The Woods

A and E

So inspirational ! I love this so so much! makes me want to cry a bit ....
Maybe i should make a film if i get this inspired by a music video!
link : Goldfrapp music video

Bushy Park and Home

Wednesday's and Thursday's wonders

Wednesday 23rd of February

Keira Knightly is a skeleton witch. Her beauty has a power over people which means no one can deny her. I am so jealous of her and can not put her out of mind. I want her clothes, her  face, her boyfriend, everything.  I see her eyes stare at me ; she is not afraid to use black magic.

Thursday 24th of Feb : morning

I think I understand what happens when we dream. People never remember how and when exactly they fall asleep. I did this once last night.

When we fall asleep it means our soul has come out of our bodies. I body continues to work  and our mind remains connected to our soul. The soul can travel as the same speed as light. Therefore it can go anywhere it wants( this explains why we dream of places we have never been before). Our soul meets others peoples souls( often the souls of people we know because the soul feels a connection to those spirits and can find them more easily) Our souls does not feel inhibited in anyway, therefore it isn’t odd for our soul to be friendly with souls of those we don not like in the daytime.

 However a soul can wonder somewhere and  by chance pump into the soul of someone we don’t know. This  is rare but explains why we feel we have already met someone , or moments déjà vu. 

Thursday

 Today  I  am going into the secret garden.  It brings tears to my eyes as I recall the last time I went there. How time  goes by so quickly. As I push the gate I feel the magic al over again. The land is free. The forests- the lakes- the plains. As I walk towards the forest I see balloons among the back trees and bears, owl people come out. I am dressed in a long dress and my hair is up. It’s been a while since we last met so we catch up.

We go to the lakes tp meet the bird people. Swan is there ; he gets out of the water. We find the deers , they are in the tall ferns , they let us ride them. It is time for the party.

We light the bomb fire . We dance , we perform our rituals.

Thursday afternoon:

Each door goes to a different world. Choose one.

I'm coming home

On wednesday afternoon I decided it would be better for me to go home to do my  work. In my action plan I am meant to revisit the places that haunted me as a child so the next last few days I have done just that.
First I went to Teddington to go to one of my favourite parks : Bushy park. It was perfect for my daydreams as I saw swans, deer and yeah, generally loads of willdlife . I also kept thinking about those playsacks I had seen at the childhood museum. I also had an idea about a different tittle for my project : 
ANNE- SOPHIE IN WONDERLAND


I then went  " home home " and had walk in the park nearest to my house where Emilia and I used to play.
Today we went to wales to see my granny and it has been a really successful day as i managed to film my younger cousins play in the woods where we used to play. I also photographed many things I remember playing with and the places used to make my dens.

- THE CHILDHOOD MUSEUM - What an adventure!

The Childhood museum is one of the best museums I have been to in a long time- I classify it in the same league as the natural history museum in oxford that I adore.

As I arrived inside all I could see were children running about and mothers trying to catch up with them. So many inquisitive children picking up and playing with odd looking objects. In the entrance were a collection of book art style  pieces that were deeply inspiring. Inside  there was more mayhem but  what should one expect in a childhood museum!?  

The rest of the museum was deeply moving; as I passed doll houses, soft toys and interactive installations I couldn't help wanting to see all of it through the eyes of  my younger self.  I imagined how a space like this would feel to a child ; how exciting it would be to see a giant doll house, 10 times as big as your barbie house at home! Nevertheless, being my older self did not prevent me from  saying oooooowwww, and wooooowwwww every five seconds. 

The museum was rich with objects and imagery that allowed my imagination to thrive .... My fantasy for that day was particularly vivid. I watched the children and how they seemed in a hypnotic  trance as spinned moving image lamps or the smiles on their faces as they rode on wooden horses.

This goes to show that the imagination of a child is a precious powerful thing ; old fashioned toys were were perfect for this however nowadays video games and other sorts leave no room for fantasies ; the  imagining part has already been done and served on a plate for the child to swallow.

