The Collection Of… – Page 24 – 'experiences of contemporary museums as theatre' (Bennett,S 2013)

‘Wrapped Reichstag’

Jade Nicholls / February 18, 2013May 13, 2013 / Cultural Terrorists, Inspiration, Research

Another huge influence to our performance was the performance led by Christo and Jeanne-Claude of the ‘Wrapped Reichstag’. They change a iconic and influential building in Germany over the course of a few days and watch how the public react to this. The public reaction in our performance is something we are extremely interested in and believe many people will stop and watch our performance throughout to see the end product. They re-create the Reichstag and make it original and unique which is what we are aiming to achieve when creating and building our own Big Ben. Although the huge difference is that we aren’t actually using the site of the Big Ben, we are still changing how it would potentially look and re-creating another iconic structure.

This is the Youtube video link to the performance- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=esiErDm62E4

After researching and finding pictures of the planning Christo and Jeanne-Claude went through it has given us ideas to try out many different materials, after the polystyrene was unsuccessful we know we at least have a lot more time to try different ideas to make our structure the best it can be. Also it has helped seeing they used drawings to give them inspiration, we have decided to start to draw how we want the structure to exactly look like and make smaller model before making the final one. The works of the ‘Wrapped Reichstag’ has helped us as it shows using an iconic building brings a lot of meaning and questions to the performance.

The original drawings of the ‘Wrapped Reichstag’ during planning.

A computerized picture of how they wanted the final outcome to look.

During the performance, whilst being ‘wrapped’, shows how many people were interested in what was going on, as it wasn’t being explained throughout, which is what we aim to do during our performance.

The completed building.

‘The Grand Step Project’

Jade Nicholls / February 18, 2013May 13, 2013 / Cultural Terrorists, Inspiration, Research

The Grand Step Project is a performance which inspires and relates to our own. Stephan Koplowitz devised a piece of dance in which his group of dancers then perform on steps of iconic buildings around the world, bringing a different type of art and culture to different cities. Their website quotes- “The work also functions as a way for local arts presenters to both reach new audiences and help connect different strands of their cultural community, specifically in dance and music.” Like our performance they are bringing different cultures. Similar to our performance with the Big Ben, Stephen Koplowitz has a huge interest in the grand staircases, particularly in New York- “I am fascinated by the grand staircases’ grandeur, imposing architectural stature, and the ostentatious embellishments that belie the stairs’ mere utilitarian function as a means of approach and retreat.” Although these performances are made up of dancing and singing it relates to our piece as we have a lot of movement throughout the gallery happening and also the use of soundscapes can be seen as a type of music.

This is a link to their website which has videos of their performances throughout-

http://www.koplowitzprojects.com/grandsteps.html

The Big Ben

Jade Nicholls / February 18, 2013May 13, 2013 / Cultural Terrorists, Research

After doing extensive research into ‘The Big Ben’ clock tower it has given us more ideas on what to include in our performance. There are many clips of the sound the clock makes every hour which we may use as part of our soundscape throughout the performance, the four quarter bells sound G♯, F♯, E, and B. We could even use an instrument to make this significant sound of maybe bring an actual bell into the gallery to hit.

Also we researched the significance in popular culture that the Big Ben has had, the clock is now a symbol of the United Kingdom and London, especially in visual media and attracts thousands of tourists every month. Even though we live so close to London and have been many times we still visit the Big Ben each time we go to London as it is such an iconic building. When a television or film-maker wants to indicate a generic location in Britain they usually show an image of the tower or involve the tower in some way. On entering every New Year the Big Ben plays a key part and around the country everybody watch’s the fireworks surrounding the clock and relies on the time it shows to celebrate the New Year. Also on Remembrance Day the chimes of the Big Ben are broadcast to mark the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month and the chimes start the two minutes of silence throughout the country. Furthermore on the 27 of July 2012, starting at 8:12 a.m, Big Ben chimed thirty times, to welcome in the London Olympic Games, which officially began that day. In 2008 a survey of 2,000 people found that the tower was the most popular landmark in the United Kingdom. It has also been named as the most iconic film location in London. These facts and examples represent to us how significant The Big Ben is to Britain and how it plays a huge part of the cultured society. By creating our own Big Ben in the gallery there will not be confusion as to what we are creating as everybody around the world is familiar to The Big Ben.

All of these facts help us with our performance as it proves how iconic the Big Ben is and supports our reasoning for using it as the iconic clock. Also we can interpret the facts in the performance and use them, for example we could get newspapers with these facts on them, or even project the facts throughout the gallery for people to read whilst the performance is going in. Finally it has given us a better knowledge on the Big Ben and if we are asked questions during our performance or after from members of the public we can be confident to answer correctly including many facts.

