too excited just yet. With the general economic picture so subdued, few are expecting retail sales - or any other part of the economy - to take off. Real average earnings might be falling at their lowest rate in three years, but they're still falling.
I mentioned the great squeeze in people's pay packets in my last post. A chart in today's release from the ONS well captures the other side of the coin - the great rise in the price of what we buy in the shops.
But not lately. We're still spending more, but not getting much more in return.
By my reckoning, our retail spending has risen by 12.3% since the first three months of 2008. What we actually get for that money has risen by only 1.5%.
That is the more-or-less inevitable result of the fall in the value of the pound in 2008-09, and the rise in world commodity prices in the past few years. As I've discussed in the past the world is simply a more expensive place, now, for people living in the UK. But you can see why people might not be running back to the shops.
Ted.com
Ted or Technology, Entertainment and Design is a website which collates inspirational talks on all of the intended areas. This website is fantastic as it allows everyone, not just those who are priviledged enough to attend the talks, to listen to CEO's , designers and people who have inspiring ideas and creative talent to share.
Jessi Arrington: Wearing nothing new
Jun 2011 TEDActive 2011
http://www.ted.com/talks/jessi_arrington_wearing_nothing_new.html
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Saturday, 1 December 2012
Clairty
Bringing this blog up to date, I have had a vision of clarity in the past few weeks. Having really struggled with the idea of another essay proving a thesis and finding a subject that was exciting enough for me to really get my teeth into, I emailed Damian with my issues and struggles with the question.
Admittedly this is the reason I had been putting off this project proposal and just worrying about failure. However after asking Damian what he thought of my question and reading the lecture notes surrounding research and methodology, Damian had finally explained that the whole reason behind this essay and project was to explore the ways in which we research. It wasn't solely dependent on the actual question and exploration of said question, but rather the discovery of oneself through the medium of research and the way in which we conduct it.
The reason I feel I have struggled so much with this, is because I haven't had to write about research methodology in such a way since I studied AS level psychology... and I didn't enjoy it then! Whilst finally learning the real purpose of this essay and finally learning its direction and what exactly we need to write about, it was like a weight lifted from my shoulders. I can now create any question around the field I was interested in, without it being too difficult to find the answers to the question, but focus more on finding the information I need to argue.
In terms of researching, I feel that I am confident with it and have always succeeded in good analytical and research skills, however it is going to take some used to getting back into and creating such a body of extensive work, outside of my comfort zone. I usually use the internet for most of my research, mainly using visual imagery, looking through blogs, popular article archives and finding links within links. This in itself can create a journey of different types of research and link to other bits of information I may not normally have looked at.
Whilst I am finding it hard to concentrate and get my head around both projects at a time, I need to learn to manage my time more efficiently. I know however I will get the project done, but it is best to keep afloat of all parts and make sure that the work load doesn't fall on top of you.
So far, I have managed to create a question, with help from Damian:
-->
"How does the use of black in fashion styling from (name here ) compare to the use of black in the designs from the Autumn collection of ….(name here) to convey atmosphere, occasion and emotion? "
The next stage is to figure which designer and stylist I want to use in order to explore the methods of research and I am thinking Gareth Pugh because his collections are predominantly in black and white and then to find a stylist of similar taste. Then delve into their collections and reseach the reasons why they use the colour, where I can find this information, what websites and journals and theorists explore the theories behind the colour black.
The first books I have been looking at are;
Visual Research Methods in Fashion by Julia Gaimster
and
Understanding Aesthetics for the Merchandising and Design Professional by Ann Marie Fiore
Upon starting to write my project proposal, brainstorming my question and beginning some secondary research for designers and stylists that only work with black, I discovered this would be too much of a specific area in order to research. This is because it is impossible for a stylist and designer to ONLY work in one colour and therefore would be impossible to compare. Therefore I have decided to readjust my question to compare the works of Gareth Pugh from Autumn/Winter collection (year yet to be decided) to Spring/Summer 2013. This would then lead to finding out the aspects of monochromatic colour that contribute more to occasion, and season whilst also investigating the use of such colours and what they convey. I think that this will open up my research and make it more accessible, whilst also allowing me to research Gareth Pugh's works more in depth and his thinking process behind his collections. The cut of his garments for the different seasons will also contribute to the theories I am researching, so i must decide if that is a good contributing factor towards my research, or if i am over indulging in information that may or may not be necessary.