Bearing in mind my project I was very interested in some of the objects that represented fantasies; some where scenes that had become boxes inside a miniature theater.

I think I do not realise yet to what extent this visit has inspired me and so I will continue to comment on this experience at a later date, I'm sure.

The Childhood Museum

Elephant magazine

Today I researched the artists I had written down in my sketchbook from reading Elephant magazine in the Chelsea Library. These illustrators use collage in a very poetic way. They create enchanting and haunting atmospheres that i am very much attracted to and try to create in my own work.

The official concept

Mankind’s ability to imagine has always fascinated me, I share the belief of artist Susan Hiller that it is an essential need to believe in the possibility of other worlds. As adults, we never shake the desire to escape to other fictional worlds, in fact the feeling intensifies but we channel it in more “mature” ways through films, books, video games etc...

Fabricating a microcosm in our minds and loosing ourselves inside it is what I call “Reverie” and is going to be my area of interest for the Final Major Project. My aim is to imagine a fantasy world built out of past and present fantasies. It would become my alter-reality, the gathering of thoughts that adulthood has forced me to dismiss as “mere daydreams”.

Concretely, for the next few weeks I will encourage myself to think like a child. I intend to write down my fantasies, record my thoughts and wonders. I expect this world to become a conglomeration of all that is irrational, intimate, eerie, dark and wonderful. I want to push how far our imagination can go before one slips into madness, and who knows if this new world might become my only reality? I expect to draw some interesting conclusions from this experience.

In order to have extraordinary fantasies I will return to places that trigger my imagination (my garden, the woods where I used to play) and visit new darker places that intrigue me today( The Imperial War Museum, prisons and even Soho’s notorious strip clubs).

Having gathered a collection of reveries the next stage will be creating visual representations – I am interested in exploring illustration, typography, book art, photography and film.

Tell me what you saw?

These are my first fantasies. I did go to these places this weekend

Date : Friday 18^th of February

I’m walking with my dad  and sister. We are  near St- James Palace near Hyde Park. It’s nearly dark. My Daddy is the King and me and Emilia are his daughter princesses. The guards open up our house , but we have never been inside it ; it is it the GKN town house. The House has a large conservatory , there are orange trees inside it. The sky is also orange from the pollution. We go onto the balcony; we see Hyde park. The  plain tree’s think it is still Christmas; they are wearing their Bo- balls.

There are other princes and princesses enjoying their evening promenades, there are flyer flies  everywhere. It is silent in the garden.

Date : Saturday the 19^th of February

 “It is time for  you girls to buy some proper fine jewellery” exclaims my father ,the King. We enter the Asprey shop.  The Asprey shop is a little world of it’s own; there are streets inside the building, stair cases that lead to other parts of the shop.  I take my camera out to take a photograph ; the store assistant approaches me and says “ sorry for the umpa lumpas security to do not permit taking photographs”.

The Umpa Lumpas work in the workshops; cutting the yellow diamonds. They are secretly employed by Asprey so that the other jewellers do not kidnap the Umpa Lumpas so they can force them to work long hours.

Date : Saturday 20^th of February

It’s Fashion Week and Katherine , Usha and I are standing in the courtyard of Somerset house. We are all dressed  in  a formal wear  as we watch the Issa fashion show from outside( Kate Middleton’s favourite designer). The models are wearing royal gowns. The Show ends and the models come out. They are as enchanting as mermaids but as evil as little devils. Their legs are 2 meters long and they have gigantic eyes. Like Cats.  They stair at us. They like us to be reminded of our inferiority. The Press is there too, the girls pose. One girl with blue lips  smiles- she has Pirana Teeth.  We go to Tom’s Kitchen ; at the Bar sits  Hamesh Bowls. His moustache is huge. We decide it’s time to go now.

