Jade Nicholls – The Collection Of…

Overall Thoughts

Jade Nicholls / May 6, 2013May 13, 2013 / Cultural Terrorists, Evaluation

Our performance was on Saturday 4^th May 2013 at 3:30pm, overall it went extremely well and we had many positive comments afterwards. I believe the use of us using our own car to speed up to the gallery and speed away from the gallery really startled the audience who were gathered outside and I overheard one audience member say ‘oh wow its started’, this really highlighted we were smuggling something into the gallery and it needed to happen quickly. The audience then followed us into the gallery which worked really well as it drew the attention from many members of the public who seemed to be extremely confused and worried about what was going on. The music was already playing when we went into the room which had already meant there were some members of the public waiting to see what was going to happen. The construction of ‘The Big Ben’ went incredibly smoothly and all of our practicing has really paid off. Once the Big Ben started to chime on our soundscape we took of our balaclavas and began acting completely differently like sophisticated ladies from the 1920s and walking around the clock as if we had no idea how it had got there. I believe this would have brought comedic elements to the audience members who were there the whole time, but for the audience members who had not seen how the sculpture had got there it may have led to confusion which is what we wanted to happen. Once we had given away our balaclavas to get ‘rid of any evidence’ we then left the gallery slowly and as if we had done nothing wrong. We left the ‘Big Ben’ standing and did not return until the gallery had closed to create more of an impact. This was our aim to let members of the audience and public have a proper look at the ‘Big Ben’ we had created and to leave them wondering if anything else was going to happen. Furthermore our costumes looked shocking as the outfit was a huge contrast, we had flapper like dresses on which women wore during the 1920s, with big work boots and balaclavas. It worked really well as it again added to the ‘shock’ factor of what was going on and once we had taken of our balaclavas we were able to play completely different characters. Overall as a group we were really happy with our piece and the reviews we received after, the idea worked very well and the ‘Big Ben’ looked remarkable once it all came together. Below are some photos from the performance and rehearsals.

Jade, Lacey and Fotini next to the completed Big Ben

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During rehearsals, practicing putting up the Big Ben was a struggle at times when we did not have very high ceilings.

One of the four clock faces

Theatre & Museums

Jade Nicholls / April 20, 2013May 13, 2013 / Audience, Cultural Terrorists, Space

After studying Susan Bennetts work into the use of theatre in museums it made us more positive about working in the museum and gallery. At first the site was daunting as museums and galleries are usually seen as places for people to relax and take in the art and artefacts without being disturbed, which is why we did not think putting on a drama performance in the Usher Gallery would appeal to the public. This was a main reason we did not decide to do a very long durational piece, we did not want the members of public to become frustrated we were in the way of what they wanted to see. However after reading Bennetts ‘Theatre and Museums’ it began to make a lot more sense as to why we were given this particular site. Performances are contemporarily performed in theatres, if you compare theatres and museums they have many similarities, ‘Theatres and Museums have increasingly become symbolic and actual neighbours, sharing the task of providing entertaining and educational experiences that draw people to a district, a city, a region and even a nation’. A lot of research has gone into whether or not performances should be brought into museums on a regular basis, John Faulk also wrote a book called, ‘The Museum Experience’, which goes into very specific details about what happens in the museums and the type of people who visit them. He found out during his research that, ‘Demographic analyses of cultural activity show that people who go to the theatre, concerts and movies are also museum visitors’, this also proves that using the museum as a site for our performance would not disrupt the members of public but actually intrigue them and may make their museum visit more enjoyable. Overall both Bennett and Faulk’s work gave us a more positive outlook on our ideas, instead of holding back so that we did not interrupt the gallery we believed the public would enjoy the performance more if we done something fast, loud and disruptive as it draws their attention and from the studies the people who visit museums also like to visit theatres meaning they must like drama performances.

Part of our inspiration…

Jade Nicholls / March 19, 2013May 13, 2013 / Cultural Terrorists, Development, Inspiration

After the gallery had a re-hanging the painting we were basing our performance around had been taken down. We at first thought this maybe a problem, however the new paintings in the gallery are very useful to our piece. The paintings of the cathedral in the corner of the room is where we are going to put up our model as it highlights the significance of the cathedral in Lincoln and how it is an iconic building in this city. This will mirror how the Big Ben is iconic for London. Another inspiration for us was the dress which is downstairs in the Usher gallery, it is covered in an atlas. We at first thought of covering our model in an atlas or map of London and Lincoln to show the differences between the two cities. However it looked extremely messy and was not as eye-pleasing as the newspapers are.

The construction stage…

Jade Nicholls / March 19, 2013May 13, 2013 / Cultural Terrorists, Development, Experimentation

Over the last week as a group we have been constructing our model. This has been very hard and taken a lot of patience and time but it has been worth it giving our end result. We have decided to cover the model in newspaper, using The Telegraph, as this is a London based newspaper and is more relevant. By the end of this week our aim is to have drawn the clock face on the tower and also have it fully covered in newspaper. Also our practice rehearsal in front of the whole class has improved our confidence on the overall piece as the tower made a huge impact in the gallery and even members of the public seemed interested to question what we were doing. The whole group gave us helpful feed back and we have taken the comments on board to make our piece the best it can be.

Here are some more photos of the building process:

Materials

Jade Nicholls / March 4, 2013May 13, 2013 / Cultural Terrorists, Development

After a lot of stress and worry about the material we are going to use for the sculpture of our Big Ben tower we have finally found the perfect solution. Our first initial idea of polystyrene was unsuccessful as we mentioned in our previous post. We then thought of using Paper meche, however this would have taken a lot of time and made the gallery extremely messy. After searching the internet and many craft shops around Lincoln we found in B&Q some blocks of Selitac, which is usually used for under floor heating, this seemed perfect to use to make the sculpture. After research online and speaking to various shop assistants we found that the material is very handy to bend and carve and it also slots together easily! During tomorrows lesson (5th March 2013), we are going to attempt to make the Big Ben with our new material. If this does not work however it will be back to square one with materials. Although its a good learning curve for us trying many different materials to get the perfect one to make our performance as good as it could possibly be.