I began this project from reading the book by Oliver Sacks ‘The
Man who mistook his wife for a hat’. The book is made up of a series of short
stories each are individual stories about Oliver Sack’s patients suffering from
unusual forms of dementia. In one part of the book the patient can’t seem to
remember when asked what a glove is? He instead describes what its possible
functions could be
-
A continuous surface
-
Infolded on itself
-
Five outpouchings
-
A container of some sort
-
It would contain its contents
From these
descriptions I then began to approach the making of my samples reflecting them.
On visiting
the Geoffrey Manton building itself I wanted to see how the space affected me
and how I felt within the space. I felt that the space was striving to preserve
some kind of identity through the large pristine, blank spaces. The shapes
within made up of lines and gestural markings, shapes due to their masked
nature were barely there.
My intention
would be to create a series of five abstract forms, taking inspiration from the
descriptions and merging my thoughts of the building to make a temporary
installation. Each separate element would be made from a silk organza fabric
measuring a metre by a quarter of a metre and would contain abstract casts of
plaster forms within them. So as not to distract from the pieces themselves I
believe the best way of attaching them to the space would be by fixing a Perspex
rod to the wall and inserting eyelets into each piece, attached with a strong
fishing wire to the Perspex rod.
I want the plaster bags to have a somewhat
ghostly presence to reflect the idea of a fading memory or thought, relating
back to the presence of the building and how you can feel lost within a space
of lifeless abstractions. Portraying how the patients suffering from memory
loss must have felt, with their worlds gradually fading around them almost loosing
the very idea of seeing, seeing something for what it truly is.
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