The use of Journals, theorists and analysis of Gareth Pugh's work will contribute to the research, whilst also I can perform a focus group and possibly a questionnaire that will allow me to find an insight into what the public think of what colour conveys and their opinions of Gareth Pugh's use of colour in his collections. Also this will allow me to gain insight into whether they would wear such dark colours on a summer's day and why they would/would not. For this I will have to choose his Ready to Wear collections as opposed to the Couture collection as the audience are obviously most likely to wear everyday items.
Admittedly this is the reason I had been putting off this project proposal and just worrying about failure. However after asking Damian what he thought of my question and reading the lecture notes surrounding research and methodology, Damian had finally explained that the whole reason behind this essay and project was to explore the ways in which we research. It wasn't solely dependent on the actual question and exploration of said question, but rather the discovery of oneself through the medium of research and the way in which we conduct it.
The reason I feel I have struggled so much with this, is because I haven't had to write about research methodology in such a way since I studied AS level psychology... and I didn't enjoy it then! Whilst finally learning the real purpose of this essay and finally learning its direction and what exactly we need to write about, it was like a weight lifted from my shoulders. I can now create any question around the field I was interested in, without it being too difficult to find the answers to the question, but focus more on finding the information I need to argue.
In terms of researching, I feel that I am confident with it and have always succeeded in good analytical and research skills, however it is going to take some used to getting back into and creating such a body of extensive work, outside of my comfort zone. I usually use the internet for most of my research, mainly using visual imagery, looking through blogs, popular article archives and finding links within links. This in itself can create a journey of different types of research and link to other bits of information I may not normally have looked at.
Whilst I am finding it hard to concentrate and get my head around both projects at a time, I need to learn to manage my time more efficiently. I know however I will get the project done, but it is best to keep afloat of all parts and make sure that the work load doesn't fall on top of you.
So far, I have managed to create a question, with help from Damian:
-->
"How does the use of black in fashion styling from (name here ) compare to the use of black in the designs from the Autumn collection of ….(name here) to convey atmosphere, occasion and emotion? "
The next stage is to figure which designer and stylist I want to use in order to explore the methods of research and I am thinking Gareth Pugh because his collections are predominantly in black and white and then to find a stylist of similar taste. Then delve into their collections and reseach the reasons why they use the colour, where I can find this information, what websites and journals and theorists explore the theories behind the colour black.
The first books I have been looking at are;
Visual Research Methods in Fashion by Julia Gaimster
and
Understanding Aesthetics for the Merchandising and Design Professional by Ann Marie Fiore
Upon starting to write my project proposal, brainstorming my question and beginning some secondary research for designers and stylists that only work with black, I discovered this would be too much of a specific area in order to research. This is because it is impossible for a stylist and designer to ONLY work in one colour and therefore would be impossible to compare. Therefore I have decided to readjust my question to compare the works of Gareth Pugh from Autumn/Winter collection (year yet to be decided) to Spring/Summer 2013. This would then lead to finding out the aspects of monochromatic colour that contribute more to occasion, and season whilst also investigating the use of such colours and what they convey. I think that this will open up my research and make it more accessible, whilst also allowing me to research Gareth Pugh's works more in depth and his thinking process behind his collections. The cut of his garments for the different seasons will also contribute to the theories I am researching, so i must decide if that is a good contributing factor towards my research, or if i am over indulging in information that may or may not be necessary.
The use of Journals, theorists and analysis of Gareth Pugh's work will contribute to the research, whilst also I can perform a focus group and possibly a questionnaire that will allow me to find an insight into what the public think of what colour conveys and their opinions of Gareth Pugh's use of colour in his collections. Also this will allow me to gain insight into whether they would wear such dark colours on a summer's day and why they would/would not. For this I will have to choose his Ready to Wear collections as opposed to the Couture collection as the audience are obviously most likely to wear everyday items.
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