Category: Evaluation

On reflection

Daniela Scimeca / / Evaluation, Nova Inventa

So having performed it was now time to evaluate. Of course I was very pleased with how it went, something we’d developed for so long had finally come together and with positive feedback I felt we’d achieved what we set out to do. In fact a man came up to us after our performance and happened to comment on how he liked the fact we walked from one window to the other, he said the looks on our faces showed we looked like we had one purpose and that was to deliver the boxes, but that he knew he wanted to follow us. This gave me reason to believe we had a positive effect on audience members as they were interested and were keen to follow us on our journey.

With performing, there is always room to improve or develop. If we were going to do it again I would increase the volume of the recording, as it wasn’t loud enough and wasn’t heard. We felt this was a real shame as the words possessed meaning. Because of the area we were in not many people come there so we assumed the level to which we had been practising would have been sufficient, however there was a lot more noise the day we performed. In hindsight we should have anticipated the hustle and bustle of the weekend. The volume on the TV situated in the area wasn’t low enough and this most probably contributed to the lack our hearing for the recording as well.  One thing I have learned is the importance of keeping people up to date with your practices as one of the managers of the site wasn’t aware we were using paint, this is something we thought we had cleared with them which later boiled down to a miscommunication.

If I was to expand on from this I think there are some great things we could do with the performance! I can see the journey of the walk being developed, perhaps walking all around the gallery. The walls could become much larger in scale; we could fill more areas and do it over a longer period of time. The possibilities are pretty much endless for the construction and deconstruction of space and not to mention quite exciting really as it would mean a much bigger statement and invasion of space.

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This time last week: Performance Reflection..

Samantha Mckenzie / / Audience, Concealed Illusions, Development, Evaluation, Uncategorized

This time last week my group and I had shortly finished our final performance piece. We were performing a piece of site specific drama in a gallery room in The Usher Gallery. Our piece aimed to highlight the similaritys betweeen idealised art and idealised people and how through the use of Instagram and makeup application we idealise ourselves.

The Performance

We were extremely pleased with the outcomes of our performance, and were happy to see the many faces who came to have a look. I found it challenging to continue doing something so repetitive for that length of time, especially because of the impact it had on my sore, stinging skin. Coming up to the performance date we did all discuss how painful our faces will be during and afterwards but felt there was nothing we could really do about this without changing the piece entirely. We did not want to change it because we thought it is such an aesthetically powerful piece which delivers a more intense atmosphere because of the gruelling and perhaps painful process. We did however choose to involve moisturiser as part of the routine between each section of makeup removal to look after our faces. I do not think this alters the aim because applying moisturiser is something that I inparticular do anyway before applying or removing makeup.

Another difficulty was staying in particular positions for a durational amount of time; it was uncomfortable to sit with crossed legs for 20 minutes but I feel it looked affective and as if we were possibly sitting on our beds applying makeup when we were young. We wanted the change of posture and position throughout to reflect how it is a routine but something we do at home in our bedrooms as part of an everyday process. Also, because we were sat in the positions that we were, spread around the bench, it gave the audience opportunity to see all of us. A lot of the audience members chose to walk around us so they could see each of our faces. However we were interested in how some of the public entered the gallery initially but once they saw us they chose to leave; perhaps they felt we were invading their space where they enjoy to look at the art work. Another interesting observation of mine was the choice some of the audience made to stand around the outside of the room or at the doors. One particular audience member spoke to me afterwards and said she did not want to come into the room because she felt as if she was invading our space, she found it odd that people were coming in and and looking so closely. It was interetsing to hear different people’s perspectives. In a way I would like to think they were intrigued enough to come a little closer but also it is pleasing to know they thought of the space as ours which was one of our aims. We wanted to recreate a space such as a bedroom where you would get ready for the day or a night out.

Our preperation began a few hours before the performance and admittedly I was nervous to set up the projector and see how the whole thing looked because we had a limited amount of time in the process to organise a practice set up. Thankfully there were no issues and the sound we had recorded also sounded great in the space and created the right atmosphere. A couple of last minute additions to our piece which I have not mentioned before are the use of an alarm clock, a bed sheet and the removal of our t-shirts.

