Reflection of Mark
The concept of your project is very interesting. The way your piece was set up instantly offered the bystanders to be interested. This was caused firstly by the location you decided to use. The hallway had a railing that made the jars easy to notice and the amount of traffic that walks past that area. Another reason I feel is was interesting and appealing to the public was the sign you used for the piece. The sign challenged the public. This offered a sense of satisfaction to your piece. It also helped that your piece was not that difficult to operated so the public would not feel threatened and embarrassed if they couldn’t perform the piece. Your piece was set up rather effective and well thought out as it produced the song “twinkle twinkle little star” noticeably enough for the general public to guess it. The concept of having a piece that resorts adults back to their childhood of smashing thinks was a interesting and effective. It seems as if this skill will never leave adulthood although it is hidden in most adults. The song choice of “twinkle twinkle little star” was a effective song to choose as it is a nursery rhyme that almost every child has heard in my opinion. Again the choice of song is linking the adult to their early childhood.
Overall the installation had a lot of good characteristics and it is an interesting way to go about an installation art. I feel that this piece was well thought out. There is little room for improvement but if i had to search long and hard I would get better sticks. It was confusing on to which way you were to hit the glass jars. Having a circular stick would of helped eliminate this problem. Another aspect of your piece is it needs general up keep. Within a few days I have noticed that the water levels have been changed and all the sticks were thrown into the jars. This has turned our piece from a work of art into a mess. More up keep is needed with this work. The length of the piece was ideal as it was enough to capture the attention of the public and short enough for it not to be to difficult for the audience to guess what song it was. I feel this concept of musical jars could be made into a gallery piece although it was an installation it is not really constricted to that environment. In a gallery it would be interesting to have a more complex piece with more jars. The audience in a gallery would be more inclined for a challenged then the general public walking by.
Your piece was entertaining to watch the public stumble upon. It was a very creative piece that was well set up. It would be interesting to see what some of the people did to your piece to lower the levels of water in the jars. I thoroughly enjoyed participating in your installation, thank you.
Self Reflection
My installation project was called “Hallway to Highway”. It consisted of a hallway that was transformed into a highway with the use of colored tape and street signs. The tape was set up in a way that mimicked a highway. With simple rules such as a two lane highway with an intersection in the middle. The piece was meant to challenge the traffic of the hallway to follow the rules of the road while walking. For the few hours that it was up I did notice people following the rules of the road so i would deem this installation an success.
My inspiration for this piece came to me one day while i was shopping in Cost-co. The vast amount of people and the hectic isle of people walking every which way, I thought of how bad of drivers they must be. I began to think if there were road markings on the floor if the flow of people pushing there cart would improve. The final project was fairly close to the original idea. Th only thing that changed was how the signs were put up for the public to see them.
My work responded to the environment as a hallway is similar to a long road. The tiles in the Archer Library hallway also resembled bricks that could make up a road. Another part of the location that responded to my project well was the aquward high volume intersection. The door to the library are in line with a door leading outside. The combination of the Archer Library hallway connection two main building that support a high amount of people crossed with the library and outside doors caused a very hectic walking area. The rules of the road would of brought sanity to this hallway if successful. The signs were put up to subconsciously help the public to identify the area as a road with rules and regulations. Hopefully this contributed to the following of the road markings on the ground.
I believe I have achieved the acquired goal of creating an successful installation. Comments from the public reassured this thought as some people commented as “this is really awesome” and “Do you know how to drive”.
This piece connects with my theme and interest of human nature in a way. This piece fits this category by exploring the reactions of individuals on a mass level when faced with a set of rules that all adults are accustom to such as the rules of the road.
Looking back at my proposal I feel like this piece was executed with the same image and idea that was portrayed with a few minor changes. I decided to hang the signs differently. The only problem faced when putting this piece up was it was taken down within 6 hours. This caused my project to not see its full potential and not be enjoyed by the public. This problem drew away from my overall piece. To change this problem I would wait for the go ahead before putting up the piece. Overall I believe my ideas and techniques were effective in creating a way of controlling human flow subconsciously and consciously within human beings.