Date : Saturday night 20^th of February

We are in my room but we all feel like going out  for frozen yogurt. We get to Soho ; it’s like a labyrinth. You can feel the devil’s presence in the air.  Us girls notice we are dressed in white gowns. Our faces look frightened and pale. We keep on walking. Soon enough we feel less scared; the sex shops seem more and more enchanting and beautiful. There are peacock people outside the doors they invite us in. We see the sign “ XXX” , we push back the curtain and  go down the 200 steps.  There are plenty of erotic marble statues;  the peacock people are still behind us. The statues look so soft. I feel my arm reach for his face. I  feel the cold marble. I also suddenly feel cold. Stiff.

I have turned to stone.

Date : Sunday afternoon 20^th of February

Usha , Katherine and I are lost in the concrete Jungle- we see the gherkin behind a  brick church. Everything is dead. We are lost thinks Usha, she has fallen into despair.

We keep walking in the blistering cold and suddenly see Liverpool station; it is alive again, it feels a little warmer.

We know where we are; the  buildings are smaller , the streets are narrower. We are very close.

Brick lane is busy;  fire spitters; circus people and pirates. The people are dirty and speak in funny languages.

Colours. Lots of colours.

The pirate people serve us some food and the Indian goddesses spoil us with Chai tea. We see some black gates and green trees. We see some dangling feathers and warrior  totems.

Inside the market, we meet a woman who wears odd  glasses. We are lost inside the labyrinth of Markets stools , we hidden under the sheets of a giant den. The outside world is gone.

We find the exit. We are back in the concrete jungle. All is silent. Except we see some giant rabbits. They rule this part of town on Sundays.  They are albino rabbits. They have redy /pinky eyes, like marbles. As they bounce the ground shakes a little. We must run;  we are dressed as flowers. The rabbits  think we look delicious.

How was your weekend?

This weekend I started investigating areas that inspire reverie. First my father and sister's visit to London inspired my first reverie. Then my friends Usha and Katherine came with me to explore some of London's odd attractions.


On Friday my father showed us the  Keen's old London house ; our great grandfather was a man of steel and was very rich. He owned a house near st-James Palace. We didn't visit the house but peaked through the bars. I am glad we didn't because it stimulated my imagination.


Saturday and Sunday I went to Somerset House for London Fashion Week , Soho and also Brick Lane. These places also inspired some odd thoughts.

Alexis Anne Mackenzie

Marie Antoinette

I watched Marie Antoinette last night. It's probably the 6th time i've seen it but I still find incredibly mesmerizing. I was talking about it with a friend and she showed me the Vogue photo shoot that came out at the same time as the the film. I am still utterly enthralled by these photographs.

Visual language

I have started to design my action plan however I just realised I have gotten all the dates confused. I actually like this sort of visual language, maybe there is more to it than just an action plan.I think the imagery is appropriate to my concept.

Wintson

Today I was doing some more research on book artists for my bibliography and found this artist : Sam Winston. His work is absolutely stunning. This is something I read on his blog

"Winston’s experiments came from looking at the structures of different types of literature: from storybooks to bus timetables: “The way you navigate a timetable is very different to the way you read a short story” he comments. “I wanted to take these different types of visual navigation and introduce them to each other: a timetable re-ordering all the words from beauty and the beast, or a newspaper report on Snow White.” By imposing the visual rules of one style of writing to a different system of organizing language, Winston has created a visually arresting and verbally intriguing piece.”

SUSAN HILLER at TATE

 Today i went to the Susan Hiller exhibition at Tate Britain. I had heard it was an excellent exhibition however I hadn't realised how relevant the show would be to REVERIE.
Hiller collects objects, images,writings and incorporates subconscious processes in her work.You can clearly sense she has been influenced by psychoanalytic genius FREUD, who studied the subconscious.A lot of her work includes dreaming, reverie and automatic writing.
these are the pieces I thought were brilliant and most relevant




I  liked Freud Museum and Hand Grenades because both these pieces were relics.
Hand Grenade were ashes of paintings she had put in 12 glass jars and Freud Museum was an ecletic collection of objects that had been carefully exhibited in wooden boxes.

