Livi _ Project Ideas

Project #1

For the small world project, my working idea is 'evolution,' but that will have to be tailored around the object I find at Goodwill in the morning. I was thinking about doing an empty candle holder, with the evolution of 'flame' but that feels too obvious.

Project #2

The snowflake is: fragile, cold, and intricate.

   Other things that are fragile, cold, and intricate:

people, ice sculptures, gems/minerals

Could be seen as self-reflection?

 I have a thing of felt I was thinking of starching or coating in glue-water to portray a bulbous bed of snow, or snow climbing to up the side of the 'This' gallery wall. I've been playing around with an online snowflake maker to (1) understand how to fold them (2) figure out how they are lined out within that fold (how they unfold) and (3) to experiment with shape and pattern without wasting paper. Also, it's quite fun.

~ https://dangries.com/rectangleworld/PaperSnowflake/

This was my first snowflake. It didn't really scream snowflake, despite my efforts by adding more triangles within the main line form. I then decided to take a less geometric path, which was a bit difficult to do since the cutting tool operates with lines that connect along a set of dots the user makes, so in order to do natural, smooth lines the user must set up a long line of dots in a row instead of a free-flow cutting tool. I was very happy with the results. Yet, I know that my folding of a hexagonal paper would produce far less perfect results. There's a lot more room for error if I were to switch from this perfect, digitized format to paper. Additionally, I'm going to have to cut the paper into a hexagon before I even fold it, so I will have to be carefully measuring lines and angles. It would be helpful to use graphing paper initially, then switching to white paper.

This last one was far easier to design, and yet it is possibly the most interesting looking. Yet, I don't think it is all that feasible to do with paper since the points would be to fragile and the points would not line up across all layers of the folds. This would be true for the second natural snowflake as well. The most doable snowflake pattern would be the first geometric snowflake and the first natural snowflake. Between those two, the natural snowflake is better looking.

I made more 'naturalized snowflakes in nature patterns of flower petals, leaves, and twigs. I then made someone I thought looked more like an actual snowflake more than anything so far.

I'm thinking maybe I should cut these out. It took a while to design them, so I think it would be wise to print them out ad use them. Maybe I could take the ink and print them onto fabric. I don't know how I'd be able to do that. 

My friend said this snowflake looks more royal than the previous one. I tried to use very rough and jagged patterns to produce a different snowflake look.

I printed these out from the library:

I'm going to paper mache them onto balloons to create these bowl forms, with the snowflakes as the centerpiece and dark baby-blue tissue paper to go with it. They will hang in an arch on the back of the room. I will cut out other snowflakes and scatter them on the floor in the corner with a fireplace - wood with a stick teepee in the center.

I was inspired by the story "To Build a Fire" by Jack London. His stories are about nature and its brutality, which is the message I want to send with the snow and the cold - especially in relation to Wyoming - a sort of looming ever-present thing that we tend to ignore because we have heated houses and heated cars and puffy coats to escape it. In the story, the man is warned of the cold in the Yukon - he is there during the gold rush hoping to make himself wealthy. He sets out to meet his friends and ignores the warning. Eventually it gets so cold he decides to stop and build a fire. He and the dog warm themselves, and then he attempts to set out once more. The dog is hesitant to leave the fire because he is anxious about the cold - the dog is wise of nature unlike the arrogant man. The man eventually falls into water, and has to build another fire right away before the wet kills him. He first builds the fire under a snow-laden tree and it goes out. Then, he frantically lights all 70 of his matches in his attempt to save himself building the new fire. He burns his hands and accidentally scatters the fire, which burns out.

He is jealous of the dog's warm fur and calls on it to come so he can kill it and take its warmth.

Yet, the dog is suspicious of the strange desperation in the man's voice, and does not come.

By the point, the mans hands are too numb to kill the dog and he cannot feel them at all despite a constant effort of smacking them against his legs.

The man dies and the dog is left stranded.

My project explores a different route the story could have gone. The man lights the 70 matches, the matches burn the man alive, showing that even if he had managed to light the fire, the man cannot control nature and do as he pleases - and his arrogance erases him regardless. The fire, which is his perceived savior, consumes his life just as the cold did. The inventions we make to combat nature can turn around and spit in our faces. We are not safe.

Initially, I drew the man projecting on the side, but I went to the 'This' gallery and saw there's outlets on all sides, so I'd much rather have him projecting onto the fabric trailing under the arch, and then I can have the snow-bowls brach out to the other wall. The front wall (door-side) won't have anything on it, but this will be the side with cut-out snowflakes and a campfire.

The fabric probably won't fall the way I'd like it to, so I might starch it or paper-machete it the same way to portray natural snowbank-esque forms. For the man, the cutout of the fire needs to be made out of a lighter paper, or at least a lighter colored paper than the man, which I will paint black for an optimal shadow.

Project #3

Since Project 3 is situational, the best place to situate the sick 'runny nose' would be by a stream. The sickness is flowing into the stream and spreading. Though it is inconvenient, it is enveloped by the large water and becomes retrospectively small. I want the sick 'being' to blend into its environment naturally, like a being made of grass or roots, or maybe even concrete if it were to sit by a stream under a bridge - it could even be a sick troll.
It should also have its face scrunched up, and wrinkled in distress.