Michelle Byeon

Project Proposal

10.17. 2020

 

My project will be focused on masks and the costume matching with the mask. The theme of my project is the fear of people and mine. I want to talk about the fear of mine and others on my masks and the costume, so my project will represent those themes clearly because I will try to make my mask and the costume as scary as possible. The project will have a main color which is white. 

The color white is the color of pure and clean. However, in Korea, when people die, others wear white clothes for the funeral. Also, some ghosts from Korean scary stories are wearing white clothes. I am not scared about them, but I want to mix the fear of people and mine, and also the tradition of Korea. The costume and the mask will be made in white color but the design will be totally finished. I am getting inspiration from a game called :Dead by Daylight. This game has some murderer characters who are wearing masks. Their costumes and masks are unique and each of them are showing their own characteristics. 

 

I am not really afraid of something usually, so I try to think about what I usually feel nervous about. I still remember the nightmare about hands. I am the person who always tries to touch something when I think I saw something. When I was young, I saw some cutted hands on the tables at night and I always grabbed it to know what it was.  It was scary and I remember that feeling. 

Also, a latch is the thing that I have been nervous about recently. Recently, there are so many crimes towards women who live alone.  I am living with my sister together in Seoul right now. The only thing that I can lean on is the latch on my door. I always feel unsafe at night. I want to show this fear on the mask.

Materials : While muslin or white canvas / sewing machine / Bristol / white styrofoam / scissor / knife / bond / hot glue gun / threads / red Acrylic paint

 

Timeline / Estimated hours : creating masks – 3 ~ 4 Hours / creating full costume – need 10 hours or few days / Taking photos – 1 – 2 hours

 

Plan Description : 

1. Create a mask and use the bristol papers to create the base of the mask
2. Make a face structure on the Mask by using bristol paper
3. Put a canvas piece on the mask to make the consistency with the costume
4. Create a pattern for the costume – costume will be a jumpsuit but interpreted in Korean traditional clothes
5. Cut out the canvas fabric with the shape of the pattern 
6. Use a sewing machine to finish up the clothes ( I had a fashion class so I know how to make clothes)
7. Try to make the costume and the mask better by touch up
8. Go out and create a scene for the photo shooting / put some blood (red acrylic paint)
9. Edit the photos and upload

 

Idea sketches :

Reaction

Toys: A Remarkable Journey

10.17.2020

Michelle Byeon

 

How does the toy effect on my life and others? I think now people are not really interested in toys. What I mean here is most of the children are having a smartphone that can enjoy various different kinds of games on one screen which is much exciting than other toys. According to this situation, parents do not really have to buy a car or any other dolls than before. So now adults who had experience of having dolls have the ability to buy a toy that they really loved before or when they were young. That is the reason why there are some adults who still collecting the toys.

From the lecture, there were some expensive toys which are focusing on adults.▼

From these photos, we can see that the toy markets are trying to focus on other customers, “adults”. Also, adults are crazy about these kinds of toys even they are not playing with those. It can be their decoration in their house. So this can also explain the situation of society today as same as what I said above, that children are playing with smartphones. Adults have great memories of having toys around them and they kept those memories which lead them to buy the toys from photos.

Additionally, there is a really expensive toy from Louis Vuitton. I think this is also reflecting the society right now.

Let’s think about this Jenga except for the brand name value. I saw some people who bought this and played with it. I think how people are using their money on and the market system is trying to make the toy that is not only for the original purpose of toys.

Also, I am a Gundam collector, I bought Gundams usually cost over 100$ because when I spend over 100$ on one Gundam, it looks really good then the 60$-80$ Gundams. I don’t play with them. I just let them stand on my shelves and I watched them sitting alone for a while. I think the toy markets are more for the adult now. That is the way that they can survive in this society by making adults feel they want to buy them.

 

I haven’t thought about the assignment well but I am planning to make a mask filter. I originally wanted to make it before but this will be a great chance that I can try out. I may want to create some 3D things on the mask but I need to try out first and decided.

Core Studio 3D]

Assignment 6 : Materiality

10/ 13/ 2020

Demo A – Soft sculpting

Idea sketches.

 

 

 

 

 

… almost. done with sewing but forgot to put embroidery….

 

 

So started again

 

 

did embroidery … did my best

 

 

almost done 2nd sewing

 

 

Final touches.

