I was reading articles about Art Basel and found Zin Taylor, and immediately thought about the conversation we had about “art thats about art”. I think he serves as a pretty good example of this type of work:

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I have made four cubes, and plan to continue until I run out of fabric or time.  I plan to make the  messages more complicated as I continue.

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I have completed the character models and other props needed for my animation. My characters may have some changes. I am now deciding how I want my video to look. I am leaning towards a crisp black and white film at the moment. I don’t usually do black and white but I think it could look nice here. After setting up some shots and experimenting with lighting, I am ready to start animating.

Before anything, I need to settle on the sounds I want the speakers to play. I tried to think of the sensation I wanted people to feel when walking through this tunnel of fabric. I don’t want to recreate an existing atmosphere, I want to let people experience an atmosphere they have never experienced before. While browsing through ambient sounds in youtube, I ran into a video 10 Hours Rainfall. It’s a video playing sounds of rainfall for 10 hours. I thought it would be unusual for people to experience a rainfall in a dry setting. They would be just hearing but not actually feeling the rainfall.

In terms of dyeing the fabric, I think I will use the Shibori dyeing technique. Here are some images done in Shibori teachnique.

Or I might end up doing the simple dyeing technique. Much like the image below.

Some of the dyeing techniques used for the textile used for a runway show also seems to create a beautiful atmosphere.

I would like to go in a direction towards a claymation animation for my final project. While researching artists working in this medium, I came across some really amazing work by Allison Schulnik. The movement in the clay reminds me a bit of ‘Baby Snakes’.

Here is her website, she also does painting and sculpture work:

 http://www.allisonschulnik.com/#

Below are some screenshots from her films:

For the final project, I’m planning on continuing my studies on fabric speakers. I looked at several artists for visual and conceptual inspiration. Janet Cardiff recently did a project called Forest where she installed more than 30 speakers in a forest, each speaker emitting “near synchronicity of natural or mediated sounds” (Gregory Volk).

I also looked at David Tudor’s Rainforest collection. This music collection was of “endangered” sounds we would hear in rainforest. It is said that “the result is a timeless sonic environment full of rech textures offering the listener an infinite variety of aural densities and spatial effects. Intensely alive and unlimited” (mode 64).

It seems that to distinguish this fabric speaker as an art piece, having a conceptual idea would be very important. Otherwise, it would just become another form of speaker. I thought about what kind of sound I would want the speakers to make. I think it would be smart to play sounds that would add to the characteristics of the fabric speaker, which is soft and small. Like whispers of sound and music.

Visually, I’ve been inspired by Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s The Gates piece. The color, texture, and the instillation seemed visually so beautiful.

I’ve also looked at Robin Minard‘s works. His work is the most closely related to mine where he installed vines of speakers on the wall. His work somewhat imitates how ivy would grow on the walls. Visually, I thought his work was also simple yet captivating.

Karla Black has been an inspiration to me for quite sometime.
Her sculptures appear minimal, however their significance comes from process, as well as use of material.
She is someone who works with a plethora of materials, from nails to moisturizer.

This piece aims not to mimic nature, but to create my own version of nature.  Through this piece I also hope to convey a sense of community by the cluster of organic objects nestled in the tree.  The lone organism further down the tree serves as a reminder of what it’s like to be outside the comfort of a family or social group.