Lecture Six - 11th March - Time Based Art, Guerrilla Art, Wearable Technology

This lecture consisted of three weeks worth of sujects into one week.

We firstly looked at Blast Theory "Can You See Me Now?" This links in with all three subject areas. "Can You See Me Now" is a game which happens on the street and online. "Tracked by satellites, Blast Theory's runners appear online next to your player on a map of the city. On the streets, handheld computers showing the positions of online players guide the runners in tracking you down." (http://www.blasttheory.co.uk/bt/work_cysmn.html)

Time-Based Art

This is an image of Andy Goldsworthy's artwork. He's concidered a Land Artist, but some of his work is also concidered Time-Based art.

Time Based Art is also known as Art and New-Media or Multimedia Art. Time-Based art is a newer term for atists using technology in their work, such as computers, photography, film.

Muybridge who was an English photographer, is known for his early use of multiple cameras to capture motion.
He looked at the movement of animals . He used a device to project motion pictures, that used the celluloid filme strip, which is still used today. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eadweard_Muybridge)

Another artist we looked at who uses Time-Based Art is Tony Oursler. "Oursler is best known for his sculptural video installations where faces are projected onto ball-like screens to present faces that talk, scream, watch and engage their audience in the gallery."


As I'm carrying out a project on dolls at the moment, I found this interesting, as a different approach to the project and research. I won't be using it for my final, but it will help with research.

Guerrilla Art

Guerrilla Art is also known as Street Art, which is any art that have been developed in a public area. This can include such art as graffiti art and street poster art. The artists who produce this type of artwork have different reasons behind them. They are usually politically related, and because of this they remain anonymous as most of their work is illegal.



One well known group who practice Guerrilla Art are the Guerrilla Girls. They are a group of feminist artists who are known for promoting women and people of colour in the arts through creative posters.

Banksy is another artist we looked at. Banksy is an anonymous Britsh street artist. His street art combines graffiti writing with a distinctive stencilling technique. "Banksy does not sell photos of street graffiti or mount exhibitions of sceenprints in commercial galleries. Art auctioneers have been known to attempt to sell his street work on location and leave the problem of of its removal in the hands of the winning bidder." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banksy)

I'm not sure how Guerrilla Art would link in with my work. As these artists work on different materials such as brick walls, it may inspire me to create some drawings and images on unusal materials, such as fabrics with acrylic paint.

Wearable Technology

For this part of the lecture, we looked at Pac-Lan. "Pac-Lan is a noval version of the video game Pac-Man in which human players play the game on a maze based on Alexandra Park at Lancaster University campus. To play the game, the Pac-Lan player collects pills using the mobile which are in the form of coloured plastic discs containing RFID tags placed around the maze. Four other players take the role of the ghosts who attempt to hunt down the Pac-Lan." (http://www.pac-lan.com/about.htm)

Again, I'm not quite sure how this would link into or inspire my work.

Lecture Five - 4th March - Land Art, Earth Art, Environmental Art

Our fifth lecture was on Land art, which is an art movement that started in the late 1960s, ealry 1970s in the United States. Land art is believed to be a protest against "the perceived artificiality, plastic aesthetics and ruthless commercialization of art at the end of the 1960s in America." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_art)

One form of land art I was surprised could be classed as land art is Lancelot "Capability" Brown's landscaping of large grounds. The grounds looked like a natural garden, but he had a sympathetic metod of designing the gardens.

Crop circles were another area of land art we looked at. Crop circles came about in 1678, when people protested against land owners and created their own crop circles. They're created from the flattening of crops, such as wheat and barley. Many explanations of crop circles have included man-made hoaxers, where some explenations include formation from UFOs. We were shown some images of crop cricles created by Next Nature. Some of the crop cirlces are so intericate and detailed, and some look 3D. What I have learnt from the lecture and hadn't realised before, is that people can only appreciate the pieces of art from the air, looking down at the design. Because of this, and the size of designs and location, most peoples land art can only be appreciated through photographs.

Nazca Lines can also be seen as a type of land art. Nazca lines "are a series of geoglyphs located in the Nazca Desert, a high arid plateau that stretches more than 80 km (50 miles) between the towns of Nazca and Palpa on the Pampas de Jumana in Peru." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazca_lines) They are shallow designs created from the removal of the red pebbles surrounding the landscape. Most are simple lines, over seventy are natural or human figures, then there are some of animals which can be seen as symbols of fertility. They have been preserved so well for many years due to the stable climate of the plateau. I liked the idea of people creating the lines from walking up and down in a straight line to create the designs, as if done with a ruler.

I found it interesting finding out about the different types of land art, as all I'd known of land art before this lecture were crop circles. I can see that the crop circles could act as inspiration for my textile work, especially with the use of patterns. From looking at Nazca Lines, I can see how they can be a source of inspiration for my stitch work.

Lecture Four: 25th Feb - The Body as a Place for Art

During this lecture, we looked at many different areas, which can be seen as adding art to the body.

We first looked at Tattoos. Tattoos are permanent markings to the skin and can be seen as a way of adding decoration to the body. It has been practiced world wide for years. There are many different purposes for certain tatooing. For example, tattoos have been used as rites of passage, marks of fertility, rank and status, aswell as punishment. They vary in different cultures.


Today however, people choose to be tattooed for cosmetic reasons as well as sentimental reasons. Some people chose to have a tattoo to remember a loved one or their childrens name. Some people choose to have their eyebrows, lips and eyes enhanced through tattooing. Looking at tattoos in more detail has been a great help towards my photography module, as the title is "Layer" I wanted to focus on the layering of tattoos on the skin.

Body painting is another form of body modification and art. They are not as perminent as tattoos, but still produce a pattern on the body. A well known example of this is henna tattooing.