The clock- As we were only supposed to be performing for two hours we needed an end point to our piece. We chose to use an alarm clock because it is something we perhaps have in our bedrooms, it is also an indictation of time and once more reiterates that applying makeup is a durational process which is part of a set time routine.

The sheet- We decided to use a bed sheet the lay over the centre of the benches we were performing on. This created a similar appearance of the makeup covered t-shirts which portrayed large versions of makeup wipes and also prevented any makeup spilling onto the surfaces. We also thought this created a bedroom affect.

The removal of t-shirts- The t-shirts we were wearing throughout the performance eventually appeared like the dirty makeup wipes which we had dropped on the floor. We decided that it would be an effective end point for us to remove them once the alarm clock sounded to show that they are something disposable. We removed our makeup and then our t-shirts also asking the questions- you wouldn’t go out without your makeup on, but would you go out without your clothes on? Is there a link between the covering of our bodies with clothing and the covering of our faces with makeup? Are they sometimes both as important as each other?

Overall I was extremely happy and relieved with the outcome. I felt that our piece delivered the exact message we had hoped for and also triggered some very important questions amongst our audience. The whole process has been very rewarding and also made me rethink how I present myself and how I want people to see me.

 

Responding to our time…

Tabitha Hilton-Berry / / Audience, Evaluation, Possessed Time

In our performance, we found that although we did not have a constant audience at all times throughout, we were noticed and intriguing to the members of the public that visited the museum that day. People would drift in and out and then come back later to see the progression of our piece. It was almost as if they thought they might be missing out on something and wanted to know what we would do next, which I found very encouraging for the overall reaction that we got from the public.

At the beginning of our piece, there was quite a considerable audience for the first hour as they watched us awaken from our fictitious slumber and start our day,controlled by the sound of a ticking clock. it was interesting to see the people who wanted to see more was generally families with young children, as the children found it either intriguing and as I remember, kept asking their parents questions about us.

‘Who are they, Mummy?’

‘Are they real?’

‘What’s that sound?’

It was encouraging to know that we were being noticed in the way that we had hoped to be and that, even though they were young children, we were being observed and questioned, not just passively watched by an uninspired audience. Not only did the children ask questions, but in order to educate their children more, parents were asking questions so together they could work out the meaning behind.

‘What sounds can you hear?’

‘What’s that on wall? Is it a clock?’

‘Do you think the sound is coming from those watches in the cabinet?’

‘What do you think they’re doing now?’

The audience response was overall very good and even when the clock puzzle was being formed by ourselves, people were walking around us and peering in to the centre of the circle to see how the puzzle was coming together. If we were to change something with regards to the performance, I would suggest audience interaction would be good, especially as a learning technique for young children. They could be incorporated into helping us put the puzzle back together, as even for us it was a fun task that we could all co-operate in.

There were a few audience members that did not appreciate what we were doing in the space. Some people would walk to the doorway, glance in, and then quickly turn around and head to another room. One woman laughed as she stood and watched us, another asked her husband ‘Is this even worth looking at?’ while her husband replied with a brief ‘Let’s go somewhere else.’ We of course did not expect for everyone to fully appreciate what we were doing as performance is not everyone’s ‘cup of tea’ and it was actually good to see that people were still observing us and questioning what we were doing even if they quickly decided that the did not like it.

 

So we did our performance…

Shellie-Ann Barrowcliffe / / Evaluation, People

So our exhibit was to be created and presented to the public for them to come and explore the café from our point of view. It was a fun process to help build the exhibit, even though I felt some members of the group did more than others throughout the setting up and deciding where things were going to be placed but it was still great fun. Being trusted to go down to the warehouse to paint the platform on my own felt amazing and for a second I believed I could be an artist as I thought someone would be watching me making sure that I wasn’t doing anything I shouldn’t. It felt nice to be trusted. The setting up process involved going back down to the warehouse underground to collect the platform and various other items that we were allowed to borrow. It was really helpful of The Collection to allow us to use plinths and glass boxes to present our exhibit as it gave it a more professional feel and made it connect and relate more to what was inside the galleries in The Collection. Throughout the setting up process I was really excited with how it was turning out and how it began to look, this was good because a lot of what we wanted to do was dependant on how it worked out on the day. I was really nervous going to The Collection on the Saturday because I knew that it was either going to work or it was all just going to fail but it seems to start off well…

After we spent a few hours setting everything up I was more confident in our piece and was beginning to get really excited. Setting up the education room was fun as we did end up moving it from our original window into the one nearby as we felt like it framed us more and gave us more chances of people seeing us, which it did. In the education room we weren’t sure on how people would react to us if they noticed us. Just as we thought we were finished setting up it started to pour it down with rain, this wasn’t good because most of our piece was outside. However, it seemed to only affect our chalk board which we rewrote before we got into our positions ready to begin and agreed that if it started raining then we would battle through it.

