Week 1
During Unit 2
https://panagiantreasunit2.myblog.arts.ac.uk/
Research interests/ Enquiries
What is a diagram and which are its components? How is it interpreted according to the linear and non-linear types of thinking? When a diagram becomes an illustration and how these two can coexist? Can an image be translated into a diagram that represents qualitative data? Which is their relationship and how one interacts with the other? What stories occur?
How can a diagram be used as a graphic communication tool to tell a story? (Storytelling through diagrams/diagrammatic illustrations.)
Final project of Unit 2: Using diagramming as a graphic communication tool/method to generate stories through the analysis of photographs captured in my urban environment. Walking, observing, analysing, making stories.
“Your Unit 2 work effectively maps an area of interest for your practice: diagrammatic language and its use, with particular emphasis on its potential to construct or shape a narrative. And you commitment to that area is commendable. However, the enquiry itself remained a bit abstract throughout the whole term. While your experimentation allowed you to test a variety of forms, types, uses of diagrams, you didn’t develop any of those to sufficient depth.” (Summative Assessment Feedback)
Source (theme/subject/topic/source/content/context)
What was conceptualizing my project?
My urban environment/surroundings (the final unit 2 project/research took place in my neighborhood, Clerkenwell – London).
Unusual things found in my way (while walking) that catch my eye; make me wonder. Why is this here? What’s the story behind this object (storytelling). A series of different objects found in unusual conditions (unprecedented). e.g. a glove placed in a certain way on the top of a fence.
Questions arose during the Symposium
- Really interesting work. Do you find there are particular textures, surfaces and structures in the city that you will focus on mapping / deconstructing in future work? For example there are spreads dealing with segregation, defensive architecture that were poking through to me.
- Antreas: you should look at James Bridle’s writing, photographing, and walking tour of London, documenting surveillance infrastructure in 3 parts. It’s called the Nor: https://jamesbridle.com/works/the-nor
- Question for all: i’m interested in the rationale for choosing to ‘fix’ some variables while allowing others to change (through chance, through interpretation, etc.). what for you are the ‘fixed’ (unchangeable) aspects of your process?
- Question/comment: all three practices suggest very open-ended approaches to ‘meaning’, challenging whether visual material always has—or needs to have—’meaning’… open to any further thoughts on this…
Short reflection (apart from my research paper)
Having an image/photograph as a source makes the translation through my diagrammatic method very subjective (everything is open to subjective interpretation). It doesn’t help me be more specific with my enquiry. On the other hand, having as a source a piece of text (something written) makes the process more specific (leaving a small space for interpretation but not that open).
I have experimented with many different forms, types, uses of diagrams but I didn’t develop any of those to sufficient depth.
Diagrams elements as facts vs interpretation, clarity vs ambiguity, subjective vs objective, etc. (same as before, more in-depth research). – Keep a balance between all these.
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First ideas and thoughts for Project 1
Prompt 1: TOOL
New or existing skills/tools/techniques that I would like to develop?
What will benefit my work and make me explore new territories?
Can the tool be a medium? In my case, my tool/medium/technique is the diagram*. How can I take this to the next level?
During Unit 2, I have experimented with many different forms, types, uses of diagrams but I didn’t develop any of those to sufficient depth.
*The diagrammatic language and its use, with particular emphasis on its potential to construct/shape a narrative.
Diagram (illustration), image, text.
These are the three (3) main design elements (core languages) I have been using in my studio work during Unit 2. It can be a combination (collage?) of them, or not (focusing only on one element or two).
It can be videos/recordings of things captured during my walks. Recording and exploring the sounds. Creating diagrams/illustrations/diagrammatic illustrations out of the sounds/visuals.Polaroid – Instant photographs. It captures the moment as it is (no edit).
COLLAGE AS A TOOL OF DESIGN. Collage? The art of collage. How can I use it to expand on my work? Combination of the elements I have been using in a way that will offer new knowledge and techniques. What can I discover? Physical vs digital.
Prompt 2: NETWORK
External artist?
Archive?
Artists with similar research interests/practice/positions with me:
Fiona Chaney
Richard Long
Stephen Willats
Walid Raad
Ricardo Basbaum
Accessing an Archive. This can be an archive with a series of photographs (for example) captured in a neighborhood about something specific that the artist was researching. It can also be an archive of recordings/drawings about urbanism (things captured in a specific (urban) environment), etc.
Prompt 3: PLATFORM
Platform/mode of distribution. Audience? How others will come in contact with my practice?
Print edition? Publication (a monthly edition, for example, each one capturing a different subject in a specific environment). ZINE OR NEWSPAPER!
Installation/ Exhibition (Ricardo Basbaum, etc.). The viewers can take part/interact/feel.
Map (e.g. Art Deco London Map, Brutalist London Map, etc.). Imagine a map, visualizing a neighborhood using other elements than usual (images of objects, pieces of texts, etc.)
A series of postcards.
Something that will challenge people to take part/ form a story. Workshop; Record and explore their surroundings, and then create something with the material generated (visuals, sounds, text, etc.).
USER MANUAL
e.g. How to save the planet. How to make the earth flat.
My first project (for this unit/term) will be based on the first prompt (tool) and my second project will be based on the third prompt (platform).
Feedback/Discussion (tutorial 13.01.22)
Many things/ideas can be included in different prompts (not only one). Prompts overlap, but the way you treat each one is different for each prompt (a different way of iterating in each one).