 

 

I mixed the embroidery and the drawing together.

you can see the details

I couldn’t get enough material. I have been to four art stores around me, but it was hard to buy even proper threads and needles. And it was hard to find the cotton that had to be put in the doll. They used to sell a lot, but these days stores don’t handle it. I did my best… ..and I hope you understand.

Reaction: Mask and Materiality

10.10.2020

Michelle Byeon

 

 

My spirit animal is a tiger, clearly. I also wrote an essay about my spirit animal, tiger before. It is my favorite animal and the thing that makes me strong, and I consider myself as one of the tigers. My life is actually related a lot to the tiger because my family and all of my friends usually said I am like a tiger and I do.

Additionally, as I am Korean, most people around me are considering zodiac a lot during our life. when I meet a new person, I ask their zodiac. My life was deeply related to the zodiac animal. My zodiac is a tiger and this is the thing that I can think of myself as a tiger which is helped me to overcome the difficult time.

I did not really think about the tiger when I was young, but after I slowly get my identity, I consider myself as a tiger. This makes me strong and brave that I can do anything that I want. I haven’t talked about this in front of other people because this is the thing that I only put it in my mind.

During the lecture, the mask reminds me that people wear it for act or play, or any other places when they need to. I can see that also the tiger is one of my invisible masks which is making me act brave or strong. People usually think that somebody who acts differently as wearing masks. I think I can also interpret this as the same as me.

 

This is the tiger mask in Korean traditional play “talchum”.

Some Korean traditional masks

 

Tiger is the scariest thing in ancient Korea because, in Korea, there were too many tigers around people. Also, when someone is missing, people grab a weapon and go to the mountain to find him because they think the tiger caught that person. Additionally, there is not a lot of scary stories (like a ghost story) in Korea because when the strange thing happened, people thought the tiger did it. Korea is deeply related to Korea and sometimes we show our country as a tiger itself.

I will not be going to make a mask as a tiger exactly the same but I will be brought some of the characteristics of the tiger to make the assignment. Maybe I will make some soft things to do it.(still thinking). My rough plan is trying to look at some of the traditional masks and paintings from Korea to get the ideas.

 

Assignment 5: Sculpting

Demo C

1st try

Progress :

 

 

 

RESULT : ▼

 

 

 

(It feels like wet tissue…..)

Continue reading Core Studio 3D] Assignment 5 : Sculpting

 

Reaction: Puppetry, the Object in Performance

10.3.2020

Michelle Byeon

 

 

Puppetry is really a part of our lives. I think most of us play with dolls when we were young. Acting as one of the characters while holding the doll and make a conversation as playing with dolls. It can include the airplane toy or any others because we can say some sounds that objects might make with our mouth.

While watching the lecture, I knew it was just a doll and the play with dolls but the first idea that I had was “they are violent”. It is also including The Uncanny Valley because the doll’s face is similar to the human face but distorted.

Why do puppet shows have to deal with such provocative stories? The point of this lecture is not this, but I have also come to think about why people are only interested in stimulating things. The whole time I saw it, I wasn’t as happy as I was. The sound of laughing from regardless of children and adults at the puppet show that only kills or hits a doll makes me uncomfortable. ▼

( I know this doll paly because I watched this last year in my seminar class and it was really strong and dark. It left quite deeply in my mind.)

 

The question here is, would I feel differently if the dolls were cute?. But after thinking about it, it would have been the same. I think I felt something more strange because it looked like a human being.

 

I personally like the glove-puppet very much. When I was young, I had several gloves. They were all cute to animals. There were also very small things to put on your fingers. As I grew up watching these things, my interest in glove-puppet is increasing. If I think of all the things I saw in the lecture as glove-puppet, I think the world of puppetry is deeper than I thought. Rather than just making it, it seems quite difficult to think deeply and understand the structure of the doll.

 

For example ▼

 

It feels different from the glove-puppet I’ve seen since I was young, but I’m very interested in making a head shape. What I love to do is drawing people very realistic way so it is interesting start to make a realistic head or bust for me and I will try my best.

Assignment 4

Michelle Byeon

9/29/2020

 

I got the idea from the Japanese ghost and I wanted to make a long neck with so many joints that can actually move smoothly. Creating a joint is not easy because, for me, the demo video was not that helpful. I cannot really get those kinds of wood anywhere where I am staying right now. That was the reason why It was challengable but I enjoy while creating this.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

you should click and download the video to watch movement.