It was amazing to be set up in the education room, not because this was a dry spot but because it allowed me to evaluate peoples reactions to what they were experiencing. It was nice to see how people were reacting to me and Holly being up there because some people would wave to us and as we were having a tea party it felt natural to wave back and smile at them. Some people looked at us confused and didn’t really understand what we were doing but yet we just carried on as we needed to. People weren’t sure what to make of the whole idea as it was bringing something that shouldn’t be there to the space, some people looked confused as their normally space had been took over and they couldn’t understand why.

After our performance ended, I had a lot of mixed feelings. I felt like it hadn’t come to a natural finish and that we should have carried on longer as I didn’t feel like it had properly run its full length of time, it just felt like when you’re watching a movie and it suddenly freezes and it hasn’t come to its correct end. I feel like some members of the group put everything into the performance whereas I personally feel like one member of the group didn’t and the problem is I don’t really understand why. I accept that it might have got boring repeating the same thing over and over for a few hours but we all knew what to expect when we agreed to do this project as a group. I just felt let down that this member didn’t seem to  feel like it was an important project after we had come so far as a group and eventually developed an idea that we all accepted and liked for this one member to then put the effort in just made me disappointed. It was a downside to being up in the education room because I could also observe the flaws within our project and I tried not to let this interfere with my own performance even though sometimes I was getting frustrated.

Evaluating our project as a whole I think that we could have pushed it even further than we did, we could have created several different things for the public to observe and make it into more of a professional gallery, I think it is a shame that we came up with this idea so late on in the project as I didn’t feel that we had enough time to fully develop our idea. If I was to develop it I would make things look even more professional, as though it really had come from inside and was just an extension of The Collection. I would create more standalone items that the audience can come and explore and maybe include an interactive thing like you get inside the galleries so that it appeals not only to adults but also children as well.

Overall it has been a great experience to have been able to do as it gave me another insight into performance however I also feel like it hasn’t been very valuable to me personally.

“And finally – putting pencil to paper…”

Tom Baines / / Concealed Illusions, Development, Evaluation, Experimentation, Research

My role in the performance was to draw the live art in front of me. I was using different shades of pencils and ordinary paper. In an extreme case it is possible that to say that I am drawing a ‘life drawing’. “The representation of a life-model – and the particular choice of a female model – generates socially and culturally specific associations” (Roberts 2012, p70). In this instant Amanda Roberts suggests that having a female model has significance in society. It certainly does in our piece. As I have said before I am the only male in my group and I am drawing a group of girls. Does this have some sort of patriarchal view on society? Or is it men’s eyes that I represent observing beauty and drawing it – similarly to what the artist did when he drew the Venus de Milo.

 

Here are the selection of drawings from past rehearsals and the final performance:

 

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It is clear that as the performance progressed the drawings became more erratic. These drawings are shown at the bottom of the photo. This happened as the girls became more frantic with their make-up. This could show men’s dominance over women or a power in art through live drawings or It could show elements of females able to exploit men’s need for a woman. But of course literally similarly to the artist who drew the Venus de Milo they are copies of beauty. Whether my drawings are accurate is irrelevant because it is quite possible the artist’s drawings at as accurate to the Venus de Milo statue; and of course the statue itself it a copy of the Ancient Greek goddess Aphrodite. How did the creator of the statue, Alexandros of Antioch, know that was what she looked like? The drawings themselves were they drawings of ‘true beauty’?  Or were they drawings of what was there? This of course leaves our project open as said before what is idealisation, the romantic era of paintings where it was painting for aesthetic sake, and what is true nowadays?…

 

 

Works Cited

 

Roberts, Amanda and Howard Riley (2012) ‘The social semiotic potential of gestural drawing’, Journal of Visual Art Practice, 11 (1) 63-73