Dream mapping was one of my favourite, because it was about making art through dreams and visually recording them.

" Hiller conducted  " group investigation" projects in 1970s where participants met to discuss and document their dreams and subconscious interaction. For Dream Mapping 1974 the group slept outdoors in "fairy rings" circles formed by mushrooms considered in legend to be entrances to fairy-land. They recorded their dreams  noting similarities and differences  through collective dream maps, taking the individual diagrams and superimposing them.The maps document the event and process of making art through dreaming."

This a still from the Susan Hiller short movie an entertainment.It highlights the violence and haunting nature of children's entertainment

Also,her hand made books were beautiful and pure.

Lastly i was deeply intrigued and scarred by this piece-
Witness transmits  2000 testimonies of people having had an ecounter with UFOs or creatures from other spheres.The Tate leaflet describes it as a "religious experience"

What I take away from this experience is the idea that it doesn't matter whether or not the testimonies are a real or simply hallucinations- or even REVERIES. They show it is an essential need to believe in the possibility of other worlds, of something beyond rational.

PITCH NUMERO DOS

THE OTHER IDEA( NOT THE ELECTED ONE)

Most of us will follow a “natural” way of life  we learn to follow very young. We learn to conform and follow the steps such as school, uni, getting a job, get married, buy a house, have children……

I often view the world like this when I'm on the bus and see thousands of commuters walking on the streets of London.

Bromden, from Ben Kesey’s, one flew over the cuckoos nest, views the world as one huge conglomeration that controls society forcing people into conformity.-

For example,at one end a new born baby and at the end a civilized,educated, “manufactured” man, a  perfect product  of the human “Factory”.

Chief Bromdon : "Yes. This is what I know. The ward is a factory for the Combine. It's for fixing up mistakes made in the neighborhoods and in the schools and in the churches, the hospital is. When a completed product goes back out into society, all fixed up good as new, better than new sometimes, it brings joy to the Big Nurse's heart...."

The idea for this project is to show society as a factory. I want to investigate society mechanisms and show these processes visually.

THE PITCH

My childhood obsession :  FANTASY games inspired by fairy tales.

I was often living my own FABRICATED world.

I was obsessed about WOODLAND.

I would enter this “state of reverie”  in GARDENS/ WOODS/ ON WALKS WITH MI PARENTS etc...

I remember constantly moving all my stuff from my room to make DENS in the  garden...

I might be using a lot of " I " 's but I'm guessing we can all relate to these things.

Many books and films are responsible for these "reveries"- very HAUNTING imagery would be engraved in my mind and I would often try to recreate these scenes in my own surroundings. Sometimes these images would reappear in dreams in which I would create new scenarios. Unlike now I could remember these dreams and afterwards I would pretend I was still in the dream .

My parents and others would often comment on my wild imagination, I would invent 100s of fantasy games.

Today I believe my tendency to daydream is linked to my creativity.

Many Artist have explored this subject .Some have created new fantasies inspired by their old ones. These references above are some examples.

I think we never shake this desire to escape to other worlds. Actually this desire intensifies when we enter adulthood but we have more elaborate ways of channelling it  for example going to see films like avatar.... one of the most successful films this year.

Adults often suppress their imagination because it is considered useless and weak. However "escapism" is  responsible for much of our happiness and is a huge part of our lives. Watching television,going to the cinema, reading a book,playing video games, going to exhibitions is all part of escaping our own world and entering an other. We might not play in woods anymore but we never stop imagining.


I was lucky as a child because little could be compared to the kicks I got from playing in my garden- today I wonder if children still love the outdoors as much as us kids did because  video games seem to be doing most of "imaging" work for them....




Fabricating our own little worlds is what I call  REVERIE  and this is going to be my area of interest for the next part  of the foundation course.