Cultural Terrorists – Page 3 – The Collection Of…

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:

Rehearsal Schedule

Fotini Efstathiou / March 11, 2013May 9, 2013 / Cultural Terrorists, Development

This is our rehearsal schedule for the forthcoming weeks:

11th March 2013- We have visited B&Q to buy more of the Selitac material which is a wood flooring underlay. We have decided on this material as it is strong enough to create the sclupture as well as being easy to shape and build with. We then began to make the rest of the sculpture. Last week (4th/5th March), we made the base of the ‘Big Ben’ and we have realised we need more of the material to create the top. This week we have started to build the top of the sculpture and put it all together.

12th March 2013- We are going to visit the archive library with the rest of the class to research more into the gallery. After the visit we are going to continue building the top of the sculpture to make sure it is finished in time for next weeks lesson to show the rest of the class.

18th March 2013- We are going to show our sculpture piece which will not be finished as we need to cover it with newspaper, however we can show the actual sculpture and practise how we are going to put it altogether on the actual performance. It is important to see how much of an impact the slupture will make in the gallery as well as we want to make a big statement so it has to be big enough to catch peoples attention and interest. After showing this to the class we are then going to begin to find appropriate newspaper articles about London to either buy or print which we can use to attach to our sculpture.

19th March- We are going to start attaching the appropriate newspaper articles to our sculpture, we decided that glue would be to messy and would not hold the newspaper to the material. After speaking with Dan we came up with the idea of using a stapler, which will minimise the mess that glue would cause and we are certain it will keep the newspaper attached to the material.

Easter Holidays- as a group we have decided to visit London during the Easter holidays, although this may not be possible for us all to be there at the same time. Whilst in London we are hoping to make a soundscape of the noises happening in the busiest areas surrounding the Big Ben and maybe even ask tourists what they think of the Big Ben and what it means to them. This will help with our research into the background of the Big Ben and we maybe able to interpret some of the public’s viewpoints of the Big Ben.

8th April 2013- We are going to sort costumes out to make sure we have enough time to make adjustments if needed. The costumes we have decided on are 1920’s style dresses, such as the authentic flapper dress and the reasoning behind this is due to the building of the Usher Gallery being built in the 20’s, so therefore we want to capture the atmosphere of that era. As we are smuggling in the sclupture of the Big Ben we thought us wearing a balaclava whlist building the sclupture would be very affective and emphasise the idea of ‘cultural terrorism’.

9th april 2013- We are going to run through the whole performance, we will email the Gallery to ensure they are fine with us using the Gallery for this purpose beforehand. Also we have decided to ask members of the public who are in the Gallery at this time what they think of our idea and whether they would be interested if this was happening whilst they were in the Gallery.

The rest of the weeks leading up to the performance we will keep running through the performance and making any changes which need to be made. We want the performance to be slick and explosive to make an impact in the gallery and capture the audiences attention.

Authors: Fotini Efstathiou and Jade Nicholls.

The Construction Process

Lacey Cole / March 11, 2013May 9, 2013 / Cultural Terrorists, Development, Experimentation

Having attempted our first go at creating a sculptural model using polystyrene, and failing miserably, we decided to go in search of other materials. We researched the types of material commonly used for smaller scale models, such as very thin wood known as balsa wood. However, due to the size we want to attempt, balsa wood was too flimsy and brittle. We eventually ended up in B&Q, and found a product known as ‘Selitac’, thin foam sheets with metallic covering that clip together to form boxes. After buying the Selitac boards we realised it was an extremely useful material for the type of sculpture we are making. It is very easy to carve and does not flake easily like the polystyrene we experimented with previously. It is also similar to a material known as ‘grey board’ which had a considered as it is a well known modelling material with a thin layer of foam. The tools we are using to carve the sculpture are scalpels, we researched into many different tools such as craft knives and Stanley knives but we decided the scalpels were the best and cheapest option, mainly because they have a smaller and more precise blade making it easier to work with.

We have decided to make the sculpture as large as possible in order to make it stand out, we decided rather than making our Big Ben half-heartedly we wanted to make an impact in the gallery so not only people watching our performance will be shocked but the passers-by will also be intrigued. Whilst carving the sculpture we have decided to make slots in the material so it is easier to put the sculpture together. In addition to making the performance smoother and faster, this will also increase the impact upon our audience as we will (hopefully) have managed to create a impressive sculpture and place it in the Usher gallery in a small amount of time. So far with the material we have made the base of the Big Ben and it is coming together nicely and staying stable. The photos below are from the first time we have carved the material and how the sculpture has started to come together.

Author: Lacey Cole

Inhabiting the space.

Fotini Efstathiou / March 6, 2013May 9, 2013 / Cultural Terrorists, Inspiration

Our performance is focused around smuggling London culture into Lincoln by placing a large sculpture of Big Big in the room of the Usher Gallery filled with paintings of Lincoln from different eras. We want to create quite a disruptive and energetic piece and in a sense take over the gallery for the thirty minutes we will be performing. During the construction of the Big Ben (which will be hectic) there will be a tea break where afternoon tea will be served, including scones, little cakes and sandwiches emphasising the typically English architecture of the building as well as the era it was built (1920’s). This will bring down the hectic nature of the performance and completely contrast with the constructing as the balaclavas will be removed and we will look like respectable 1920’s women enjoying a spot of tea on their lunch break.

In a sense we are creating a ‘lived-in’ space as we take over the gallery and when we leave after the performance is finished our afternoon tea will be left to show that someone has been there and lived in it. The Reckless Sleepers who were formed in Nottingham in 1989 have frequently undertaken this notion of a ‘lived-in’ space, most prominently with their performance of ‘The Last Supper’ in 2003 where thirty-nine audience members were invited to dinner. We have been inspired by this idea of getting the audience involved so therefore, during our afternoon tea we will be inviting some audience members to join us, thus emphasising this notion of a ‘lived-in’ space and hopefully increasing the entertainment value.

Author: Fotini Efstathiou

Works Cited: Govan, Emma, Helen Nicholson and Katie Normington (2007) Making a Performance: Devising Histories and Contemporary Practices, Oxon: Routledge, p. 115.

Pussy Riot

Lacey Cole / March 5, 2013May 9, 2013 / Cultural Terrorists, Inspiration, Research

Whilst considering costume and props for our performance piece, we came to the realisation that in fact some elements of our piece could be likened to that of feminist collective, Pussy Riot. Having decided that balaclavas would be a great statement against 1920’s era flapper dresses for costume, it dawned on us that we had seen something similar on the news in relation to the Russian group. Pussy Riot is known for their provocative performances in public places, similar to those of Lone Twin, a collective from which we have taken great inspiration. More recently, however, Pussy Riot has been widely spoken about on the news, due to the arrest of some of their members. There is now an ongoing campaign to free the women, which is discussed in the below video.

Currently two of the members are in prison on charges of ‘hooliganism’, after a performance inside a church during which they condemned the re-election of President Putin in 2012 whilst wearing brightly coloured clothing and balaclavas. This idea of guerrilla-like terrorism is something that obviously has influenced our piece, however whilst Pussy Riot uses their statement clothing and music to portray a very political message, it is our hope that the construction we are creating will lead to something more of a personal realisation for those who view it. Instead of outward discussion of others, we want people to think about themselves and really connect to their roots in terms of their personal historical influences. In this way, whilst connecting to Lincoln as the root of piece, we also want to bring in our personal histories as it were, with the realisation of a building that is effectively the centre of the largest city in the United Kingdom.

Pussy Riot band members

Author: Lacey Cole.