The Big Ben.

The Iconic Bell

‘The Old and The New’

Jessica Jarvis / February 18, 2013May 1, 2013 / Concealed Illusions, Space

Lincoln is one of the world’s great small cities, renowned for its striking fusion of old and new.

Living in Lincoln for 1 and half years I have never explored and discovered the true identity that hides behind the bricks and water. The design and culture of this city expresses the historical features and the contemporary/modern buildings that we see today, eg. The University Of Lincoln.

(^^^Picture of The University of Lincoln^^^)

Is the city losing its identity Maybe it doesn’t quite know where it belongs, is it the past,present or heading towards the future? or can it work with both? Which being the old and the new.

Discovering Lincoln, has enabled me to discover the clear divide between the past and present. We had to discover the architecture and the smaller details of Lincoln and this made me discover the new and the old contrast with one another. When you go to the town centre, your purpose is to go there for shopping, or food etc so you never take any notice of the buildings that you are passing or are in, such as the cafe that is opposite the Waterside shopping centre, doing this exercise ,it help me become aware of the historical and contemporary content that the town centre holds as a city.

Finding the strong link between Lincoln city and both, The Usher Gallery and The Collection, the divide between the old and the new has a big effect on the society The collection, taking the educational (factual) modern approach to the members of the public, where as the Usher gallery takes the more mature approach to the members of the public allowing people to interpretate the art, rather than being told the facts of the piece.

The feeling between the old and the new creates a sense of division between members of the public. This is why the Museum caters for the younger generation (The collection) and the more mature generation (The Usher Gallery.) Discovering Lincoln I believe that this is because of the clear separation between the old and the new and it highlights this in the museum.

Lincoln is a changing city trapped in the historical content of the city. It’s constantly developing, with The University Of Lincoln, Wagamamas ( restaurant) being on the Brayford pool, what is the next new thing to be built in this old, historical city?

Will the City lose its identity or will it emphasize the crucial historical features of this beautiful city?

YOU DECIDE…

Like Clockwork

George Creighton / February 14, 2013February 26, 2013 / Possessed Time, Public Responses, Research, Space, Video Research

“In order to help us focus our copious amounts of ideas, we needed to find a way to get the project on its feet. Correlating with our fascination with the clock in gallery 3, it had to be an exercise that would involve everyone constantly, and producing a mechanical like performance. I decided that although it was a small space and we had spent several hours in it, we needed to look at it in a more performance base way. This was the reasoning behind each person walking around freely, although with the intention of covering as much ground as possible. As well as this we passed a ball around linking our separate entities together. Furthermore reflecting back to the mechanism of a clock, bringing seperate things together and making them work effortlessly, which we intended each transfer to be.

Each time we did the exercise we added a different discpline, whether it be the way we move or the way we passed the ball.

The exercise took 6 minutes to do. Our performance is intending to be six hours long so in theory it could be a microcosm of the final performance.

Can you keep up with the ball?”

Author: Shane Humberstone

For our first attempt, this was a more natural movement, exploring the space with the only artificial element being passing the ball between us. This was used to help us engage with the space and interact with each other. We felt that this was useful as it showed us what it was like to work as part of a unit whilst still moving naturally, much like the mechanics of a clocks interior.

We then experimented with the concept of bio-mechanics whic included moving our bodies in time with the monotonous rhythm of a ticking clock. This made us consider the possibility of a more regulated piece, dominated by time and having time dictate our movements to us. The videos also show the reactions of an audience surprised by an experience they were not expecting. Several individuals were hesitant in entering the room, whilst others did not do so at all.

The final endeavour was one which was completely at odds with the first, in so far that it was mechanical, utterly devoid of natural movement and totally regulated. We found this to be useful as it challenged our previous conceptions of the space, forcing us to move differently and observe aspects of the room and displays we had hitherto ignored.

After our excercise, we interviewed members of the public who had briefly observed our performance. It was intriguing to hear their response to how the use of sound in the room did not distract from our visual display but was still recognised. They also said how the darkness of the room helped to channel their attention on to the performance. One individual compared our use of the concept of time with their own performance of an Ibsen text, also correlating with time. He explained how his exploration of the text included a coordination between human movement and the ticking of a clock.

Authors: Chloe Doherty, George Creighton, James Barker, Tabitha Hilton-Berry, Stephanie Jackson