During this lecture, we also looked at body reshaping. For this part of the lecture we looked into the work of the german anatomist Gunther von Hagens. He developed the exhibition known as Body Worlds, which is a travelling exhibition of human bodies and body parts, which have been preserved. The term used for this was "plastination" which is where the body has firstly been embalmed, fat and water removed, and then filled with plasctic.

Many people have been in uproar about this exhibition as they don't see it as art. Some people believe it's offensive to the bodies and to their families, especially with some of the positions they are put in. On the other hand, others have said how it gives a good insight to parts of the body they wouldn't normally be able to see, which could help when carrying out an operation on the spine for example. I personally didn't like what I saw of his work. I'm not very good with things like that usually. One image which has stuck in my mind from the book, is a body holding its own "coat" of skin. I found this quite disturbing.

We also looked into performance art. Marine Abramovic is a performance artist, she began her career in the early 1970s. She has recently started to describe herself as the "grandmother of performance art" as she has been performing for over three decades. Her work explores the realtionship between performer and audience as well as the limits of the body and the possiblities of the mind.In one of her performances, mentioned in the lecture, Abramovic explored elements of ritual and gesture. "Making use of ten knives and two tape recorders, the artist played the Russian game in which rhythmic knife jabs are aimed between the splayed fingers of her hand. Each time she cut herself, she would pick up a new knife from the row of ten she had set up, and recorded the operation. After cutting herself ten times, she replayed the tape, listened to the sounds, and tried to repeat the same movements, attempting to replicate the mistakes, merging together past and present. She set out to explore the physical and mental limitations of the body – the pain and the sounds of the stabbing, the double sounds from the history and from the replication." (Taken from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marina_Abramovi%C4%87)

Orlan is another performance artist we looked at during this lecture. Her take on performance art is quite unique and I'm my opinion quite extreme! She transforms her face through the use of plastic surgery to make "carnal art." "the artist started to morph herself with respect to some of the most well known historical paintings and sculptures. Orlan's goal in these surgeries is to acquire the ideal of beauty as suggested by the men who painted women." (Taken from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orlan) I personally think this is an odd take on performance art. I think it's a risk messing with your body and face through the use of plastic surgery at any time. Orlan's work is going to be a source of inspiration however for a doll project I'm completing at the moment. I'm looking into whether the doll Barbie has a negative affect on the western world as well as the rest of the world as she's now global. In particular, I'm looking in to how Barbie may influence women and maybe men to constantly have a youthful appearance, which may only be achieved through plastic surgery.

Lecture Three: 18th Feb - Body Extentions

I was away for this lecture due to illness, but I have found out the lecture was on the work of Rebecca Horn.

From looking at her website, I have found out that she is a performance artist. "Rebecca Horn has been creating an oeuvre which constitutes an ever-growing flow of performances, films, sculptures, spacial installations, drawings and photographs." (Taken from her website : http://www.rebecca-horn.de/pages/biography.html)

"Pencil Mask" is one of her body extention pieces. From what I can understand, the mask is made up of six straps running horizontally and three running vertically, and it's at the point at which these straps meet, that a pencil has been attached. From moving her face back and forth against a wall, the pencil marks recorded the movements.

"Finger Gloves" I believe to be another of Rebecca Horn's performance pieces, which was done in 1972. They were worn like gloves, but the finger form was extended with balsa wood and cloth. From Rebecca being able to see what she was touching, it felt to her as if her fingers were really extended and an illusion was created that she was actually touching what the extentions were touching.

If we think about it, we can all extend our bodies in some way, whether it's through plastic surgery or more simply through a piercing or tattoos added to the skin. Clothes can also be seen as an extention.

I have been told that we were asked which part of our body we would like to extend if we could. I think I would like to extend my legs, to get a greater feel of height, as all I've ever known is to be the shortest person, even when wearing heels!

Lecture Two: 28th Jan - Tapestry

During the second lecture, we were given information on Tapestry.

From this lecture I learnt that tapestry is a form of textile art, dating from the 3rd Century BC. The earliest tapestries, which have been found preserved in the desert of Tarim Basin, were made by the Greeks.

A tapestry is woven by hand on a vertical loom. It is the weft thread which gives the colour and produces the image or pattern on the tapestry. The weft threads are usually dyed wool or cotton, but may include gold or silver to give the colour to the tapestry. The warp threads are left un-dyed and usually add strength to the piece.

Arras, France was a thriving textile town back in the 14th and 15th centuries. These fine wool tapestries were sold all over Europe, decorating palaces and castles. They had many advantages over decorating castles than paintings. This was because they were much more durable and easier to clean. As they were thin, they didn't provide much in the way of insulation, thier primary purpose was decoration.

Sadly few of these tapestries survived the French Revolution as opportunists realised they colud remove the gold thread from the tapestry to make quick money.

I did find this lecture interesting as it gave me an insight to the meanings behind certain tapestries, and how there's a more intense and deeper meaning to some. The term used for this is "allegory" a word I've never come across before, so that was interesting to learn about.

Lecture One: 21st Jan - Textiles Timeline

This first lecture was based on looking at how each of us has come into contact with textiles throughout our lives. We were put into groups of five and all had to create a timeline, starting from newborn right up until adult.

We recorded the types of materials such as flannelette, wool, cotton, which we had come into contact with right from the moment we were born. The types of clothes we had once worn were also recorded as well as the different phases through the years.

I really enjoyed looking back and remembering the types of fashions and textiles around during my life so far. The group activity was a great way to get us all involved. It's also amazing to see how many different types of textiles you do actually come into contact with without realising.

I believe one of the other group members has the timeline, so I sadly can't show you our attempt at this.