The final project is about using a stereotype to creating a project that can bring influence to audiences. Our professor put us into a context of applying for a grant, called Genius Grant. In Seminar class, we write things that we need for applying, including resume, cover letter and etc. Therefore, we can use this experience to apply for grants in the future.
The stereotype I am exploring in this project is judging students by grades. This stereotype happens a lot in my country, like parents will tell their children ‘to be friends with good students’ or ‘if you want to be successful you have to study hard’. In this project, I want to start to focus on parents as the audience, because it’s hard to totally change an education system in a country. However, this stereotype is not only happening in school, it exists in society also, especially when people want to apply for a job. I want people to change their minds through my project, not restrict by grades. The grade is not the only criteria to actually measure a person.
This week I have changed my original idea, so I don’t have an actual prototype to show in class. The idea I showed in my critique group is that I want to wrap up a person with long strips like a mummy. Those strips will be printed with test paper in Chinese and some sentences that parents will tell children about grades. I am not sure about the way to present my final project. My group members suggest me to do performing art in class, which will be more powerful. And they don’t think paper strips can work well for wrapping. Therefore, I may change the paper to the fabric. After I have talked with my professor, he thinks my new idea is interesting. What I need to figure out is the way to present the final piece. He suggests me use photographs.
For the following week, I will try to print words and photos on the fabric, at the same time find the suitable fabric. After the class, I had bought a piece of fabric that the worker in the fabric store recommended. And I researched about if it can print in the design lab. There is a UV printer I can use. I will go to the design lab during the weekend to find out how long it takes to print. If it works, I will go to the fabric store to buy a larger piece of fabric. I consider that there’s a possibility that the fabric I bought cannot be used to print or printed images don’t mix my expectation. It may take two more days to fix this printing problem. So I planned it to be finished by Wednesday.
After I have printed fabric, I will try to cut the whole fabric into strips and sew them into long strips. It may take more than 2 hours to finish it. I will bring these printed strips to Friday’s class. After the critique and some changes, I will actually wrap a person up and to find contexts.
12/3/2018-12/09/2018
This week I have tried to print the image on the fabric by using the UV printer. It works well. During the class, I showed my printed fabric and explained my idea about this project and the budget for this genius grant.
For this week, I actually followed the plan that I wrote last week. What I have concerned about printing also happened. The biggest size that a UV printer can print is 20”x13”, which is far smaller than what I need for this project. Another problem is that I can not finish my project if I use UV printer, because the earliest day to pick up my printed fabric will be Thursday, the day before presents. Therefore, I have talked to the worker in the design lab and came up with a solution which is using fabric transfer.
In class, my group members suggested a way for the budget, which is a little off the topic but interesting. My professor helps a lot to refine my project. He points out the most important mistake I made in this project. He asked me what’ the metaphor for the mummy because mummy is to preserve a person’s soul but I want to express restriction in my project. So he and I have discussed this and changed the mummy concept to banding. I plan to use the grant to do a survey with students which I can get real results. He wants me to further develop my idea of budget.
I will finish printing during the weekday. For the following week, I plan to get my video done by Wednesday, so I can show it to my professor and make some change. I estimate the printing will take 2-3 hours. Then, ironing and cutting fabric will take 3 hours. Filming the video may take a day or longer. I need to do research for the budget part, what should I do after I get all the results from my survey and the most effective way to show my project.
12/10/2018-12/14/2018
Before Monday, I have cut fabrics into strips. Although some printing on the fabric has little damage, they will not affect a little to my final video. On Monday, I invited a classmate to help shoot this video. Everything went well, besides the lack of fabric was what I didn’t expect. I have finished editing before Wednesday I met my professor. He suggested me to play around with effects in Premiere in order to my audience to feel uncomfortable during watching my video. I recorded my breathing as the music effect in the video.
On Friday’s presentation, it’s really nervous. I got good feedback about this project from my professors and classmates. They gave some ideas about what I should do with these strips after I have done shooting the video. What I am thinking is display them with the video if I have a chance to present in an exhibition, or use this strips to make cloth and tote which are convenient for people to carry around.
(This is the photo of my video that my classmate shot during the presentation.)
Reflection:
For this project, I really learned a lot. The context of applying for a grant teaches me how to develop an idea into an actual project that may be useful to change a situation. Combining Seminar class and Studio class together, I need to consider a lot for both sides which is hard but useful. I use the video as my way to display my project. I think it is powerful when a video is edited properly. Also, it will be easy to promote through digital devices. In the presentation, it also helps me to think about the material that I used for the project, whether the fabric is the best material to present my content in the video. Genius Grant Proposal is really helpful because it leads me to thought the whole process. When my thought is a little off the track, I will look back at my proposal, to see what is the final result that I want to get through my project. It’s the first time that I need to be a professional artist and apply for a grant. I think feedback from others is really important during the process. They will give me many aspects that I may not think about before and they can help me to stay in the right way. Be an artist really needs to consider a lot, the budget of the grant.