Audience? (platform)
My stories require time for the reader/viewer to go through, analyse, explore the details, etc. How do you give people the time to read? EXPERIENCE! Book design (size, format). Cheap, or valuable (limited)?
References
Book: Conceptual Art in Britain (1964-1979), Tate
Projects and ideas from the book above:
Sue Arrowsmith – Untitled 1970
Idea
A series of photographs. The captions and the diagrammatic illustrations make the story. Can these elements change completely the description of a photograph? How the perception of the viewer is affected?
Can I convince the viewer, that what he is looking at is something else? e.g. the artwork above: “Is it a white frame being painted black, or a black frame being painted white?”
Victor Burgin – 25 feet two hours
Idea
Research on a series of photographs. How the chronological and alphabetical order affects the project? Analysis using my diagrammatic method.
David Tremlett – The spring Recordings, 1972
Idea
A series of recordings. These can form a story. Using a series of sounds as a source for my diagrammatic illustrations, which in turn will form a series of narratives.
Luchezar Boyadjiev – GastARTbeiter, 200
“In his wall piece GastARTbeiter, Boyadjiev traces his artistic career during the 1990s. Unlike the usual artist’s biography, this one is presented not in terms of prizes, grants, exhibitions, and solo projects at certain institutions, but rather through the financial resources he has received. In addition to hotel bills, restaurant receipts, contracts, exhibition budgets, and other documents, the work contains photos, reminiscences, and commentaries by Boyadjiev, and so becomes a kind of personal chronicle. Since his participation in a guest artist program in Stuttgart, and because of his grievance against the institutional art market system, he began calculating how much money Western foundations and funding programs were prepared to invest in his career over a ten-year period.“
“In his work Boyadjiev examines the relation of art, economy, and everyday life, and at the same time takes an equally ironic and critical stance towards the social and political contexts of art. Beyond this, he questions the capitalist operating system of art itself. (AE)“
Idea
As a collector of many things I always keep receipts, postcards, notes, quotes, etc. of everything (memories). How can I use old postcards or quotes, for example, to form stories through the analysis of diagrammatic illustrations?
A collage. A map with information.
Inspiration
Ideas, thoughts, points that can navigate me through the first project:
- Enquiry: Diagrammatic language and its use, with particular emphasis on its potential to construct or shape a narrative. Diagrams elements as facts vs interpretation, clarity vs ambiguity, subjectivity vs objectivity (same as before, more in-depth research in a specific type of diagrams).
- Tool/Technique: Diagram/diagrammatic illustration/diagrammatic composition. It can be digital collage, for example, (combination of image, text, diagrammatic illustrations, or a combination of some of these elements (only diagrams, only digrams and images, etc.).
- Source*: a series of photogrpahs taken in my surroundings, unusual things found in the street (like before, while walking)., written text/quotes found while walking, etc., or, old stamps, old posted postcards. –
Same source (one image, one piece of text) – different iterations using the same new technique?, OR,A variety of sources (a series of images or, a series of text extracts) – iteration for each one of them using the same technique?
It could be:
Having something as inspiration and source*; a piece of information (image, text, etc.), using it to create something new; A diagrammatic composition; A new story. The aim of the project is to point out the value of imagination/thinking, exploring how people respond to things they don’t understand and how this confusion/misleading can form new interesting narratives (leaving space for imagination, striking a balance between clarity and ambiguity, objectivity and subjectivity).
*WHICH IS MY SOURCE?
1. A series of images taken in my surroundings (EC1, London)
2. London – Poems on the Underground
I have already used one in one of my previous stories. How would the project be developed if I use a series of these poems?
3. London old posted postcards
4. A written short story
Other references (already used in my research paper, but will continue to inspire me for the rest of the course):
Richard Long (2021) Available at: http://www.richardlong.org/
Basbaum, R. (2016) Diagrams, 1994 – ongoing. Berlin: Errant Bodies Press. Berger, J. (2008) Ways of seeing. UK: Penguin Modern Classics, pp. 8-9.
Debord, G. (1958) ‘Theory of the Dérive’, in Internationale Situationniste #2, pp. 62-66.
Gibbs, G.R. (2018) Analyzing qualitative data (Vol. 6). Sage, pp. 3-5.
Groves, K.S. and Vance, C.M. (2015) ‘Linear and nonlinear thinking: A multidimensional model and measure’, in The Journal of Creative Behavior, 49(2), pp. 112-113.
Holzer, J. (1976) Diagrams 1976. Available at: https://projects.jennyholzer.com/drawings/diagrams-1976 (Accessed: 13 October 2021).
Leborg, C. (2006) Visual Grammar: A Design Handbook (Visual Design Book for Designers, Book on Visual Communication). New York: Princeton Architectural Press, p. 22.
Lupton, E. (2017) Design is storytelling. New York: Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, pp. 9-13.
McCandless, D. (2012). Information is Beautiful. London: Collins, p. 128.
McLuhan, M., and Quentin, F. (1967) The Medium is The Massage. New York: Penguin Classics.
Rock, M. (2013) ‘Fuck Content’, in Multiple Signatures: On Designers, Authors, Readers and Users. New York: Rizzoli, pp.91-95.
The Atlas Group (1998) Let’s be honest, the weather helped. Available at: https://www.theatlasgroup1989.org/weather (Accessed: 18 October 2021).
Willats, S. (1998) Changing Everything. Available at: http://stephenwillats.com/work/changing-everything/ (Accessed: 1 November 2021).