Reaction: Biomimicry, Bendable Laws, and The Uncanny Valley

9.26.2020

Michelle Byeon

 

I really love this week’s lecture and the topic of it. It was interesting and made me think about some relationships between The Uncanny Valley and the Biomimicry things. I think the Uncanny Valley is the topic that always comes out constantly online. I was quite not familiar with all of those topics so it was nice to hear all of those. The biomimicry was also the part that I was not really taking care of and take a closer look at it.

I can see so many things around us are coming out from nature and also the designers are getting ideas about the products from nature. I thought it is the normal things to look around us and get the idea from something that was close to us to improve our living conditions but after the discussion session, it changed. My classmates said biomimicry can also be considered as The Uncanny Valley and it hit my head strongly.

 

For me, the velcro was interesting because I did not know about this before. but when we try to think differently, this is the part that can make us feel creepy. It might help our life situation better, but combine some bugs, or plant things with our lives can be seen differently. The velcro, It is a really fascinating idea and I also love to use it; however, borrow the characteristic of the plant which it has for their reproduction/breeding.

 

I would like to make some puppet that is related to the human figure but not an actual human. I will bring some human characteristics but twist some of them and expanded in a different way. I want to make some long neck puppet with a normal face. Using some styrofoam balls to make some general joint and using some clothes to create the skins that can hold the styrofoam balls. I will try out some ways to make what I want for the result but the first idea is the thing that I said above.

There is a female monster with a long neck among the Japanese monsters. I got some ideas from this monster, and the movement of my joints was taken from a snake wooden doll I used to play with when I was young. I want to make a long-necked doll by combining these well.

 

Core studio 3D

9/22/2020

Michelle Byeon

 

My topic is about Korean traditional food recipes.

It is actually about how to make kimchi in an easy version. I want to focus on the drawings which are the visual things on this recipe book. I put the pop-up art at the last to make a good finishing.

It was really hard how to do with the pop up because I did not really have knowledge about the pop-up structure and I tried my best with making it. For me, this assignment is the most stressful one for me. I do not want to say that but for me, this was really the thing that I did not like and enjoy. HOwever, all of the process was planned out well and I tried to get the materials as possible.

 

(It was really hard).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Reaction: The  Book as Object

9.18 .2020

Michelle  Byeon

 

This lecture “The Book as Object” gave me some new ideas about the pop-up book. I usually thought that pop-up book is just for children’s book that can make children get interested in the story. Also, I  only experienced the pop-up from the children’s book.

After watching the lecture, I knew that there are so many types of pop-up books that are for adults, too. It is hard to say that is just for an adult but this is the easiest way to explain it for me. I  was surprised about how the pop-up book started.

Everything in the lecture was new and interesting. We are looking at the 2-dimensional things to learn something but the pop-up which is making a 3-dimensional object on the 2D surface makes people understand the subject more easily because we can see how it actually looks and understand the structure of it.

Also from the lecture, the pop-up art on the book leads readers to feel like they are in that world. They can actually feel like they are not separated from the book while reading it. That makes us to involve with the book’s story and help us to focus more.

I love to see Kelli Anderson’s work which is really inspiring to me. This was the main thing that helps me to change my prejudice of the pop-up book.

Her works were keeping the shape as the book but it is only just for the pop-up art. There is not a lot of pages, and just having a pop-up which is actually helping readers to experience some kinds of topics.

 

Not only focusing on the words in the book, but We can also clearly get attention to the pop-art more. We can understand how the paper does not have a limitation on everything.

From all of those, I wanted to make some pop-up art just on big paper about the Korean food recipe. You can open up and close the paper about every step of the cooking and how it looks like after doing the 1st step, to 2nd step with my drawings. From this process that I am planning right now will not really have such a complex design but I am guaranteeing that the result will be absolutely cute and fun to look at. I will put some paper equipment to make the final food to show before and after ( it is hard to explain right now).

I will do some cute and warm-colored drawings for food but it is not for children. People can read and play around with the pop-up art of mine to learn how to cook the specific food and experience the pop-up art. This will be a peaceful moment (can say as “healing”) to read it. So this will not have a shape as a book but it will have steps which will be specified as pages on one big base paper.