Week 1/2 (Vis Com)

I think its safe to say that my first experience of Foundation has certainly been interesting. In a similar way to when I started Art at A-level the course really opens your eyes to the sheer vastness that is 'Art and Design'. No more so than in week 1, Vis Com.

To start with we were all assigned a word most of which were nouns such as cup, twig, moon and mine... dump. The aim was to conjure as many ideas that that specific word evoked, so immediately I thought of the most common - land fill, waste, smell (the senses which are triggered by being around a dump). Then I moved onto less literal aspects, dumping/ abandoning children or pets, word that rhymed with dump (pump, slump etc); then finally the affects dumps have on peoples lives - disease, visual pollution and so on.

This was a side of art which I'd never encountered before, one which focused more on the process and production of ideas as opposed to the 'hands on' approach typically associated with art and design.

FRESHERS FESTIVAL! (08/09/10)

Wow! This being the first year of the FE Freshers Festival I was looking forward to meeting new people and finding out what subject areas people were most interested in. The purpose of the day was to buy your partner, someone you didn't know a gift for £1, quiet a challenging brief baring in mind that there we're 'prizes'up for grabs!

My partner or blind date as it was said, for the day was Lin (pictured below & right). Whilst we walked and talked along the streets of Chelsea we struggled to think of many unique ideas, until... we stumbled across 'Retromania'. Jokingly I walked over to a rack which advertised items for £1 (just off picture to the right) and placed a rather colourful dress up against my body, 'How do I look?' and shortly after Lin put on a navy blazer and thus our idea had been created! 'Gender Swap'. This of course being a very unique idea got us 2nd place and a £15 voucher.                                                                                                

               

  

 AUDIENCE

...the title of week two's project for me pretty much summed up what Visual Communication was dependant upon and many other areas of design and that is a consumer/viewer. Using the method of message / receiver we had to portray an idea which was both understandable yet enticed the viewer or audience. Dominic Wilcox's work was really helpful in this respect, illustrating that graphics and product design can be merged and have certain things in common.

I thought I'd go for a clear cut, simple message but focus more on the presentation and delivery as against an intricate message and simpler presentation.

Message ideas -

• time management, reminders
• routines
• keeping tidy... keeping on top of the WASHING UP.

I tried to think of things which were relevant to me (similar to Wilcox) and that i could easily relate to, and in doing so came up with washing up. Identifying the receivers was simple, who else than my flat mates. So I went about collecting various pieces of dirty crockery and dishes and placed them in areas which were either regularly used or easily seen by my flat mates in an attempt to visually send my message and ultimately prompt them to do there washing up. I thought maybe seen as one of my flatmates is rather obsessed with personal hygiene that I'd start in the bathroom. In this sense I tried to highlight that if you don't get on top of your washing or 'pull your weight' (a possible text message or slogan I could of used to further develop my project) eventually even the places used to clean the body would become overrun with unwashed dishes. I continued this method by finding other locations which had the greatest exposure to my flatmates and thus would be most effective in illustrating my message. These are shown below.

      And my final piece...