Psychogeography for Martina

http://planbperformance.net/dan/blog/

This might be a helpful source for you as I know that they use geography to produce various work.
Also, a bit of history/research that might link with your work is this....

http://www.geog.leeds.ac.uk/people/a.evans/psychogeog.html

Meeting with Roree Windus, Third year embroidery student (22nd March 2012)

As I examined each third year embroidery student’s description about themselves, as individuals and their work I was immediately drawn to Roree Windus and was genuinely surprised that not many others were.

Her work concerns abstract expressionism principally though emotion and the physicality of painting. The work exploring emotions inspired me greatly and I felt a connection immediately with some of her preparatory paintings. Rorree spoke of a time in her life where loss was rife and her pieces began to reflect it. They took an almost macabre or depressive state which I thought to be very interesting. However, she also stated that she wanted to steer away from the such which I thought to be a pity as her emotions, being so raw at that particular time in her life, was conveyed into some beautiful images.

Rorree Windus’ work, to me is pieces that reflect the time where she almost escapes reality and the world in which she inhabits. She instead, comes into tune with herself and her emotive state at the time which I believe is a truly beautiful path to go down as an artist.

She finished her presentation by quoting Emini, “Life is my art, I create how I feel”.

For Abby?

You said you were looking at the music industry in Manchester and I heard this on Radio 2 and I am 99% sure is was covering this subject. Here's the radio show you can listen to, if it helps.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01fq91w

Whitworth workshops

http://cottonglobalthreads.com/special-events/

check this out if anyone is interested in furthering their experiences outside of the uni. The Whitworth art gallery has some good stuff on including 'drop in weaving sessions' and 'crafternoon tea'. There is also a student evening on so follow the link if you're interested in anything external to MMU.

:)

Brendan Dawes

I must say, I wasn’t entirely excited on going to the talk led by Brendan Dawes as on research, his work, initially did not interest me. However, I came to realise that it wasn’t the importance of the work or finished product but rather the meaning behind it.

What grabbed my attention was his creation entitled, ‘Double Buzz’. This piece of programming was a tool to illustrate or display information from the internet differently. Going against the ‘norm’ and showing information in a different way to, for instance, Google, caused much debate on its worth and quality. This unusual search engine led me to ponder on how one may display discovered information. This talk reemphasised the importance of creativity in today’s world and how it is integral to ‘step outside the box’ and ‘go against the ‘norm’ as much as you possibly can’.  How shall we as a group of young artists and designers display our new found information of the city of Manchester?

Historical Maps of Manchester

I came across this website on exploring points of interest for the rest of the group earlier today. I thought it might appeal to you Martina? It focuses on maps from the past and is quite an interesting website to explore and play around with.

http://manchester.publicprofiler.org/

Damien Hirst

Damien Hirst - The First Look

A documentary worth seeing.

Damien Hirst is an artist I have never quite fully understood, yet I never understood through fear. Fear of the ideas he presented. However, through years of maturing and now watching the channel 4 documentary “The First Look,” I understood that the man known as 'Mr Death’ is just a man with bursting mad, creative ideas and thriving on them. His jokey, fun character comes through in his art work, showing off his personality and what he believes is something worth looking at and debating over.

Hirst’s work is very controversial, making work you cannot possibly ignore. For example his piece ‘A Thousand Years,’ made up of a box hatching maggots into flies, a rooting cows head and an insect killer. A gruesome life cycle. Also, his most famous work ‘The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living,’ the shark preserved in a tank of formaldehyde. He takes objects out of their normal habitats and puts it into artistic environments changing the way we see them, the way he sees it and especially for this piece is ‘facing our fears’.

A year after this work, Hirst still made a shocking piece, but I believe shocking in beauty. ‘In and Out of Love,’ is based in two rooms, one, a room of dead butterflies fixed onto canvas and in the other, the butterflies are born. It is simply a butterfly house in an art gallery, but what does this mean? How does it make sense? This piece, as Hirst states, give people hope, when we look at a dead butterfly they still look alive, all their beauty fully in tack.

What I took from this documentary was creativity, to be able to think outside the tradition beliefs of art;

“Confront things you can’t avoid.” (Damien Hirst)

Summing up Damien Hirst’s work and ideas, 

“He’s the naughty child making us confront our deepest fears,” Noel Fielding.

The Documentary.