Here is a current brief which could be entered into as a craft practitioner such as myself.
The brief requires this:
- to design and make a piece of sculpture, furniture or 3D art work that contributes in aesthetic or practical means and improves the experience of those visiting or using the Sharpham Meadow site
- A concept for the piece which might also provide the opportunity for people to add to as part of their memorial for loved ones who have been buried at the site
- A piece of work with a natural aesthetic which compliments and is sympathetic to the landscape and our vision of connecting people to nature
- Work that is durable and long lasting, suited to the local weather conditions and the environment
- In keeping with the site, locally sourced materials as far as is practical
Artist Residency and Commission 2014
For this, the third Sharpham residency, we would like to commission a piece of Public Art for our newly created Natural Burial Ground, the Sharpham Meadow. Sharpham Meadow is set in a stunning area of natural beauty, with extensive views over to Dartmoor and down to the river Dart. The site is based on approximately 4 acres of land and includes a specially designed natural circular ceremonial cob building.
It is also an opportunity to stay during the residency at Sharpham whilst the project is completed, which would be a good opportunity for an artist who has either the ability to travel or work away from home, or in my case at the moment doesn’t really have one!
This commission appeals to me for this reason and several others; the connection to the natural world, circles of life, craft and with death and memorial. My current work using corn dolly techniques especially in the 5 plait where you plait around a central stem creating a curved structure which flows around could be adapted and expanded on. Using local materials is something I am interested in also with this work. I think looking at live briefs can help you as an artist and maker to think in different ways surrounding contexts which are not part of your usual work and help to develop your existing work practice. Taking part in the London Design Museum competition helped to develop my own interests and ideas further so I would definitely look at doing more of this in the future. The requirements for the artist, at this time are not right for me as you have to have been practicing for 2 years in your chosen subject. Also being a current student at university means I could not dedicate my time to it. It is however positive that there are opportunities for artists and makers to participate in projects like this and being something that involves designing, constructing and engaging the community are things which I am interest in as a maker and designer and I will continue to develop my skills and experience in this area to build up a good portfolio so future opportunities like this will be available for me to enter.
Ideas tap is an online resource that helps creative people get access to information and support. It is a charity which works with leading arts organisations to create industry opportunities for it’s members and a variety of ways for people of all ages to access job and funding opportunities, networking and other artists profiles.
Presently there is an opportunity to create a display at the London South Bank Centre shop window space to be displayed for their Christmas period which really interests me as a craft maker. Making pieces with which to draw people into the other works in the shop window is a strange concept because as a maker I am affectively saying “buy this other persons stuff”! Window displays however are a great way of selling products and to appreciate this as a retail selling platform and participate in this as a prop designer could lead to a better understanding of how to create spaces that promote sales, which is an important aspect to think about as a designer. It also would create links with the shop itself, which is a point of sale for hundreds of thousands of people from all around the world who come to visit the South Bank. This could be a valuable contact in terms of future sales potential, for work in the shop itself, sales, window dressing or even as a wholesale maker providing them with your own products.
Creating good design proposals is key with a brief like this. You will need to communicate your ideas clearly and effectively in a short amount of space and time.
Through entering the London Design Museum Competition’s Design Factory 2014 for which I was shortlisted for my corn dolly bench design using recycled PU foam, I got to experience participating on two levels in this area of proposing an idea to a 3rd party. The first part to create the design and enter the competition itself. This involved months of research and module for my university project, culminating in a series of design boards to communicate the process and outcome of the research and development of your ideas.
Although this was a student brief and nothing was commissioned, the feed back I received from the judging panel was a valuable lesson for myself at this point in my learning development. Our normal critique is done by tutors, people we have built up a working relationship with and the feedback here was from complete strangers. Their response was completely objective but much more critical than I had expected from being one of the selected participants. learning to accept that not everyone is going to appreciate or understand your ideas. However, there was positive aspects to my submission and they felt the over all the idea was really interesting and could be developed further and my boards were visually eye catching. I feel at this point their comments were fair and I have learnt that allowing time for proof reading and the construction of design boards is really crucial as a designer. This is the only way in which the 3rd party will have to interpret your work and it must be clear, reflect the brief and use the correct terminology and appropriate language.
The other was during the actual symposium, where we were split into small groups and given the task to design something for a hallway for one of the terraced housing developments which our guest speaker had designed and built. We had about and hour or so to complete a design and communicate this in a way of our choosing using basic art materials of mainly paper, string, pens etc… Whether this be models, drawings, collage etc… In a very short space of time we had to introduce ourselves, work out each others strengths and weaknesses, areas of specialism and create a design based on our own unique creative responses to her request which was a great exercise. Almost like a form of design life drawing but we also had the whole awkward initial small talk thing going on. We did how ever get on really well and it didn’t feel forced just new.
This was for me the best part about the day and I got a lot out of the experience because it showed me that my strengths lie in responding to the brief in the conception of ideas and the organisation needed to put it into place. They guys I worked with were clearly more technical led and were studying degree’s which involved more graphic based design. We all contributed to the designing however and shared the responsibility of different tasks out equally and quiet naturally.
My initial design response was thinking about how she had talked about the hallway often being a wasted space or a neglected space, where people come in to use other areas of the house, dump their things and move on. They can be chaotic spaces full of stuff and we thought about how looking at the original Victorian period of the development site itself and how hallways were used then and how we personally use our own hallways. I am old enough to know what a hall stand is… which is really quiet scary and weird considering I wasn’t even born anywhere near the 18th century so showed the two guys (who had no clue what I was on about) a picture of one and how we might re-design it for today’s home owner, especially for one living in a contemporary, geometric space like the terrace we were designing for. One of the guys remarked on the tiles of Victorian hallways and the shapes used to create patterns, so we started to work with this as a concept. The other guy in our team set about making a paper model of a geometric hall stand which was a part of the wall and continued up and on the celling, connecting the floor, walls and celling into the space. Simple cuts of triangles we made to loosely communicate the idea of the tiles which instead of being mosaic together, were scattered like the bread crumb trail which led you around the corner to find the unit. Each part of the shapes had different purposes, some as hidden cupboards which could be pushed to open to house keys, phones, wallets etc.. others would be fitted with mirrors to refract the light coming in from a sky light. others drawers for more objects associated with hall use like shoes and umbrellas. I composed the design boards and used simple text to communicate our ideas as I knew she would not have long to look at them. This really paid off as the first thing she remarked on was that in this situation words were really important to her because some of the designs were not self explanatory and needed text for her to understand what they were, how they worked and how they would be used by the home owners. She really liked our idea of redesigning something which once served a purpose but who’s design had become clunky, brown and boring. She also liked the use of mirrors to refract light and create shadows which would change during the time of day.
Communicating your ideas quickly and effectively whether it has taken you months to prepare or minuets is really crucial and a valuable lesson which I will take into my own work, not only for potential submissions for other competitions but also within my own research for myself in learning to break down ideas and work in simplistic ways. I think this could help me in my own designing to process things simply and follow things through from an initial design development stage using clear visual aids (drawings or models) with supportive text.
Also taking part in this type of competition allowed me access to this and has enabled me to add it to my CV which will look good for future projects for working within a 3rd party brief.
Public Realm 